But that is about to change, according to Ball. QOS involves meeting end users' service-level expectations in terms of responsiveness, availability, and security, as well as enabling service providers to meet the performance and predictability requirements of end users. One of HP's first QOS initiatives involves levels of service on the Web. The company plans to provide differentiated service levels, with premium users receiving preferential service levels. Another QOS capability is overload protection, provided by load balancing.
Load balancing manages the user request load across all servers in the architecture.
Where QOS involves the network, HP plans to work with partners like Cisco. Middleware Initiative HP is also announcing a middleware initiative that depends on third parties in the ISV community to provide signal and messaging technologies, objects, security, application development, and directory services. HP will choose the third parties and integrate their solutions. In broad terms, HP has targeted three markets. In this area HP is examining commerce solutions that integrate elements of the VeriFone payment system.