Top OS/400 Stories from Around the Web

(IT Jungle) Go to market strategies are very popular in the IT industry. They sound impressive. Bragging rights go to the ones that are quicker than the competition's. Like all the other big players, IBM likes to talk about its go to market prowess. But they don't have much to brag about when it comes to the i5/OS blade server. Yes, it's finally here, but what the heck took it so long? READ MORE >

(eWeek) Since 1995, IBM Software Group has acquired 66 companies at a cost of almost $18 billion. Rational Software, which came with a price tag of $2.1 billion, was one of the key purchases. What has this application development tool vendor contributed? It's helping Software Group to reach its goal of generating 50 percent of IBM's overall profit by 2010. READ MORE >

(Boston Globe) The pearly gates of office productivity software are opened, at least in most people's minds, by the omnipresent Microsoft Office. The gates don't open for free though, and in this age of downsizing, outsourcing, and budget wringing, there are plenty of eyes watching the bottom line. IBM Lotus is poised to take advantage of that with a mix of free productivity software and a deluge of collaboration tools that rival and even surpasses Microsoft's best in some areas. This could be Lotus' season to bloom. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) The amount of V6R1 announcement information released last week was greater than the IT Jungle sack. To make it all fit, there's more. IBM has made a bunch of tweaks to DB2 for i5/OS, logical partitioning, performance measurement, peripheral support, and other areas that will probably not individually compel customers to upgrade, but add their collective weight to the stack of new features and it could break the camel's checkbook open to do some spending in 2008. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) By and large, do people understand that the System i is a modern server with capabilities that far exceed batch processing green-screen transactions? No. And what about RPG? Why don't people understand the difference between RPG II and RPG IV? READ MORE >

(MCPress) One of the best-known RPG application development experts, Paul Tuohy, makes a meal out of V6R1 and let's us know what he found to be particularly tasty. Let's start with the increased size of character fields and files defined in subprocedures. Click here for more. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) The average wage of an IT pro inched up to $74,570, according to the latest report from Dice. The data comes from 19,000 IT professionals across the United States and includes the gamut of job titles. "Technology workers remain among the highest paid employees, especially those with management experience and hard-to-find skills," says Dice's CEO. READ MORE >

Vendor Announcements, Promotions, and Deals

(IT Jungle) Help desk software can break like balsa or be strong like an oak. Which would you rather use for your business? If it's a really small business, lightweight might be all you need. If you consider yourself an enterprise, something more stout will serve you and your employees and your customers better. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Hot off the PHP newswire: A beta release of PHP 5.3 looks like it will debut in the first quarter of 2008, and, depending on the feedback from testers, the full release should be good to go by the third quarter. Looking ahead, PHP 6 is predicted to arrive in 2009, and looking back, development of PHP 4 ceased when we flipped our calendars to 2008. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Application testing prior to implementation--as you may well know--is a labor-intensive endeavor. Attempts to develop labor-saving software have yet to make a real dent in the problem. It is estimated that 80 percent of testing relies on hand work--and that estimate is probably lower than what most companies experience. Automated testing has been known to turn ugly, but the rewards can be truly handsome. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) What's on your data storage shopping list? You might want to make some additions now that new tape drives, improved archiving arrays, and upgraded storage area network arrays have been introduced by IBM. Read all about them and don't forget to follow the related stories links for additional info. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) What have you done for me lately? Sounds like something the boss might ask, doesn't it? Well, if you have a really good answer, you might pass it along to the folks at IBM and COMMON. They are once again sponsoring the i5/OS Innovation Awards. There's a big crystal trophy and some other nice perks for the winners, and the feather in your cap will look real nice, too. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) If you are a developer who thinks a green-screen application is one of the ugliest things not covered with flies, here's an Eclipse-based development tool that might look pretty good to you. It provides fast access to DB2/400 and is designed for maintaining or debugging existing applications and creating interactive inquiry applications. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Depending on whom you ask, the definition and full extent of a document management system can cover a lot of territory. Most often it is implemented to monitor System i print queues; process the output with segmenting or bundling rules; convert it into PostScript, PDF, HTML, RTF, CSV, or plain text format; and distribute it electronically (via e-mail, fax, FTP, or the Web); print it; or archive it. Scanning and other imaging hardware are often in the picture as well. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Enterprise quality industry-specific software is as important to the System i user base today as it was to companies that were being introduced to the AS/400 almost 20 years ago. The livestock industry is a prime example, as a recent ISV partnership hones in on improving organization-wide insight into the production and supply chain processes. READ MORE >

Redbooks, White Papers, and Other OS/400 Resources

(LANSA) Why would a company want to modernize its green-screen applications? There are several answers, but one stands out from the rest: a more intuitive user interface. If you need help convincing management at your company, the results of this survey may help you be more persuasive. READ MORE >

(System iDeveloper) Shortcuts are like chocolate bars. One will get you through the day, but a box of them will get you through maybe an entire month. Here's a list of WDSC/RSE keyboard shortcuts provided by RPG experts Susan Gantner, Jon Paris, and Paul Tuohy. It includes windows shortcuts, navigation shortcuts, and editing shortcuts. Enough to last you for awhile. READ MORE >

(IBM) All programs moving to i5/OS V6R1, which will be available in March, will need a degree of conversion to run. In order for a program to be converted, its creation data (sometimes referred to as observability) must be available for the system to make use of during a conversion process. Programs created for V5R1 or later have their creation data automatically saved during program creation. Those with programs created for OS/400 V4R5 and earlier need to ensure that the creation data is available for the conversion process. This technical paper provides a focus on what you should expect in terms of conversion processes. READ MORE >

(IBM) Short of pulling the plug, what can you do to tame the power-hungry IT beast? This 12-question tool promises to deliver energy efficiency improvements through increased awareness of power-related issues and data center planning. Data centers that use less energy, generate less carbon dioxide, take up less space, and can also save big bucks. READ MORE >

(COMMON) The online session guide for the upcoming COMMON Annual Meeting and Exposition provides a quick and easy overview of topics that are of interest to System i professionals. Browsing these topic areas and brief session descriptions might give you some ideas for advancing your career or getting a work project off the back burner. READ MORE >

Chats, Webinars, Seminars, Shows, and Other Happenings

See our full calendar of events at
http://www.itjungle.com/fhm/fhm-calendar.html

February 21 -- Columbia, South Carolina - Building SQL skills beyond the basic level is the purpose of this full-day seminar presented by Skip Marchesani. Topics included in this session include built-in functions for data manipulation and analysis, using subselect and scalar subselect to write complex SQL statements, embedding and compiling SQL statements in RPG and COBOL programs, stored procedures, and triggers. This event is being hosted by the Midlands Midrange User Group. LEARN MORE >

February 22 -- New Haven, Connecticut - A one-day application modernization technical seminar focusing on service oriented architecture, Web services, and extending the value of RPG-based applications and OS/400-based system hardware is being presented by ASNA. This event provides an introduction to Web Services and service oriented architecture while emphasizing team skills. LEARN MORE >

February 27 -- West Chester, Pennsylvania - The Delaware Valley Computer Users Group will host a presentation on DB2 Web Query for System i (the IBM replacement for Query/400) with guest speaker Jackie Jensen, one of IBM's top Senior Consulting IT Specialists. Jensen will discuss converting current Query/400 applications, creating dashboards, and expanded methods of analyzing reports. The event, which will be held at the West Chester University Graduate Business Center, begins at 8 a.m. LEARN MORE >

February 27 -- College Park, Maryland - The future of Java and PHP on the System i is the focus topic for this full-day session hosted by the Washington Area Midrange users group. Blair Wyman, from the IBM Rochester Lab, is the guest speaker. Wyman is a frequent speaker at the iSeries Technical Conference, COMMON, and many local user group meetings. Among the focus topics of this presentation are an introduction to PHP and Java native interfaces, the Java virtual machine tools interface, and the JDK 1.5 enhancements. LEARN MORE >

February 27 -- Webinar - In today's interconnected world, virtually every aspect of a company's operations is vulnerable to disruption. So business continuity has become a concern that extends beyond IT. How do you determine the continuity and recovery requirements of your business? How do you identify and integrate critical business and IT priorities into a comprehensive continuity program? Where do you start? This session, hosted by VAI, will help you on your way to getting those questions answered. It begins at 2 p.m. EST. LEARN MORE >

February 27 -- Woodbury, New York - The Long Island Systems Users Group monthly meeting will feature two speakers: Al Barsa, Jr., at 5 p.m. and Fant Steele following dinner. Topics have not been selected yet, although Barsa says his topic will have something to do with V6R1 and Steele specializes in the areas of IP Telephony on System i, network infrastructure design and implementation, hosting multiple operating systems on i5 systems hardware, server consolidation, application development tools, and implementing security. LISUG meetings are held at the Fox Hollow Inn. LEARN MORE >

February 28 -- Fairfield, New Jersey - Guest speaker Fant Steele will discuss open security in i5/OS at the regular monthly meeting of the North Eastern Systems Technology Users (NESTU) meeting. Topics will include ssh, scp, and sftp. A particular emphasis will be on ssh as Steele explains how to install and set it up, how to use it to move data around the network, how it is used to communicate with the HMC, and how to manage resources under program control. The event begins at 5:30 p.m. and will be held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. LEARN MORE >

February 28 -- Webcast - A session on systems management software featuring Vision Solutions' Vision Direction product will emphasize topics such as reclaiming and proactively managing DASD, improving application performance, reducing planned downtime, and improving high availability and disaster recovery. Raymond Hammell, Vision Solutions architect, will present the information. The event begins at 11 a.m. EST. LEARN MORE >