• Image Catalogs: Another Timesaving Method for Upgrade or Installs

  February 23, 2011 Hey, Joe

  Great article on six tips for preventing Power i upgrades from slowing down. One tip that you missed is using Image Catalogs for your upgrades. They really help with installing software and PTFs. Also PTFs should be downloaded via FTP using IBM procedures from their Web site. CDs and DVDs are nice, but image catalogs are significantly better! –Rich Rich wasn’t the only reader who pointed out the advantages of using Image Catalogs in lieu of CDs or DVDs for i/OS PTF application and upgrades. While I neglected to mention them in my recent article, image catalogs can be

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• Commands: Underused and Unappreciated

  February 16, 2011 Ted Holt

  As programming languages go, CL is not glamorous. Nevertheless, it is practical and effective, and it has some nice features. One of my favorite features is the ability to extend the CL language by creating my own commands. I have used this feature many times to great advantage over the years, and I am amazed that so many programmers have never written a command. In this article I discuss advantages of creating commands and give an example of how to do so. I have noticed that many shops use the CALL command exclusively to start execution of a program. CALL

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• OUTQ vs. PRTDEV

  February 16, 2011 Hey, Ted

  Several CL commands–Create User Profile (CRTUSRPRF) is a good example–have two parameters that control the destination of printed output. Where is the need for both print device and output queue? Can you explain the role of these parameters in determining the destination of output? -Tim I know of no need to use both print device and output queue (“outq”) parameters. I have always managed fine with outq’s only. The System/38, one of the predecessors of the AS/400, used outq’s exclusively. I understand that IBM added the print device option to support software that had been developed for the AS/400’s other

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• Admin Alert: Six Techniques to Prevent Power i Upgrades from Slowing Down

  February 16, 2011 Joe Hertvik

  When I’m ready to perform a significant software or hardware upgrade, I use a series of techniques to cut upgrade time, avoid mistakes, and avoid delays. This week, I’ll review six of those techniques in the hope that you can use some of them to make your next Power i upgrade go easier. Keeping the Upgrade from Slowing Down I’ve always found that you can never increase Power i upgrade speed, you can only stop an upgrade from slowing down. In no particular order, these six tips can help you reduce the amount of waiting time in the Power i

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• Synchronize Your Outlook Calendar with DB2 for i ERP Data

  February 2, 2011 Hey, Mike

  We would like to merge the Resource Assigned Calendar from our JDE Service Management software with the Outlook Calendar so that we only need to look in one place. We also want to receive an email from Outlook and create a case. How can we approach this? –Robert Hi, Robert: As always, there is more than one way to skin a cat, and this calendar synchronization task is no exception. The approach I will be taking to solve this problem is to allow an Outlook client to monitor the ERP system’s calendar table using Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) coding.

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• Another Reason Why Function Subprocedures Should Not Modify Their Parameters

  February 2, 2011 Ted Holt

  I’ve never liked the idea of functions modifying their parameters. It seems to me that a function should accept zero or more input values and return one and only one value. Modifying a parameter is a roundabout way of returning another value. While looking for something in the ILE RPG reference recently, I found yet one more reason why it’s not a good idea for a function to modify a parm. This is IBM‘s example code with my modifications to make it run. Figure 189. Sample coding of a call with side effects *..1....+....2....+....3....+....4....+....5....+....6....+....7...+.... H dftactgrp(*no) actgrp(*new) D fn

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• Admin Alert: QPWDRULES Rules!!! Opening Up User Password Options with i 6.1

  February 2, 2011 Joe Hertvik

  Like many i/OS shops, we recently started upgrading several systems from i/OS V5R4Mx to i 6.1. One of the more interesting features about i 6.1 is the new Password rules (QPWDRULES) system value, which allows you to control and extend password composition settings to designate all your password rules in one place and to include password composition options that weren’t available in earlier versions of the operating system. What is QPWDRULES? Think of QPWDRULES as a password composition rule aggregator. In earlier i/OS and AS/400 operating systems, IBM did not consolidate password composition system values in one place on

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• A Reusable Routine for Doubly-Linked Lists, Part 2

  January 26, 2011 Miguel Ortiz Martín and Ted Holt

  Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here. In Part 1 of this series, we introduced several concepts, such as managing external storage and defining comparator procedures, that are required for defining a reusable routine for managing doubly-linked lists. In this second part, we: Detail the procedures that create, delete, and manipulate reusable doubly-linked lists. Tell you about the source code and how to create a service program. Show you an example of how to use the doubly-linked list service program in your applications. Creating and Destroying a List Let’s begin with a list of the

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• Don’t Let Users Wreck Their Joins

  January 26, 2011 Ted Holt

  You’re swamped with work, and here comes Harold in Accounts Receivable yet again for help with some query he threw together that doesn’t work correctly. Harold’s not a bad guy–his wife, his kids, and his dog adore him. He just doesn’t understand computer stuff. Here’s a way you can help him help you. Harold’s problem is that he doesn’t understand how to join files properly. What you need is a way to store join field information on the system. That is, you need a way to store the fact that file A and file B join over field C and

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• Why Can’t I Move System Memory Between Partition?

  January 26, 2011 Hey, Joe

  I’m using the Web interface on my Hardware Management Console (HMC) to move memory between my Power i partitions, and it keeps timing out before completing the move. What’s going on and why can’t I move memory between my partitions? –Sven There are a number of reasons for moving memory between i/OS partitions. I’ve frequently moved memory and CPU from one partition to another during an upgrade, to help speed the process along faster. A few years ago, I also set up an HMC to automatically shift memory from our development box to our production system and back again during

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