More Software Pricing Carrots for IBM i Shops
by Timothy Prickett Morgan

IBM is making some more moves to try to get customers using older OS/400 and i5/OS releases and older iron to move up to more modern IBM i releases and the latest Power Systems hardware. The moves follow the extension of the marketing of i5/OS V5R4 until May 27 this year and a 25 percent licensing increase on older Power-based systems for that software--announcements that Big Blue made as the new year was getting under way. READ MORE >

iSam Blue Predicts Falling HA Costs
by Dan Burger

Robert Seal is convinced the cost of high availability can be reduced. And he thinks that cloud computing is just the thing that will make that happen. The costs of HA--both software and hardware related--have already been squeezed in the past several years, but even the most optimistic estimates have fewer than 10 percent of IBM i, System i, iSeries, and AS/400 shops implementing this level of business resiliency. Seal says HA is ready for a growth spurt. READ MORE >

When IT Attacks: Disasters of the Technology Kind
by Alex Woodie

There are nature-made disasters, such as hurricanes and earthquakes, and there are man-made disasters, such as revolutions and war. In either case, an IT department will go into disaster recovery mode to get its organization back up and running as quickly as possible. But what happens when the disaster is of IT's own making, such as the debacle unfolding in California, where a decade-old project to install a case management system has spiraled out of control, and now carries a $2 billion price tag? In such cases, the pain goes on and on. READ MORE >

Mad Dog 21/21: The Daily Nothing
by Hesh Wiener

The ironically yclept News Corp, purveyor of Fox and fishwrapper, has launched the Daily Nothing, its news service for the iPad. Fox sells the Daily Nothing as a subscription app, but most of the feed is also available for free. The pregnant possibility of Apple's charming but dimwitted device becoming a game-changing outlet for intertainment will bring fresh hope to indomitable IBM i shops with crusty, trusty green screen applications. Unfortunately, the often augured mass resurgence of dumb terminals, like the reported rediscovery of Prester John's kingdom, never turns out to be true. READ MORE >