Sun's backup software

Recently I found myself trying to find details of some backup software that Sun resell, so I could make a recommendation to a client. I knew exactly what I was after: a newer version of Legato NetWorker, which Sun used to rebadge as Solstice backup, this being the product the client was already using. I should also point out that I think Sun are a good company on the whole & their kit and software is generally excellent.

I did the obvious thing: look at www.sun.com to find out what they sell. This turned out to be a mistake: Sun's information is almost completely obscure. On casual inspection it looks like they have two product ranges:

• Sun StorageTek Enterprise Backup Software which claims to be the descendant of Solstice Backup;
• Legato (now actually EMC) NetWorker which obviously actually is the descendent of Solstice Backup.

So that's confusing, but well, it's Sun, confusion is the name of the game. (By the time anyone reads this the URLs above will probably have broken, which is, of course, half the point.)

So I thought I'd have a grovel over docs.sun.com on the grounds that it might be clear from the docs which one we actually want. Well, there are manuals for a partly-rebadged NetWorker there under yet another name: Sun Storedge Enterprise Backup Software. It's nice that the titles of the manuals in the list suddenly give up and change to saying Legato NetWorker in the title after the first few, as if someone just gave up retitling them.

There seems to be no sign at all of anything called Sun StorageTek Enterprise Backup Software on docs.sun.com. But of course, life wouldn't be complete without discovering that there are manuals for Veritas (now Symantec I suppose) NetBackup, which I guess Sun also resell.

So I think my conclusions are as follows.

• There probably are two offerings: Legato NetWorker which is variously known as StorageTek Enterprise Backup Software, Storedge Enterprise Backup Software and Legato NetWorker, and was formerly known as Solstice Backup; and NBU, which is only known as NBU.
• We want the Legato stuff because we already have it (and NBU is a story of chaos and death all of its own which we don't want to get into, though a very good product).
• Sun need a strategy for coherently naming products, making it look as if their product lineup makes some kind of sense and presenting this information to people who might want to buy stuff. It doesn't need to be a particularly good strategy, they just need some strategy: the current approach of apparently randomly-generated information, while innovative, is not working.

If I'd come to Sun's website cold, trying to buy a backup product, I probably would have got confused, given up and decided to stick with Windows: as a tool for selling products Sun's website is an absolute disaster. As it was it took me the best part of a day to find the information I needed (and remember: I knew exactly what I was after, I was not trying to compare offerings).

The only thing that makes this better is that all the other `enterprise vendors' are pretty much as bad, but that is not an excuse: the aim should be to be better than everyone else, which would not be hard

March 2007