Missouri Shop Discovers Real Source of iSeries Power

by Friar Tuck

IT administrators for a manufacturer in Missouri got a surprise last week when they took shipment on their new iSeries server. As Bartholomew Baxtwiliger, an operator with the midsized shop, explained, they were just checking to make sure that all the parts they had ordered for the new iSeries 825 were included with the shipment, which they had learned the hard way to do a few years before.

"Back in '01, me and Bennie [IT administrator Benjamin Fitts] were unloading our new AS/400 Model 270, and we both quickly noticed that it didn't have the red stripe. Somebody had messed up on that red stripe that goes along the bottom," Baxtwiliger said. "We were really cheesed. I mean, what's the point of getting a '400 if it ain't got the red stripe?"

The missing red stripe was a serious blow to the pride to the pro-'400 forces inside the IT shop, but Baxtwiliger and Fitts--long derided by the Windows guys as "those 70s programmers"--eventually recovered and undertook a late-night raid to migrate their Windows-based e-mail and collaboration software to that very 270. In fact, that project proved so successful that management decided to undertake an ambitious Windows consolidation project to get rid of the rest of the Windows servers, which is why their new Model 825 was loaded with five integrated Windows server cards. At least, that's how they ordered it, and that's why Fitts and Baxtwiliger decided to take a look inside the new Model 825 to check for themselves.

"When Bart pulled that cover out of the way, I just about fainted," said Fitts, still shaken by the incident. "He steps out of the way, and I seen this bright beam of light, and it's coming right out of that genie lamp over there," he said, gesturing to a small, golden lamp sitting innocently on a shelf 10 feet away.

Baxtwiliger recounted the episode moment by moment. "It was all lit up--almost like it was radioactive--so I says to Bennie, 'Go ahead, Bennie. Pick it up.' And so he does," Baxtwiliger said. After unplugging the genie lamp from a PCI slot, Fitts noticed that it had a "slight static charge" to it. "The hair on my arm started to stand up, and that's when I knew that this genie lamp was something special," Fitts said.

Somehow in the confusion of the moment, Baxtwiliger had the presence of mind to check for the integrated Windows server cards, which is why they opened the case in the first place. They were missing. "That's when I says, 'I know what your first wish should be," Baxtwiliger says. "Go ahead and rub the lamp and make the genie come out."

After summoning the genie ("She didn't look a thing like Barbara Eden," Baxtwiliger said. "I was a little bit disappointed), the two got down to business. With the first wish, Fitts had the five integrated Windows servers added to the box, and with the second wish he had them configured. "That magic genie lamp really saved us on the configuration," said Baxtwiliger. "It was better than any wizard I've ever used."

And what did the pair do with the last wish from the magic genie lamp? "Well, we were still missing that red stripe on the old 270, and our new 825 seemed to be missing its red stripe, too," Fitts said. "So we told the genie to get us an entire case of red stripes so we'd never be short again. That might have been our best wish of all."

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