IBM AS/400 creator Frank Soltis reveals upcoming dedicated server plans August 16, 1999 — The next dedicated server offering from IBM’s AS/400 division could well be a Java-dedicated machine, according to Frank Soltis, creator of the midrange hardware.“What I’d like to see would be a pure Java server,” said IBM’s AS/400 chief scientist and the man responsible for creating the AS/400 architecture, in an interview last week. Soltis was on a tour of Hong Kong and mainland China to address and meet with AS/400 users.Toward the end of next month IBM plans to launch a dedicated AS/400 server for Domino, the company’s Web applications software from its Lotus Development subsidiary. “If the Domino server is a success, we will do other specific ones,” Soltis said.In addition to a Java-dedicated machine, Soltis said that he personally would also like to see a Web-specific AS/400 server become available in the future, given the likelihood that the application service provider market is set to take off. That will create more of a need for application-specific hardware.The upcoming Domino server is not IBM’s first venture into offering application-specific AS/400 machines, Soltis said. He explained that a few years ago the company began offering “very application-specific” AS/400 servers for enterprise resource planning software from SAP, J.D. Edwards, and System Software Associates (SSA). Soltis said that an AS/400 dedicated Domino server can help users in consolidating their PC server farms.“You typically start out with a PC server running Windows NT,” Soltis said. “You can’t have just one, so at some point, the support costs become overwhelming and you need to consolidate into less boxes.” He said that one user had been able to reduce his 50 Windows NT servers running Domino down to two AS/400s carrying out the same task. Software Development