Talk:IBM z13

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This article is a little ahead of reality, the IBM-Global Foundaries deal has not closed yet. Currently, the East Fishkill fab is still IBM. It will eventually (probably later this year) be Global Foundaries.

z13 in the news for "end-to-end hybrid cloud environments"[edit]

http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/15/ibm-launches-new-mainframe-with-focus-on-security-and-hybrid-cloud/?ncid=rss&cps=gravity_1462_9218295925015853593

I know what is meant by "cloud" and "hybrid", not sure about "end-to-end hybrid cloud"..

At least some of the news is I guess wrong with: "include numerous specialized processors", as while that used to be the case, and yes, there are cryptographic instructions, if I recall all (or most) co-processors are gone. They may be "there" (in a way for compatibility, "usual" processors, that can do more, but artificially restricted), as a way of getting you to pay more. comp.arch (talk) 19:53, 16 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I think that IBM is referring to the feature of the Z/Arch processors to load processors with specialized "firmware" to do a sort of on the fly customization of a processing unit, essentially change the PUs instruction set in software. They've used this to make a PU be specialized for Java, IO, crypto, Linux, memory management, etc. I'll have to do some reading about this new Z13s machine. -- Henriok (talk) 10:36, 18 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, as I recall, the CPUs can be/or I guess always are specialized, by [IBM provided] "firmware", that is, it's only software, the hardware is the same (unlike in older generations). This is at least in this CPU and maybe some older, but not "Z/Arch". I assume you are not talking about "end-to-end", as that seems a completely separate issue.. comp.arch (talk) 15:40, 18 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Do they actually change the instruction set in a fashion other than "change the millicode so that the processor can only boot {the Java engine, the crypto engine, Linux, etc.}"? I think, these days, the instructions that don't trap to millicode are fixed in hardware. Guy Harris (talk) 03:28, 17 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I think "end-to-end hybrid cloud" means "somebody in IBM marketing picked those three words/phrases out of a box and glued them together because they thought it sounded good". :-) Guy Harris (talk) 03:30, 17 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]