Windows NT
Arguments for an NT role:
- Hand-in-glove with Intel Pentium
- Enormous industry leverage
- support for commercial software important to us (Objectivity, AFS, LSF,...) that is unavailable on other Intel OSes (Solaris, Linux)
- Licenses often much cheaper than Unix (Orbix: $6500/$2500)
- HEP support (CERNLIB, LHC++, Geant4)
- Good development environment (code management compatibility?)
- Rapidly developing NT-on-Unix to ease migration of code and physicists
- Microsoft developing it as a scalable OS for distributed computing; growing encroachment on Unix
Concerns (and quickie refutations):
- Unfamiliar in HENP (so was Unix when VMS was king)
- Scalability is a problem (how big? Impact of NT5 in late ‘98?)
- Weak to nonexistent batch capability (false; LSF is supported on NT)
Value as a desktop platform seems clear; as a farm platform, unclear today but trend is visible