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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.

  • ERP Caught Up In Cloud Updrafts

    April 4, 2018 Alex Woodie

    Don’t look now, but ERP software is headed up – into the clouds, that is. That’s according to the latest ERP survey from Panorama Consulting, which says more than four times as many users reported adopting cloud-based or SaaS ERP than deploying on-premise enterprise software.

    A quick look at Panorama Consulting‘s 2018 ERP Survey shows that cloud/software as a service (SaaS) and on-premise deployments of ERP effectively switched from 2017 to 2018. In 2017, the survey found that 67 percent of users reported deploying ERP on premise, while 33 percent reported using SaaS or cloud ERP.

    In 2018, Panorama …

    Read more
  • The Five Hottest IBM i RFEs Of The Quarter

    April 2, 2018 Alex Woodie

    You should know by now that IBM wants your input on new features for IBM i. Anybody with a valid IBM ID can submit their ideas – anything, really – through the new Request for Enhancement (RFE) process it put in place over a year ago. Now that the first quarter of 2018 is officially in the books, it’s a good time to check in with the RFE submissions and see kind of new stuff IBM i users have dreamt up to enhance the midrange server platform at the center of this community.

    Here are the top five new RFEs, …

    Read more
  • SEA Launches New Job Scheduler For IBM i

    March 28, 2018 Alex Woodie

    When it’s not talking System z mainframe tools, Software Engineering of America (SEA) has traditionally involved itself with IBM i security and messaging tools. But the New York software firm has expanded its repertoire to IBM i job scheduling with the recent launch of absScheduler.

    The new software was developed by SEA to be a “next-generation” job scheduler that can handle batch workloads across one or more IBM i partitions or systems. The software, which was developed by the same IBM i development team that developed the absMessage product over a decade ago, features both a 5250 green-screen interface and …

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  • IBM Patches Another BIND Flaw In IBM i

    March 28, 2018 Alex Woodie

    A serious flaw has been discovered in the BIND networking service that could be used to launch a denial of service attack against impacted servers, including IBM i. IBM patched the flaw in every version of the OS from IBM i 6.1 to 7.3 with a program temporary fix (PTF) made available earlier this month. IBM also patched a serious flaw in WebSphere that could let information leak out.

    According to the IBM security bulletin issued March 12, the ISC BIND flaw known as CVE-2017-3145 has the potential to allow a remote attacker to crash a vulnerable server by sending …

    Read more
  • TEMBO Bolsters Database Modernization Kit

    March 26, 2018 Alex Woodie

    TEMBO Technology Lab is shipping a new release of its software designed to help IBM i shops modernize their databases for the SQL age. The South African company made mostly minor tweaks to its flagship product, dubbed AO Foundation, which should position the product to do more down the road.

    Since it entered the IBM i discussion in 2012, TEMBO has been building database modernization tools and evangelizing the benefits of the SQL Query Engine (SQE) as the modern, up-to-date database engine that IBM i shops should strive to use, as opposed to the older CQE engine that used DDS …

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  • Reassessing IBM i Value: Worthless Iron or Legacy Goldmine?

    March 21, 2018 Alex Woodie

    In the minds of modern-day technologists, the IBM i server is relegated to the scrap bin of history, looked down upon as a vestigial organ of technology’s past with no place in the distributed future, where workloads run effortlessly on clouds and data flows seamlessly everywhere. That outlook gives the platform’s present value a low mark, but considering the recent influx of capital into IBM i ecosystem, one might want to reassess.

    Trying to assess the value of something is not an easy thing to do. When looking at the worth of the entire IBM i ecosystem, or even just …

    Read more
  • Rest4i Eyes Digital Transformation Via API

    March 21, 2018 Alex Woodie

    A new company headed by IBM i software veterans is beginning to turn some heads with a new product aimed at helping IBM i shops with digital transformation strategies. Rest4i, as the outfit is called, says its LXR framework turns IBM i into a lean, mean REST API-serving machine.

    Stuart Milligan, who headed the UK software firm Databorough before it was sold to Fresche Legacy (now Fresche Solutions) way back in 2013, says LXR (pronounced “Lexer”) is the result of four years of investment and development in a “pure IBM i REST API solution.”

    Milligan describes LXR as …

    Read more
  • Ensono Embiggens With Wipro Data Center Deal

    March 19, 2018 Alex Woodie

    Ensono isn’t the most well-known datacenter operator in the world, either in the open systems or mainframe/IBM i space where it currently operates. But thanks to its recently announced deal with Wipro to buy eight Wipro data centers for nearly half a billion dollars, the Chicago-based company is putting itself on the map.

    If the name Ensono is news to you, you are not alone. The company was formed just two years ago when Arkansas-based Acxiom spun out its IT Outsourcing (ITO) division to create a standalone entity with four data centers in the US, three in Europe, and $300 …

    Read more
  • Peeking Outside Of The IBM i Bubble

    March 14, 2018 Alex Woodie

    It can be tempting to continue doing what you’ve done before. After all, there’s safety and security in familiarity. But when it comes to planning your future and reaching your goals as a technology professional, you should not limit your opportunities, whether it’s learning a new technology or even being open to jobs in different states.

    That’s the message from Patrick Staudacher, an IBM i recruiter in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, who has witnessed the evolution of the midrange platform and the professionals who make it run since he started in the unique trade 20 years ago. For many years, the job …

    Read more
  • A Code Inspector For RPG

    March 14, 2018 Alex Woodie

    Programmers who are tasked with maintaining applications often spend 50 percent or more of their time just figuring out how programs work, taking away valuable time they could spend on other tasks. Now a company called i400hub.com is promoting a new tool called RPG/Code Inspector that helps programmers reclaim that lost time.

    RPG/Code Inspector is a program comprehension tool created by longtime IBM i developer Steve Kilner that’s designed to help programmers discover what’s going on in their RPG applications quickly, without going line-by-line through the source code. The software automates several tasks for programmers, including:

    • Analyzing and cross-referencing how
    …

    Read more

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