Top OS/400 Stories from Around the Web

(IT Jungle) What was behind the purchase of application lifecycle management software vendor Aldon? Daniel Magid, Aldon's president and chief executive officer until the company was acquired, said the cost of funding future development and marketing those products was a big hill to climb, and that led to private equity money. Magid will remain with the company and is researching additional companies to acquire. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Mark Shearer says IBM is going to focus on its total revenue generated from i5/OS and OS/400 shops rather than revenue generated specifically by i5 hardware sales. That strategy is fueled by spending patterns in those organizations that show IBM losing market share on the other platforms that share the shop floors. What does this say about growing the System i installed base and the ecosystem? READ MORE >

(System iNetwork) I know. You've heard it all before. One of today's trendy marketing darling, software as a service, is an idea that has been around for years and years without catching on to any great degree. Maybe the idea was just ahead of its time and now its time has come. And maybe it's what large software vendors need to do to develop new business in the small to mid size market. READ MORE >

(System iNetwork) Once upon a time there was a CIO who liked the idea of integrating the System i and IBM's BladeCenter. He looked out over his vast Windows server farm and said, "I can slay this maintenance and administrative dragon." And, by golly, he did. Was it magic? Get real. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Like a chameleon, Big Blue turned into Big Green last week as it announced a plan to sell technology and services that would help data centers consume less power even as they support expanding IT workloads. IBM is reallocating $1 billion in resources previously earmarked for other developments toward making data centers more energy efficient. That's a lot of green, Big Blue. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Sirius Computer Solutions is an IBM business partner with more than 5,000 customers across the United States. When a large private equity firm traded an undisclosed boatload of money for a majority share of the business, it helped advance children's education, children's medical treatment, medical research for illnesses and diseases affecting children. This is how that happened. READ MORE >

(DMReview) Have you ever been in a fitness club? Me neither. But there are people who go on a regular basis, and it seems to be a vibrant business. And, as we know, IT is what really runs businesses. So here's a case study of a fitness club business that runs on the System i and how the IT department there delivered information on enrollment trends, cash flow, and campaign management. READ MORE >

Vendor Announcements, Promotions, and Deals

(IT Jungle) Access to ERP functions from within Microsoft Office used to be about as likely as your boss showing up for work today driving an '83 Chevy Camaro and sporting a mullet haircut. Crazy, you say? No. Interfaces can be created for 5250 applications without making changes to the underlying code. And, I think you'll love this, you can forget about OLTP batch and the Enterprise version of i5/OS. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) You can see the value of application modernization, but you can't see how you'll ever find the time to get it done. I understand. The entire IT department is being worked like rented mules. I understand. Here's how you might get time on your side and that app modernization project moving forward. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Are you fighting the office forms fight with one hand tied behind your back? It could be worse. You could be in company that hasn't moved to electronic forms. But then, too, it could be better. You could have an electronic forms and reporting tool that runs on the System i and works with all kinds of databases and the capability to automatically generate PDF documents from RPG applications. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) For a lot of companies, business data analysis comes down to one tool: Microsoft Excel. Some might call that business intelligence with training wheels, but you have to start somewhere, right? Now all you need is easy access to DB2 data and queries. No problem. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) Would Spider-Man work without a net? Of course not. So why would any System i systems admin superhero work without a security policy and a method for enforcing it? The answer is: He wouldn't. For those who haven't reached superhero status (and its commensurate wages), here's help in designing and implementing security policies. READ MORE >

(IT Jungle) If you can talk intelligently about firewalls and intrusion protection systems for the System i, then you'll likely be interested in learning more about packet filtering, stateful connection tracking, application-level security of Internet traffic, virtual private networking (VPN), as well as support for whitelisting and blacklisting, and quality of service (QoS) bandwidth management. READ MORE >

Redbooks, White Papers, and Other OS/400 Resources

(BOSaNOVA) When it comes to data security, it is necessary to take steps beyond firewalls, virtual private networks, and intrusion prevention systems. That's why the topic of data encryption has gained so much attention. This white paper looks at risk assessment and regulatory compliance while make a strong case for encryption. READ MORE >

(LogLogic) This white paper by the SANS Institute uncovers and defines the importance of proper log management. It includes real-world issues facing the IT community, best practices of log management, traditional vs. new high-performance commercial solutions, and the capturing of all log data messages including informational levels. READ MORE >

(iMessaging Systems) This white paper examines interactive voice response software (sometimes referred to as call routing) and how it works with OS/400-based applications. The description includes examples of how customers can gain automated 24-hour-a-day access to company services and information. Cases are taken from several industries and an ROI analysis based on each example. READ MORE >

(Power Tech) The data in this report originates from iSeries security assessments conducted during the past 12 months. It may open your eyes to risks that require attention in your own IT department. Confidential information may not be as protected as you think it is. READ MORE >

(Maximum Availability) This report covers key business issues that revolve around the concept of business continuity. Among the issues it touches upon are: data volume and complexity, data loss, downtime, high availability, and disaster recovery. READ MORE >

Chats, Webinars, Seminars, Shows, and Other Happenings

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

May 17 -- Webinar - Best practices when auditing the System i to meet government regulations will be the topic of this online session presented by PowerTech. At the heart of this topic is putting the right IT controls in place on your System i to be security compliant and then being able to demonstrate it. This Webcast begins at 11 a.m. EDT. LEARN MORE >

May 20-25 -- Orlando, Florida - IBM's Impact 2007 conference features WebSphere and service oriented architecture (SOA) as the stars. Hear the story from IBM, analysts, and companies that have implemented SOA. There will be 325 sessions and labs and three separate tracks are designed for business leaders, IT executives, and technical personnel. LEARN MORE >

May 20-25 -- Las Vegas, Nevada - This year's expanded Interop 2007 IT Conference puts its educational focus on interoperability. A partial list of session topics include: application delivery, collaboration, security, service oriented architecture, storage, unified communications, virtualization, and VoIP. More than 200 educational sessions will be offered. There will also be intensive full-day and two-day courses for CIOs, security executives, and networking management to name a few. The expo area features more than 400 exhibitors. Keynote speakers include Microsoft's Senior Vice President of Server and Tools Business, Bob Muglia; Nortel's President and CEO Zafirovski; and Cisco System's Chairman and CEO John Chambers. LEARN MORE >

May 21-23 -- Las Vegas, Nevada - RPG World, organized by the well-known RPG expert, Bob Cozzi, is billed as "training for the job you are doing today." Session topics include RPG IV subprocedures and APIs, service programs and binder sources, WDSc, DB2, SQL, XML, and AJAX . As a distinction between RPG World and other training and education options, Cozzi says this conference doesn't "doesn't preach the big-blue party-line when it comes to RPG." Cozzi will be one of the session presenters and will be joined by other experts such as Bob Tipton, Bradley V. Stone, Aaron Bartell, Greg Veal, Bruce Hoffman, and George Farr. For those seeking advanced development training, there will be a separate Professional Developers Conference on May 20. RPG World will be held at The Orleans Hotel. LEARN MORE >

May 22 -- Costa Mesa, California - IBM experts will discuss the basic WebSphere Process Server architecture and its capabilities during this OCEAN User Group meeting. Among the topics on the agenda will be how the new WebSphere Integration Developer tool simplifies development of component-based business process applications and how it integrates with WebSphere Business Modeler for application development. The meeting begins at 6 p.m. at the IBM offices at Plaza Tower. LEARN MORE >

May 22 -- Madison, Wisconsin - Disaster recovery and high availability are the topics of discussion at the monthly meeting of the Madison Area Midrange Systems Users Group. Guest speaker is Richard Dolewski, a certified systems integration specialist and disaster recovery planner. The event, including lunch, takes place at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. LEARN MORE >