Alex Woodie
Alex Woodie is Senior Editor at IT Jungle. He was previously editor of two of IT Jungle's main newsletters, Four Hundred Stuff and The Windows Observer. Prior to joining Midrange Server (as Guild Companies was formerly called) in October 2001, Alex was a products editor at now defunct publisher Midrange Computing, where he was first introduced to the AS/400 and covered hardware, software, and services for Midrange Technology SHOWCASE magazine. Before joining Midrange Computing, Alex was a staff writer for The Insurance Journal and a reporter and columnist with The Paradise Post newspaper. Woodie obtained his Bachelors of Arts degree in journalism from Humboldt State University in 1997. Upon graduation, Alex intended to make his way onto a major daily newspaper, but in 1999 he found himself drawn to the high-technology industry, where his background in science and engineering has suited him well. He lives in Northern San Diego County. When he is not writing next week's newsletters, Alex can be found in his favorite chair reading the day's paper, in the kitchen, or at the beach.
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Rocket Software Names New CEO
October 6, 2021 Alex Woodie
Rocket Software yesterday announced that Milan Shetti, currently the company’s president and a former Hewlett-Packard vice president, next month will take over the CEO position from Andy Youniss, who will step back from day-to-day operations but will remain with the company he co-founded more than 30 years ago.
Youniss co-founded Rocket Software in 1990 in the garage of his home near Boston, Massachusetts with a plan to develop and sell tools for IBM’s DB2 database, as it was then called (it only recently was renamed Db2, with the lowercase “b”). Its first product was a resource monitor for IBM’s …
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Db2 PTF Group Enhancements Target Web Services, Audit Journal
October 4, 2021 Alex Woodie
It is indisputable that the Db2 for i database is the beating heart of the IBM i platform. There were no earthshattering enhancements to this database in the latest batch of Technology Refreshes for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4 that IBM announced and shipped last month. But there were a few items worth mentioning that shipped in the Db2 PTF Group, including new HTTP commands for calling the database via REST and new SQL-based commands for querying the security audit journal.
The top new Db2 for i feature arguably is the new set of functions for HTTP requests to consume …
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Rocket Maps IBM i Apps for Modernization Ventures
September 29, 2021 Alex Woodie
Many IBM i shops want to start modernizing their applications, but they don’t know where to start. One possible beginning is a new software offering called Rocket Process Insights that that documents how IBM i applications work, and provides a heatmap and statistics that show which screens are the most commonly used.
The new offering, which Rocket Software unveiled last week, has been a long time in coming, according to Chris Wey, the president of the company’s Power Systems Business Unit. “It’s a brand-new solution from the company and we’re really excited about it,” he told IT Jungle. “It’s …
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IBM Patches Nine Security Flaws in IBM i
September 29, 2021 Alex Woodie
IBM patched issued three security bulletins Friday alerting IBM i users to the availability of patches for nine newly disclosed security vulnerabilities in OpenSSL, HTTP Server, and a WebSphere Liberty components. Some of the vulnerabilities are potentially serious and should be patched immediately.
IBM patched two security flaws its OpenSSL API that potentially could have devastating consequences on impacted systems, including enabling a hacker to take over the server, to read sensitive information, and execute a denial of service (DOS) attack. IBM patched these flaws in IBM i 7.1 through 7.4, according to the security bulletin, which you can read …
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IBM Adds Public Cloud Targets For IBM i Cloud Backup
September 27, 2021 Alex Woodie
The cloud has become a popular place for organizations to store backups. And with the recent Technology Refreshes (TRs) for IBM i, the number of targets for the Cloud Storage Solutions for i has increased significantly.
IBM debuted Cloud Storage Solutions for i back in 2016 as a connector that allowed Backup, Recovery, and Media Services (BRMS) to push IBM i backups over the Amazon S3 protocol to the Cleversafe object storage system running in SoftLayer, the public cloud platform that would become IBM Cloud in 2018 (IBM would subsequently rename Cleversafe as IBM Cloud Object Storage).
IBM has augmented …
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COMMON Cancels In-Person POWERUp Again, Takes Conference Virtual
September 22, 2021 Alex Woodie
COMMON announced last week that it has cancelled the in-person portion of the POWERUp 2021 conference that was scheduled to take place in Virginia Beach due to the Delta variant that is causing coronavirus infections to surge. That’s the bad news. The good news is that the show will go on as a virtual conference October 4-7.
This was the third time in two years that COMMON has been forced to cancel or delay its POWERUp conference. Like Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown just as he’s about to kick it, SARS2 just won’t let COMMON actually hold …
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IBM Improves Run SQL Scripts with ACS Update
September 22, 2021 Alex Woodie
In recent years, Access Client Solutions (ACS) has become an indispensable utility for a range of tasks involving the IBM i. A good reason for that success is the adoption of Run SQL Scripts, which has been enhanced with the latest Technology Refresh for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4.
ACS is a Java-based product that IBM first unveiled in 2012 and that has replaced other versions of Client Access, including the dedicated Windows utility. No matter what type of computer or device you’re using to work with the IBM i server, be it Windows, Linux, or Mac, you can access …
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IBM i Open Source Gets Better With Fall 2021 TRs
September 20, 2021 Alex Woodie
The open source community has become a big source of new software for the IBM i platform in recent years, if not the biggest contributor. To that end, the recent Technology Refreshes (TRs) for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4 bring a dozen or so new or updated packages to the platform.
One of the most exciting additions to IBM i’s open source repertoire is tn5250, a bare-bones terminal emulator for accessing IBM i system and application screens. Distributed via Source Forge, tn5250 is a Windows program that enables users to access green screens from the Secure Shell (SSH) terminal. …
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The IBM i Job Environment, It’s a Changin’
September 15, 2021 Alex Woodie
The IBM i job market ain’t what it used to be. Change is a constant in this world, but the rate of professional change during the current pandemic is of particular interest at the moment. From new technologies and enlarging salary requirements to work-from-home and pending retirements, you could say we’re experiencing a period of punctuated equilibrium when it comes to working in the IBM i ecosystem.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, companies across many industries have adopted work-from-home mandates. IBM i shops, like all others who can, have moved strongly in that direction. Many have still not …
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New Nav Puts SQL Services Within Reach
September 15, 2021 Alex Woodie
IBM delivered new Technology Refreshes (TRs) for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4 last week, and there’s a lot of good stuff in there. Arguably one of the biggest announcements is the overhaul of IBM i Navigator, which the folks at IBM have taken to calling “New Nav.” But what makes New Nav so special?
IBM rewrote New Nav from the ground up in Angular, a JavaScript framework for building Web and mobile applications, and PrimeNG, a popular component library for Angular. The combination of these two technologies gives New Nav a fresh-looking interface that will appeal to users of all …
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