Alex Woodie
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Medical Supply Firm Protects Data with Vault400
January 14, 2014 Alex Woodie
… Read moreA.A. Laquis Limited, a medical supply distributor in the Caribbean, has selected the Vault400 offering from United Computer Group to protect its critical IBM i server, the vendor announced last month.
With 150,000 square feet of distribution space in Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados, and Jamaica and more than 200 employees, A.A. Laquis Limited is the biggest supplier of medical supplies and home healthcare supplies in the Caribbean. The privately held company uses an IBM i server equipped with ERP software from VAI to automate its back-office operations.
The distributor selected Vault400 after looking at the other alternatives available on the
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Townsend Launches 2FA To Thwart Cyber Attacks On IBM i
January 13, 2014 Alex Woodie
… Read moreTownsend Security is unveiling a new security solution that enables two-factor authentication (2FA) on the IBM i platform. The offering requires users to properly enter a PIN code, sent via a mobile text or an automated voice call, before being allowed on the system. Alliance Two Factor Authentication will help companies defend themselves against privilege escalation attacks that are currently comprising otherwise secure IBM i systems, says company founder Patrick Townsend.
The growing technological sophistication of cybercriminals is forcing organizations to step up their security games to prevent falling victims to the digital marauders. The advent of keyloggers and other
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2013: An IBM i Year In Review
December 16, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreAs we get ready for 2014, it is worth taking a look back at 2013 and seeing the year that was in the IBM i midrange marketplace. From new servers and operating systems to new security flaws and new business ventures, it was an eventful year. So sit back, grab a beverage, and prepare to reminisce on the IBM i year that was.
In January, computer security was a front-page news item after several critical vulnerabilities were discovered in Java, including a zero-day vulnerability that hackers were actively exploiting in lieu of patches from Oracle. It turns out that
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Quarterly Server Sales Drop Nearly 4 Percent, IDC Says
December 16, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreContinued soft demand for servers around the world resulted in a 3.7 percent decline in sales during the third quarter, according to IDC. A poor showing by IBM, which suffered a 19.4 percent decline in factory revenues during the quarter, enabled Hewlett-Packard to regain the title as the world’s top server maker.
This year has been tough on server makers, as they struggle to maintain revenues in an extremely competitive market for the commodity X86 servers that dominate the server landscape. Strong demand for low-end X86 servers actually increased year-over-year sales of these types of systems by 3.5
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The New Math of DRaaS
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreIn the last several years, a whole new spectrum of possibilities has opened up for disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS) in the midrange. The combination of inexpensive virtual tape libraries (VTLs), online backup to the cloud, and the managed service provider (MSP) business model puts in place the building blocks for vendors in the IBM i market to offer fully integrated DRaaS with 24-hour recovery time objectives (RTOs) for prices starting at $1,000 per month.
In the past, if a company wanted a full service DRaaS, they would call on IBM Business Continuity and Resiliency Services (BCRS) or Sungard
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CM First Strengthens Mobile App Story for IBM i
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreCM First Group is looking to make it easier for IBM i shops to create compelling mobile apps with the latest release of its CM WebClient add-on for CA Plex tools. With support for the latest OSes from Microsoft and Blackberry, the latest iOS themes from Apple, and native device integration with Apache Cordova, generating mobile front-ends for backend IBM i apps is less scary than ever.
“CM First knows how intimidating mobile can be to a company just beginning the journey,” says Christoph Heinrich, the CEO of CM First, in a press release. “CM First developers felt
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Surround Tech Takes .NET Development Further for IBM i Shops
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreSurround Technologies last week unveiled Accelerator for .NET Version 4.3, the latest release of its .NET-based application framework that for rapidly developing Web, Windows, and mobile front-ends for new or existing applications running on IBM i. Surround Tech bolstered its wizard and code-generation capabilities with this release, and also unveiled a beta of a new query tool.
Accelerator for .NET includes a set of prebuilt components and wizard-driven code generators that plug into Microsoft‘s Visual Studio development environment. Surround Tech’s software has traditionally been heavily focused on bridging the gap between existing business logic residing in DB2/400 with Microsoft’s
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m-Power Gets Responsive with Screen Design
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreAs a high-powered business executive, you expect to access the same application from multiple devices without any issues. However, requiring developers to maintain multiple versions of an application for PCs, Web browsers, smartphones, and tablets would be a giant waste of your awesome powers. With the latest release of its m-Power application development tool, mrc adopted the concept of responsive design, enabling the same GUI to automatically adapt to all of your varied devices.
If only business cards could automatically adjust from portrait to landscape mode.
From the perspective of a master of the universe, the concept of responsive design
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A Big Blue Cloud of Clouds
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreIBM last week announced that is brainiacs in research have come up with new cloud storage software that provides a simple way to migrate data across multiple clouds, while keeping it confidential and secure.
According to IBM, companies want to move their applications to the cloud but are scared off by poor security and reliability, and the utterly horrifying specter of vendor lock-in. The solution, according to IBM, is its patent-pending “cloud of clouds” approach.
In the Big Blue cloud of clouds, organizations can “invoke the resilience of separate clouds to offer stronger protection against service outages and data loss
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IBM i Options for Open Source E-Commerce
December 10, 2013 Alex Woodie
… Read moreWhen it comes to powering e-commerce Web sites on the IBM i platform, there are a handful of options that will set you back hundreds of thousands of dollars. For those looking to take the open source route, there is Magento, a PHP-based ecommerce framework that’s owned by EBay.
Magento is an open source e-commerce Web application that launched in 2008. Like other open source products that have been successfully commercialized, Magento relies on a core group of developers to develop basic functionality, and taps into a larger network of developers for add-on capabilities.
Magento itself doesn’t run