When IBM rolled out its Solution Edition versions of the Power 720 and 740 servers in August, the world’s three biggest ERP vendors were represented, along with a smattering of smaller ISVs that are well-known in the IBM i community. But there was one company on the Solution Edition list–Solarsoft Business Systems–that many IBM i insiders didn’t recognize. Who are these guys and what are they doing on this platform? They’ve been here, it turns out, for quite a while.

Solarsoft Business Systems was created following the April 2007 merger of two midmarket ERP software developers: CMS Manufacturing

Shield Advanced Solutions recently introduced HA4i, a major new version of its previous high availability product called Receiver Apply Program, or RAP. Shield rewrote some of the underpinnings of the product to make data replication and recovery tasks faster and more streamlined, while the elimination of extraneous features and the introduction of a new Web-based interface are aimed at making the product easier to use.

When Shield introduced RAP/400 nearly four years ago, it intended the product to function as a disaster recovery product. However, since RAP utilized remote journaling data-replication that’s built into IBM i, the base plumbing

Micro Focus recently launched a new release of RUMBA, its terminal emulation suite that is used by many IBM i shops. The highlight of version 8.1 may be integration with Microsoft Office, which will allow users to easily move data from the emulator to Outlook or Word. Other notable features include FIPS 140-2 certification, a new screen and data capture system, GUI enhancements, and new developer tools. The vendor also launched Web-to-Host 6.1 and OnWeb 7.5.

For the last decade, two unmistakable computing trends have wound their ways through American corporations. The first concerns the “legacy” applications running on IBM

The product development folks over at Halcyon Software have been busy lately, as the company released updates to three separate products this month. The most important may be the addition of real-time monitoring capabilities to its Audit Journal Manager, which will help IBM i shops detect intrusions. On the performance front, Halcyon shipped the first release of Snapshot TSC since buying it earlier this year, and it also unveiled an iPhone app for its Performance Analyzer product.

On its face, the introduction of Audit Journal Manager would appear to be a brand new addition to Halcyon’s suite of systems management

Caterpillar, the $32 billion construction equipment giant that has long a big user of IBM Power Systems gear, has made a recommendation to its distributors to use ACOM Solutions‘ suite of IBM i-based document management products to generate shipping labels, the vendor announced this month.

Cat machines are sold around the world through a network of hundreds of company offices and thousands of independent distributors. Because Cat uses IBM i gear and RPG applications in its corporate offices, IBM servers and software can be found in many of these locations. By all accounts, the server has served the company

Jeans-maker Jordache Enterprise, which is looking to recreate the hold it had on fashion in the 1980s, turned to 21st century technology recently when it adopted handheld barcode scanning computers from Psion Teklogix to improve the efficiency of workers at its largest warehouse.

Like many companies in the apparel business, New York City-based Jordache relies on IBM Power Systems servers to automate key business functions, such as the coming and going of raw and finished goods. In July 2009, it was announced that the company adopted the IBM i-based ERP software from RLM Apparel Software Systems of Lyndhurst, New Jersey,

Infocrossing, a U.S.-based outsourcer that is owned by the Indian IT giant Wipro, is making a big investment to create a state-of-the-art data center in Cleveland County, North Carolina. Infocrossing says the new data center says will run all major operating platforms–including IBM i–and create more than a dozen American jobs.

It is ironic that, at a time when displaced American IT workers are bitter over losing their jobs to overseas rivals who work for less, that an Indian company made rich through outsourcing is investing millions of dollars to create an outsourcing center that will employ .

Wal-Mart’s surprise decision this summer to give item-level radio frequency identification (RFID) tagging a go will help to drive RFID spending up 16 percent next year, according to ABI Research, which tracks spending on RFID and other emerging technologies. While the growth for 2010 is decent, it’s actually down a bit from ABI’s September forecast.

ABI’s latest RFID forecast from mid-November pegs the total global RFID market for 2010 at $4.6 billion (a number that does not include car immobilization devices). Next year, the total spending should account for $5.3 billion, a 16 percent year-over-year increase, the firm says.

Informatica recently issued a new release of its master data management (MDM) tool, which it acquired seven months ago from Siperian. The company has also stepped up its public relations activities around the product by conducting a 30-city road show for Informatica MDM, as the product is called, and touting a recent good showing in a leading analyst firm’s magic four-sided polygon.

Informatica jumped into the MDM discipline this February with the $130-million acquisition of Siperian, a fellow Northern California company that tackled the problem of how organizations can identify duplicate or inconsistent data residing across different applications or

It shouldn’t be surprising that virtual and cloud environments are more difficult to protect from a disaster than your standard un-virtualized, on-premise application. After all, there is an extra layer of technology separating you from your critical data, and that complicates the disaster recovery (DR) initiative. But what is surprising, and just a little disturbing, is a recent report from Symantec that found that companies are doing a worse job at protecting this kind of data than they were last year.

The most telling piece of data from Symantec’s self-titled “Symantec 2010 Disaster Recovery Study” may be this: that 60