Top Concern for i Shops: Making Users Happy
by Timothy Prickett Morgan

Despite all of the legitimate complaining that many of us in the IBM midrange community do, it looks like the IT staff, business partners, and IBMers have their eye on the ball and are focused on satisfying the needs of customers. That is the message from the preliminary results of the 2011 edition of the COMMON Europe Top Concerns survey of the OS/400 and i installed base. READ MORE >

IBM Powers Through The Second Quarter
by Timothy Prickett Morgan

The comparisons are getting a little bit harder as 2011 rolls along, but the Power Systems business at IBM pulled its weight and then some in the second quarter ended in June. Big Blue's mainframe business is enjoying the best upgrade cycle it has had in five years, raking in the bucks as companies in emerging markets buy mainframes for the first time and established companies in the financial services and insurance industries do long-overdue upgrades to their big iron. READ MORE >

RPG Open Access Suffering from Inaccessibility
by Dan Burger

You would think that in any IT community, especially one as tight as the IBM i community, there would be few, if any, secrets. But that doesn't do justice to IBM, where apparently it is believed that loose lips sink ships. A good example is RPG Open Access. Funny how you could have something called Open Access and yet hardly anyone talks about it except the proponents of modern RPG. READ MORE >

As I See It: Barry, Barry Bad
by Victor Rozek

More often than not, ethical behavior seems to be determined by distance–either real or virtual. The Internet provides a daily reminder that the more removed an offender is from the outcomes he creates, the more emboldened he becomes. And the corollary is also true: The more remote the victim, the easier it is to harm her. Stealing an old woman's money from the safety of Nigeria is easier than mugging her in Des Moines. READ MORE >