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NonStop is a series ofserver computers introduced to market in 1976 byTandem Computers Incorporated,^[1] beginning with the NonStopproduct line.^[2] It was followed by the Tandem Integrity NonStop line oflock-step fault-tolerant computers, now defunct (not to be confused with the later and much differentHewlett-PackardIntegrityproduct line extension). The original NonStop product line is currently offered byHewlett Packard Enterprise since Hewlett-Packard Company's split in 2015. Because NonStop systems are based on an integrated hardware/software stack, Tandem and later HPE also developed the NonStop OSoperating system for them.

NonStop systems are, to an extent, self-healing. To circumventsingle points of failure, they are equipped with almost allredundant components. When a mainline component fails, the system automatically falls back to the backup.

These systems can be used bybanks,stock exchanges, payment applications, retail companies, energy and utility services, healthcare organizations, manufacturers, telecommunication providers, transportation, and other enterprises requiring extremely highuptime.^{[citation needed]}

Originally introduced in 1976 by Tandem Computers Inc., the line was later owned byCompaq (from 1997), Hewlett-Packard Company (from 2003)^[3] and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (since 2015). In 2005, the HP Integrity "NonStop i" (or TNS/E) servers, based onIntelItanium microprocessors, was introduced. In 2014, the first "NonStop X" (or TNS/X) systems, based on Intelx86-64 processors, were introduced. Sales of the Itanium-based systems ended in July 2020.^[4]

Early NonStop applications had to be specifically coded forfault tolerance. That requirement was removed in 1983 with the introduction of the Transaction Monitoring Facility (TMF), along with Pathway transaction management software and SCOBOL applications (or, later, NonStop Tuxedo transaction management software), which handles the various aspects of fault tolerance on the system level.

NonStop OS is amessage-based operating system designed for fault tolerance. It works with process pairs and ensures that backup processes on redundant CPUs take over in case of a process or CPU failure. Data integrity is maintained during those takeovers; no transactions or data are lost or corrupted.

The operating system as a whole is branded NonStop OS and includes the Guardian layer, which is a low-level component of the operating system and the Open System Services (OSS) personality which runs atop this layer, which implements a Unix-like interface for other components of the OS to use.

The operating system and application are both designed to support the fault tolerant hardware. The operating system continually monitors the status of all components, switching control as necessary to maintain operations. There are also features designed into the software that allow programs to be written as continuously available programs. That is accomplished using a pair of processes where one process performs all the primary processing and the other serves as a "hot backup", receiving updates to data whenever the primary reaches a critical point in processing. Should the primary stop, the backup steps in to resume execution using the current transaction.^[5]

The systems supportrelational database management systems likeNonStop SQL and hierarchical databases such asEnscribe.

Languages supported includeJava,^[6]C,C++,^[6]COBOL, SCOBOL (Screen COBOL),Transaction Application Language (TAL), etc. It uses the scripting and job control languageTACL (Tandem Advanced Command Language), and is written in TAL and C.

The HPE Integrity NonStop computers are a line offault-tolerant, message-based server computers based on theIntelXeon processor platform,^[4] and optimized for transaction processing. Average availability levels of 99.999% have been observed.^[7] NonStop systems feature amassively parallel processing (MPP) architecture and provide linear scalability. Each CPU runs its own copy of the OS, and systems can be expanded up to over 4000 CPUs. This is ashared-nothing architecture—a "share nothing" arrangement also known asloosely coupled multiprocessing.

Due to the integrated hardware/software stack and asingle system image for even the largest configurations, system management requirements for NonStop systems are rather low. In most deployments there is just a single production server, not a complexserver farm.^{[citation needed]}

Most customers also have a backup server in a remote location forIT disaster recovery. There are standard products to keep the data of the production and the backup server in sync, for example, HPE's Remote Database Facility (RDF),^[8] hence there is fast takeover and little to no data loss also in a disaster situation with the production server being disabled or destroyed.

HP also developed adata warehouse andbusiness intelligence server line,HP Neoview, based on the NonStop line. It acted as adatabase server, providing NonStop OS andNonStop SQL, but lacked thetransaction processing functionality of the original NonStop systems. The line wasretired, and no longermarketed, as of 24 January 2011.^[9]

• List of compilers– includes some compilers for NonStop
• Master-checker
• Reliability engineering
• Stratus Technologies

• Siewiorek, Daniel P.;Swarz, Robert S. (1998).Reliable Computer Systems. A K Peters, Ltd. pp. 586–625.ISBN 1-56881-092-X.
• Horst, R.W. (February 1995). "TNet: a reliable system area network".IEEE Micro.15 (1):37–45.Bibcode:1995IMicr..15a..37H.doi:10.1109/40.342016.
• Horst, Robert W.; Harris, Richard L.; Jardine, Robert L. (1990). "Multiple instruction issue in the NonStop Cyclone processor".Proceedings of the 17th AnnualInternational Symposium on Computer Architecture. pp. 216–226.doi:10.1109/ISCA.1990.134528.
• Bernick, D. (2005)."NonStop advanced architecture".Proceedings of the 2005International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks.doi:10.1109/DSN.2005.70.
• Kim, Won (March 1984). "Highly available systems for database applications".ACM Computing Surveys.16:71–98.doi:10.1145/861.866.S2CID 4397686.

• HPE NonStop

• Hewlett Packard Enterprise
• Computer-related introductions in 1976
• Computer architecture
• Fault-tolerant computer systems
• HPE servers
• HP software
• MIPS architecture
• Proprietary operating systems
• X86-64 operating systems

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