Compaq outlines low end Linux strategy

The Compaq strategy to link Linux, Alpha and its own Tru64 Unix took further shape today as a senior exec at the company outlined its plans. But the one-to-one telephone call offered little hope that Merced was an all-time Compaq favourite. Jesse Lipcon, high performance server platform manager, with overall control of both Alpha chips and the platform, said in the clearest statement of Compaq to date that its own chip was the platform of choice. He said: "Alpha is 64-bit and has been since 1992." If and when Merced and Intel's IA-64 platform have market share, Lipcon said he had no doubt it would be successful. He would not comment on whether it was late or not. Said Lipcon: "With our Unix platform, typically our competition is HP, IBM and Sun and it depends on applications." He said Tru64 was aimed at data warehousing, high performance applications and Internet servers. Many small Web servers use Linux-Apache combinations and as they grew they would move over to Alpha-Tru64 platforms, said Lipcon. "We see Tru64 as complementary to Linux," he said. "but with both running on the Alpha platform. It's a little brother, big brother relationship." He said: "We believe Linux-Alpha is a great platform. The highest volume of small Web servers tends to be Apache on Linux." He said big machines like AltaVista and Yahoo! servers typically used Tru64. "We're building bridges between Linux and Tru64. Alpha platforms will spread across our entire product line. This is no secret. We certainly have every interest in shipping EV6 across our whole line in the very near future." The reason for that, he hinted, was that Linux ran extremely well on the Alpha platform. ® Related Stories Merced project in utter disarray How Compaq views the real world