• POWERUp 2025 –Your Source For IBM i 7.6 Information

  May 12, 2025 Alex Woodie

  The IBM i community is getting ready for the biggest event of the year, the COMMON Annual Conference, better known as POWERUp 2025. The event, which is being held next week at the Disneyland Hotel in Southern California, is chock full of information relating to IBM i 7.6, the latest release of the operating system.

  It seems like just yesterday the IBM i community was convening on Fort Worth, Texas, for what would be one of the largest and most positive COMMON events in recent memory. In particular, IBM and COMMON were successful in attracting a substantial contingent of …

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• Maxava Consulting Services Does More Than HA/DR Project Management – A Lot More

  May 12, 2025 Yvonne Enselman

  IT organizations have been having to do more with less for so long that it is frankly amazing that anything at all gets done some decades later. And the funny thing is that the To Do list just keeps getting longer – and wider – as the years go by.

  We know exactly how short-staffed and over-burdened IBM i shops are, and that is why Maxava is launching Maxava Consulting Services, a new arm of the high availability software maker that aims to provide a broad and deep set of strategic and tactical services to help IBM i shops get …

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• Guru: Creating An SQL Stored Procedure That Returns A Result Set

  May 12, 2025 Mike Larsen

  Continuing to build out the stored procedure series, I’m going to show how to create an SQL stored procedure that returns a result set. This is very similar to the previous article where I showed how to do this using RPG. In this example, we’re just using pure SQL to achieve the same results.

  I created an SQL script (Figure 1) that selects all rows from the Departments table. The SQL statement is the same as the one I used in the RPG program from the prior article, but I’ll describe it again here. I didn’t add any selection criteria …

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• As I See It: At Any Cost

  May 12, 2025 Victor Rozek

  In more innocent times, advancements and achievements in computer technology were celebrated as human advancements and achievements. Computers were perhaps the ultimate expression of humankind’s aptness for tool making; and the ability to craft tools was indistinguishable from the tool maker. But over time, that linkage gradually eroded. Now, every new development in AI technology (the tool) threatens to bring us all (tool makers) closer to becoming obsolete.

  Who among us, old enough to remember, was not rooting for IBM’s supercomputer Deep Blue to beat Garry Kasparov, at the time the world’s reigning chess champion, considered by many to be …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 19

  May 12, 2025 Doug Bidwell

  Welcome to this week in IBM i Land. And we will start out by warning you to watch out for the defective PTFs listing this week.

  And now, to a security bulletin and a patches to fix it and a warning about a vulnerability that has not been patched.

  First the one that has been patched, which is in Security Bulletin: IBM i is vulnerable to an authentication and authorization attack due to incorrect validation processing in IBM i Netserver [CVE-2025-3218] and which you can see more about at this link. The IBM i PTF numbers for 5770-999 contain …

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• IBM Unveils Manzan, A New Open Source Event Monitor For IBM i

  May 5, 2025 Alex Woodie

  IBM developers have created a new open source event monitor for IBM i. Dubbed Manzan, the project, which was spearheaded by IBM i open source guru Jesse Gorzinski, promises to provide a versatile way to ingest and redistribute a variety of IBM i event data types to downstream tools, thereby consolidating event monitoring for a wide range of use cases behind a single pane of glass.

  There are no shortages of ways that users can monitor what is going on in their IBM i server. There are job logs to look at, message queues to inspect, and even stream files …

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• Say Goodbye To Downtime: Update Your Database Without Taking Your Business Offline

  May 5, 2025 Donna Westmoreland

  Downtime is costly, impacting productivity, revenue, and customer trust. For retailers and financial institutions, even a few minutes can mean significant losses. This is why enterprises rely on IBM i Db2 for mission-critical systems. IBM i offers 99.999 percent availability, high stability, robust failover strategies, and real-time monitoring to reduce unplanned downtime.

  However, planned downtime for critical updates and projects is also necessary. The challenge lies in scheduling this maintenance and upgrades without disrupting business applications. So, how can we utilize new functionality and optimize systems with minimal disruption?

  Database File Updates

  It is not surprising that businesses tend to …

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• i-Rays Brings Observability To IBM i Performance Problems

  May 5, 2025 Alex Woodie

  One of the new IBM i products that POWERUp 2025 attendees will get to check out later this month is i-Rays. Developed by the Polish software company Omnilogy, i-Rays is an observability tool that helps customers to detect performance issues with their IBM i server, investigate the causes, and then get a machine learning-based recommendation on how to fix it.

  Performance issues are rare on the IBM i, which is generally a tireless transactional workhorse, but they can happen. When legitimate performance problems do crop up, it can be difficult to track down the source of the problem unless you …

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• Another Non-TR “Technology Refresh” Happens With IBM i TR6

  May 5, 2025 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  As you know, Big Blue released IBM i 7.6 and IBM i 7.5 Technology Refresh 6 (TR6) on April 8, with the expectation that both would ship to customers on April 18. IBM i 7.6 was detailed in announcement letter AD25-0031 and IBM i 7.5 TR6 was revealed in announcement letter AD25-0077. We’re all good there. And many of the features in IBM i 7.6 were backcast as a refresh into IBM i 7.5 with TR6, if you read the announcement letters.

  IBM i 7.6 was available on April 18 as expected, but we know a bunch of people …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 18

  May 5, 2025 Doug Bidwell

  Welcome to May, and we start out with PH65941, a notice from Big Blue that IBM WebSphere Application Server is vulnerable to server-side request forgery (CVE-2025-27907 CVSS 4.1). You can check out this link for more details. IBM says that the fix for this APAR is set to be included with WebSphere Application Server 8.5.5.28 and 9.0.5.24. We are not sure when that will happen.

  Here is the rundown of PTF Groups by IBM i release level since we last published:

  PTF Groups 7.6:

  • HIPERs – High Impact Pervasive
  • Group Security
  • Performance Tools
  • IBM HTTP Server for i
  • Content

  … Read more

• Will The Turbulent Economy Downdraft IBM Systems Or Lift It?

  April 28, 2025 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We have always contended that recessions accelerate technology trends rather than slow them down. And if we start heading into a recession either in the United States or around the globe – it is hard to imagine one without the other – it is reasonable to assume that companies will be looking very aggressively to take automation up another level to cut costs further, to generate new lines of business, and to push profits as hard as they can in what will probably be a deflationary environment.

  There are a lot of assumptions in that paragraph, so let’s pick it …

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• How IBM Improved The Database With IBM i 7.6

  April 28, 2025 Alex Woodie

  Developers have a host of new database functions to play with in IBM i 7.6 and 7.5 TR6, not the least of which is the new data change table reference functions. In addition to that big new feature, IBM is bringing updates to SELF, enhancements to parallel execution of SQL statements, and 10 new IBM i services, among others.

  The Db2 for i database is the beating heart of the IBM i platform, storing, processing, and serving data to all of the IBM i applications. While other databases are available on the platform (MySQL, MariaDB, and Postgres) through the AIX …

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• Rocket Celebrates 35th Anniversary As Private Equity Owner Ponders Sale

  April 28, 2025 Alex Woodie

  Rocket Software has come a long way since Andy Youniss and Johan Magnusson Gedda founded the company in Youniss’ Boston garage in 1990. Today the company counts more than 12,000 customers, including a large number of IBM i shops, and reportedly has a valuation of around $10 billion. Could the company’s 35th anniversary of its founding be a good time for its current majority owner, Bain Capital, to sell?

  Youniss started building what we now think of as Rocket Software in 2000, when he completed the first of what would become dozens of acquisitions. Over the years, there would be …

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• 50 Acres And A Humanoid Robot With An AI Avatar

  April 28, 2025 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We have made a joke for over the past year that sometime in the not-too-distant future, when we are born, we will be issued three things: Some kind of unique identifier such as a Social Security number in the United States, a software-based collection of AI agents to teach us and to do self-driven education about the world, and a humanoid robot that can embody that collection of AI agents – one might call it a Purson – to keep us safe as we grow.

  This would at least level the AI playing field to a certain extent.

  All jokes …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 17

  April 28, 2025 Doug Bidwell

  Just a reminder that as part of the April 8 announcements, IBM Software Support content is changing to require entitlement check for software patches. See more at this link, but the gist of it is that IBM Software Support Troubleshooting, Question & Answer, and How To documents are changing to require entitlement. This means that you will be required to log on with an IBMid that has proper entitlement before viewing the entire document.

  Also this week, there is Security Bulletin: IBM WebSphere Application Server is vulnerable to server-side request forgery (CVE-2025-27907), which you can find out more about …

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• The New Capabilities IBM Added To Navigator For i

  April 23, 2025 Alex Woodie

  The addition of multi-factor authentication (MFA) to IBM i 7.6 is the big news with the recent operating system update from IBM. But IBM has introduced new capabilities to other parts of the platform as well, and some of the biggest reside in Navigator for i.

  As the strategic Web-based console for administrating the IBM i server, it’s natural that Navigator for i gets lots of attention. Whether you’re looking to monitor or manage the databases, inspect batch jobs, configure security, or monitor performance, Navigator for i is the one central place that lets you do it. You can, of …

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• One Big Time-Saving Network Enhancement In IBM i 7.6

  April 23, 2025 Alex Woodie

  IBM i 7.6 brings a host of new enhancements around security and database development, among other areas. But IBM has also brought one big new capability to the operating system’s networking environment that will be worth the cost of an upgrade for some larger IBM i environments.

  IBM introduced Ethernet Link Aggregation support in IBM i 7.1 Technology Refresh 3 (TR3), which shipped way back in 2012. Ethernet Link Aggregation enables several full-duplex Ethernet links to be grouped into a single line description with a single Media Access Control (MAC) address, which can boost reliability as well as throughput. …

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• Using AI To Derive Application Intelligence And Drive Modernization

  April 23, 2025 Marc Dallas

  Everybody in the IBM i space knows that Big Blue is working on a coding assistant based on generative AI models to help developers write better and more consistent RPG applications with what everyone assumes will be a smaller and smaller programming talent pool.

  But there is more to leveraging AI as a tool for application development and modernization than this. There are those who want to be able to use GenAI tools that can analyze and convert code from one language to another – much as the same large language models were first trained to translate between two languages …

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• Sundry Interesting IBM i Announcements For You To Ponder

  April 23, 2025 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We are still picking though the latest tweaks and changes to the IBM i platform that came with the April 8 announcements. We are still also working through our disappointment that there was not one single interesting hardware announcement from Big Blue relating to the Power Systems platform. We are having a bit of iron deficiency, it seems.

  First thing first, we noticed this week that the official Redbook for IBM i 7.6, which naturally enough is called IBM i 7.6 Features And Functions, has been published, and is jam packed with 215 pages of more details about …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 16

  April 23, 2025 Doug Bidwell

  This week, we bring you two security vulnerabilities and an import HIPER for firmware updates for Power Systems iron. Let’s start with the firmware.

  There is new microcode for Firmware 950 .. 950.D1, which you can find out more about at this link here, and new microcode for Firmware 950 .. 950.E0, which you can read all about at that link there. These are HIPERs and affect the following hardware:

  • Power System S914 Server (9009-41A)
  • Power System S922 Server (9009-22A)
  • Power System S924 Server (9009-42A)

  Now for the vulnerabilities. First, we have Security Bulletin: IBM i 7.6 is …

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