IBM Makes Some Progress Porting Own Apps to i5/OS

Published: October 31, 2006

by Alex Woodie

Over the last two years, IBM has made a lot of noise concerning its iSeries Initiative for Innovation. Big Blue has hooted and hollered to get third-party software developers to improve their applications so that the System i can be more competitive. Most of the attention has been focused on third-party apps, but IBM, which is one of the world's biggest software developers in its own right, has also been hearing and heeding its own advice--to some extent anyway.

If you've been reading IT Jungle's newsletters over the years, you'll know that it hasn't always been easy for the System i group in Rochester, Minnesota, to get the respect and support they deserve. Tom Inman, the software group vice president in charge of WebSphere, last year described the process of porting WebSphere products to i5/OS. "We've been operating in a very wrong fashion, if you will, in the software group," Inman said at the time. "We've been doing what I call a 'port and pray' model. Port some of our products over to the iSeries platform. Pray that something good happens. That's not the model that we're on any longer."

IBM recognized that it had a problem with the iSeries and its ecosystem, which is one of the reasons it launched iSeries Initiative for Innovation early last year. But while the folks in Rochester have changed their ways, the more important question (at least for this article) is: Has Software Group changed its ways?

The answer, according to Michael Prochaska, the IBM System i software portfolio manager, is yes and no. While there have been some successes, there is still clearly work to be done.

"We have been working very closely with Software Group to get products on i5/OS natively," Prochaska says. For those products that aren't ported to native i5/OS, Prochaska looks to see if they can't be run on the box in some other, via AIX, Linux, or IXS (Integrated xSeries Server) cards.

While some IBM software products are almost in lock-step with i5/OS releases, there exists a bigger gap between i5/OS and other products. Prochaska gave us a rundown on IBM's internal efforts to get software running on the box.

Domino

"Domino is one of our best stories," Prochaska says. "Domino has been on the platform for many years, and is kept concurrent with new releases." In fact, i5/OS consistently ranks second only to Windows on the most popular platforms on which to run a Domino server, he says.

Other Domino products that have found success on the platform include the WebSphere Portal family, which is composed of Portal Express, Portal Enable, and Portal Extend. (While the products bear the WebSphere name, they are managed by the Domino group.)

Similarly, the new Workplace e-mail and collaboration server offerings (which are also managed by the Domino folks) also run native on the System i, Prochaska points out. These products include Workplace Collaboration Services and Workplace Services Express, a scaled-down version of the full Workplace offering. "They run only on Windows i5/os and Linux--no AIX," he says.

"Again, a good news story there," Prochaska says. "From that side of the house, we're in good shape as far as Domino and Domino-related products go.

WebSphere

The i5/OS story is not as positive on the WebSphere side, but it is getting better. Because WebSphere Application Server is such an important architectural element in IBM's software strategy, it has been running natively on OS/400 and i5/OS, as well as every other major operating system, from the very beginning. The scaled-down WebSphere Express offering has also been offered in an i5/OS version, and has done well among small- and mid-size shops, Prochaska says. Similarly, the native i5/OS WebSphere MQ message broker software is used at larger System i shops.

Where the WebSphere i5/OS story is still developing is with the numerous other WebSphere products, such as content management, RFID, business modeling, and at least a hundred other WebSphere-branded products. Suffice it to say, it's doubtful that many of these products will never run natively on i5/OS.

But that's not to say that IBM doesn't look at the needs and take action where it thinks it can get a good return. This is what is happening with WebSphere Process Server, which is a key component of IBM's service oriented architecture (SOA) and business process management (BPM) strategy.

"We issued a statement of direction that with the next release of WebSphere Process Server, it will run native on i5/OS," Prochaska says. "It's a new foundation for customers' whole SOA initiative, and tying middleware together." The next release, most likely to be called WebSphere Process Server version 6.1, is currently in beta, and will be available in 2007.

Tivoli

Tivoli has a checkered history when it comes to supporting i5/OS. The best example of this is what happened to Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM), the brand's flagship backup and recovery product.

For some time, TSM ran natively on the iSeries alongside all the other supported operating systems, including Windows, Linux, OS/390, AIX, HP-UX, and Solaris, and enabled users to backup pretty much anything in their IT shop that housed data, including servers, storage arrays, databases, e-mail servers, and desktops.

Then, with the last release, TSM ceased to support i5/OS as a server platform (i.e., you can't run TSM on the box), which alienated the few iSeries customers using the product. While users can still back up some kinds (but not all kinds) of OS/400 data by running a TSM agent on the System i and the TSM server on some other kind of box, the days of running and managing enterprise-wide backups using TSM on the System i are over. (Customers that currently run TSM on iSeries machines and would like to continue to do so following the end of regular support next year should contact IBM and set up a custom maintenance agreement, Prochaska says.)

The success of Backup and Recovery Media Services (BRMS) is the main culprit in the demise of native i5/OS TSM. "The main reason is we have BRMS, which [System i] customers have been using for years," he says.

While BRMS and TSM exist today as entirely separate entities--with entirely different host systems, processes, and personnel--IBM recognizes that its customers may benefit from the integration of these separate worlds. To that extent, IBM is looking at ways it could potentially integrate some aspects of BRMS and TSM together, Prochaska says.

Tivoli just doesn't have much to offer to System i servers at the current time (although Tivoli products could benefit System i shops, which tend to be heavy Windows users too). "The tack we're taking with Tivoli--security and monitoring--is integrated into i5/OS already," Prochaska says. "Historically, there's been very little demand for Tivoli products on native i5/OS."

As far as the other brands go, there isn't as much to say. i5/OS already has a rock-solid DB2 database; in fact, DB2/400 was the original DB2. IBM's DB2 business intelligence strategy doesn't seem to heavily favor i5/OS at the moment, but Prochaska preferred to have one of his DB2 experts answer questions in this regard.

IBM is currently in the middle of merging its Eclipse-based WebSphere Studio development tools with the Windows, Unix, and Linux development tools it acquired from Rational Software. While some Rational products, such as the ClearCase change management system or the Rational Functional Tester, offer i5/OS or 5250 support, the Rational toolset as a whole is still aimed at Windows, Unix, and Linux development.

Next week, we'll take a look at what goes into IBM's decisions whether to port to native i5/OS or run new software in Linux or AIX partitions or relegate them to the outboard IXS.