The Scope Record

Our Offering: Keep, Host or Migrate an HP-UX or OpenVMS System

Answer five questions about the system you run now, and the page returns one of three outcomes with the reasoning printed beside it.

What this page answers, and what it leaves alone

This page answers one question for a reader who runs an HP-UX or OpenVMS system on Itanium: should the system stay where it is, move onto hosted hardware that someone else keeps running, or be migrated off its platform? We hold that the answer is settled by three things: what the application depends on, the support and hardware clock that is running, and who is left who can run it. The seller of the next step does not settle it, and this page does not rank providers.

Rows of rack-mounted servers with blue status lights in a data centre
Racks of servers with status lights, the kind of room an OpenVMS or HP-UX system on Itanium sits in. It is a stock photograph and shows no particular installation.

The page covers HP-UX on PA-RISC and on Integrity, and OpenVMS on Alpha, Itanium and x86-64. It does not price work, does not cover other operating systems, and does not read your licence terms, which belong with the vendor. Answer the helper below in order. The note under each question says where that answer could push the result either way.

Five questions about your system

Each question asks about something you already know. The answers stay in your browser, and once you submit, the outcome appears beside the questions with the answers that led to it.

  1. Which system is it running on today?

    A PA-RISC system may have a vendor-documented emulation route, which the outcomes treat as a hosting option. This site could not confirm an equivalent route for Integrity or Alpha systems.

  2. Do you still have the source code and a build set-up that works for the application?

    Not sure is counted as no. A rebuild needs the source, so until it is found, a rebuild is not a route in the result.

  3. Is there someone who can run and change this system without outside help?

    Thin staffing can push either way. A rebuild needs people, and a host can run the system while those people are found.

  4. How much downtime can the business accept for this system?

    This answer does not change the outcome. It changes the cutover plan you need, which each outcome's check-next line covers.

  5. What is pushing the question now?

    A hardware, support or cost push counts toward a change. With nothing forcing one, the helper leans toward keeping the system as it is.

The HP-UX support dates in the keep outcome come from The Register's January 2026 report on the end of standard support for HP-UX 11i v3. The OpenVMS and Itanium dates are set out, with their sources, in the questions further down this page.

Keep it where it is

Leave the system running where it is, check its support position on a fixed date, and plan any change for when something forces it.

This result leads here when nothing is forcing a change yet and someone can still run the system. A planning question, with a team able to carry it, points this way.

Not accounted for: the support clock. HP-UX 11i v3 standard support ended on 31 December 2025, as The Register reported in January 2026, and the reduced tier that follows is reported to run to at least 31 December 2028. Check that tier against the vendor's support matrix before you rely on it. On OpenVMS, confirm who now holds support for your version.

Check next: the age of the hardware and the spares it would need, the support date for your release, and a fixed date on which to look at the position again.

Host it on supported hardware

Move the same system, unchanged, onto hardware or a hosting service that keeps its platform supported, and leave the application as it is.

This result leads here when the source is missing or no one can rebuild it, or when a hardware, support or cost push lands on a system that cannot be rebuilt. The same binaries run on a platform someone else keeps supported.

For OpenVMS on x86-64, the V9.2-3 release notes list KVM, VMware and VirtualBox as hypervisors it installs on, and say it will not boot if its CPU feature checks fail, so test the host first. For cloud hosting, the published pattern is a bare-metal instance with a hypervisor you run yourself, not a managed OpenVMS service, as in a published cloud walkthrough for OpenVMS on bare metal. A PA-RISC system may have a vendor-documented emulation route. That is the vendor's claim to test, it covers PA-RISC only, and third-party licences need checking.

Not accounted for: a host keeps the platform running but does not change its age, and the same support clock runs underneath it.

Check next: which release the host supports, what hardware or spares it supplies, the licence terms of every third-party component, and what the host will not support.

Migrate it off the platform

Rebuild the application on a supported target from its source, and cut over in phases.

This result leads here when the source is held, someone can rebuild it, and a hardware, support or cost push is already in play. A system that exists only as binaries, or that no one can rebuild, does not reach this result.

Linux on Itanium is not a target, so the destination is another platform, and the rebuild needs the source. Data is a step of its own: a database vendor's documentation says data moving between platforms of different byte order must be converted to the target format.

Not accounted for: the licence cost on the new platform, the time to test a rebuild, and the cutover window the business can accept.

Check next: whether the compilers for your languages run on the target, what byte order your data uses, and whether a cutover window fits the downtime answer you gave.

Working through the system before you answer

Record the platform and its exact release

Take the release string from the system itself, not from memory or an old invoice. The release decides which platform route applies, and the hardware family sets which hosting routes exist for it.

List what the application depends on

Write down the databases, middleware, licensed third-party components and the hardware the application talks to. A database is easy to forget. Moving an Oracle database from big-endian HP-UX to little-endian x86-64 means converting its datafiles, as Oracle's documentation on transporting data across platforms explains.

Set the clock: support dates and hardware age

Write down the support end date for your release, the age of the hardware and any vendor notice you have received. The helper asks what is pushing the question, and these dates are what that answer should rest on.

Plan the cutover in phases

Moving OpenVMS workloads from Alpha and Integrity systems to x86-64 follows a pre-migration, migration and post-migration sequence. For the detail on each phase, see VSI's OpenVMS migration guide.

Questions that stall a decision, shortest answer first

  1. Is any new Itanium hardware still being made? No. The chip maker's schedule, reported in 2019, set the last order for 30 January 2020 and the last shipment for 29 July 2021, so spares come from the used and refurbished market (The Register, 2019).
  2. Is Linux on Itanium a way off HP-UX? No. Linux kernel 6.7 removed IA-64 support, and GCC 15 stops building IA-64 binaries, so Itanium Linux does not lead to a maintained platform (The Register, April 2024).
  3. Does a test environment need a paid licence? Non-commercial testing for Integrity workloads has to run on x86-64. The hobbyist licences for Alpha and Itanium were set to run out in 2025 and not renewed, and the Community licence is x86-64 only, supplied as a virtual machine image (The Register, April 2024).
  4. What happened to OpenVMS support after 2020? The original vendor's standard support for OpenVMS V8.4 and the final orders for Itanium i6 servers both ended on 31 December 2020. Customers were told to move that support to VSI or a third party (a customer notice published in May 2020).
  5. Can an OpenVMS application be rebuilt without its source? Not in the usual way. A rebuild needs the source, and the cross compilers that ran on Itanium at the 9.2 launch covered Fortran 90, BLISS, COBOL, Pascal and C. Sites without source need a different plan (a planning article on the OpenVMS 9.2 release).

What to do with the outcome

Take the outcome to the people who run the system and to the vendor who supports it, and treat it as the start of the decision. The helper cannot see your contracts, data volumes or change calendar, so the check-next line under each outcome is the list to work through.

A man peers through a tangle of cables beside a computer tower
Cabling work at the back of a computer, the hands-on side of any change. It is a stock photograph and not a picture of a particular system.

For the mechanics behind each route, the explainers set out what running on Itanium involves, what hosting it on Integrity hardware involves, and how emulating, re-hosting and porting differ. The glossary explains the terms a vendor is likely to use. The choice between the routes stays on this page.