There’s a lot to love about the IBM i server. It’s extremely secure and reliable, and scales like the dickens. It’s even relatively affordable these days. But everybody hates those clunky green-screen interfaces, which scream “I’m old and outdated.” One vendor that’s developing modern interfaces that users will truly love is Surround Technologies. The company recently updated its collection of Accelerator tools, which marry the best of Microsoft .NET user interface technologies with IBM‘s foremost business server.

There’s no question that it can be very difficult at times to be an IBM i professional, especially when your organization

Up until now, Infor has been a no-show at the mobile party that has been occupying the IT universe since the iPhone launched five years ago. But the enterprise software giant jumped in with gusto last month when it unveiled its new mobile strategy, called Infor10 Motion. Only two mobile apps are available today, and they only run on the iPad. But according to an Infor official, the company’s mobile strategy is set to ramp up quickly.

It’s hard to overstate the impact that mobile computing is having on the IT industry. Take Apple for example. After recording $26 billion

The push to mobile is in high gear at the moment, and one of the latest IBM i software vendors to unveil a mobile solution is IntelliChief. In the next week or two, the developer expects to deliver IntelliChief Mobile, a new user interface that enables workers to use a tablet to view documents stored in their organization’s content management system. Not all IntelliChief features are supported yet, but the new interface will enable users to consume documents from anyplace with a network connection.

IntelliChief Mobile is a pure HTML client that gives users access to their IntelliChief dashboard.

Oracle recently delivered three smartphone applications that extend its JD Edwards EnterpriseOne ERP suite in the areas of purchase order approvals, requisition requests, and sales reports. The applications run on Apple iOS, Google Android, and RIM Blackberry devices. However, the new apps require the WebLogic application server, so they aren’t supported by “Blue Stack” EnterpriseOne shops that run IBM WebSphere as part of their ERP infrastructure.

The three JD Edwards EnterpriseOne mobile applications unveiled by Oracle in late January include Mobile Requisition Self Service Approval, Mobile Purchase Order Approval, and Mobile Sales Inquiry applications. The software is available now, and

Developers who use mrc‘s m-Power tool will no longer have to compile their m-Power applications to see how their changes affect the application thanks to the new preview function that was added last month. The Chicago company also added a new feature that allows a single application to support multiple languages.

m-Power now features a preview window that allows users to see their applications take shape during the build process. According to mrc, the preview window will provide invaluable feedback to the developers as they customize applications using the templates and wizards that are at the heart of m-Power.

Don’t expect to see any screen scrapers during ASNA‘s “No Stinkin’ Screen Scrapers Here” tour, which began last week in sunny Florida.

Screen scrapers? We don’t need no stinkin’ screen scrapers! That’s the rallying cry behind ASNA’s latest round of workshops, which explore the ways that its Wings modernization tool can spruce up older-looking IBM i apps constrained by those ugly, green 5250 interfaces.

Almost everybody in the IBM i community loves to hate screen scrapers, a class of tool that quickly renders 5250 screens in as graphical interfaces. What screen scrapers gain an IBM i shop in speed,

IBM i document management software vendor inFORM Decisions last week announced that it’s signed TEMBO Technology Lab (Pty) LT , a large South African IBM i server distributor, to be its agent in the region.

TEMBO specializes in helping customers “unlock the value” in their existing systems through the use of modernization tools to develop new user interfaces. The company eschews the term “legacy” as it relates to the midrange platform and its applications, preferring instead the term “vintage.” Much of TEMBO’s IBM i modernization work is done using tools from its Australian partner, looksoftware.

As inFORM’s new partner,

Thinking of running a data warehouse on the IBM i server? Then you may be interested by the news that RODIN, an IBM i-based extract, transform, and load (ETL) tool from Coglin Mill, has been accepted into IBM‘s IBM i Solution Edition program, thereby providing you big discounts when buying the software in conjunction with a new Power Systems server.

ETL is one of those workloads that many IBM i shops don’t give a second thought to putting on an outboard Windows or Linux server. After all, many customers are using an ETL tool to suck data off

CCSS has added a new layer of access controls to its real-time message monitoring solution for IBM i, called QMessage Monitor (QMM). Using the new features, organizations can be assured that only authorized personnel are accessing or changing QMM functions, such as security alerts and escalation procedures.

QMM is a powerful tool that automates many aspects of IBM i monitoring. Instead of manually watching the various message queues, such as QAUDJRN, an organization can set up the software to keep an eye out for critical events, such as looping jobs, high DASD utilization, or unauthorized access of DB2/400. When a

The capability to generate Quick Response (QR) codes on business correspondence is increasingly becoming a requirement for document management solutions. To that end, Integrated Custom Software (ICS) now supports QR codes in its document management software for IBM i, called FormSprint.

FormSprint is a suite of software that enables IBM i shops to transition away from printing spool files using expensive pre-printed forms, and to dynamically generated documents that can be printed on any standard laser printer or distributed electronically. The modules that compose the suite include a PC-based form design tool, PDF/TIFF converter, email, fax, and signature capture.

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