A statement of general direction is a fine tonic for IBM Power Systems i users, some of which are confused about IBM’s intentions with the platform. Last week, Ian Jarman, manager of Power Systems software and keynote speaker at the RPG & DB2 Summit gave i-centric attendees a glimpse of the future. Knowing his crowd well, he highlighted RPG and DB2 enhancements in the pipeline and explained Power Systems positioning with the benefits that lie ahead for those thirsty for IBM attention on i.

As with any statement of general direction, details are limited, but they confirm details that appeared

i365 last week introduced a pair of new storage solutions that work with System i and other platforms. The new EVault Plug-n-Protect backup appliance is a scaled down version of an existing EVault device that’s designed for small and mid size businesses, while the new EVault Offsite Replication Service allows customers to implement a hybrid cloud storage that utilizes i365’s data centers, and can even be used as a warm site for disaster recovery.

i365 is no stranger to the System i storage arena. The company, which was previously known as EVault and is a subsidiary of storage giant Seagate

nuBridges last week delivered a major update to its managed file transfer (MFT) offering with the launch of Exchange 3.0. The new software features a new Web 2.0-style interface and a unified code base for all target platforms, which should simplify the installation and overall use of the product. Exchange 3.0 also gives nuBridges’ System i customers a second MFT product to choose from.

As the new flagship product of nuBridge’s MFT product offerings, nuBridges Exchange 3.0–or Exchange Enterprise as it is sometimes called–is an amalgamation of various file transfer products that nuBridges has built and bought through the years,

When it comes to making predictions, there are as many techniques as there are people. Some may involve a twig, a piece of string, and a really strong hunch, while others use giant supercomputers and trillions of bytes of data. One company trying to democratize the data-driven approach is i OS business intelligence software vendor Information Builders, which recently crunched baseball statistics to come up with the most probable winner of the World Series. Hint: the winner’s initials start with “LA,” not “NY.”

Unlike any other sport, baseball is a game deeply rooted in statistics. More than one hundred

Ever since Oracle obtained JD Edwards several years ago, some JD Edwards customers have been skeptical about Oracle’s commitment to the products, its commitment to customers, and its business application roadmap. Last week at the Oracle OpenWorld 09 conference in San Francisco, the software giant did its best to turn the skeptics into believers when it committed to supporting JD Edwards products for a decade, and promised to deliver the next-generation Fusion applications next year.

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison is not normally known for being the touchy-feely type. His hostile takeover of PeopleSoft in 2004 was both brutal and personal,

HiT Software last week launched a new version of its data transformation software, Allora, that should help organizations in highly regulated industries keep better track of their data. Customers also gain new scripting capabilities and more automated management of data transformations with Allora version 6.

HiT Software bills Allora as a data transformation product with a special aptitude for XML. With its capability to generate XML from any database, and, in turn, write XML element and attribute values back into any database, the product eliminates the need to hire or train an XML guru to do hand coding for data

People normally take the term “database replication” to mean that data is being replicated from one database to another. But as the result of new entity relationship modeling and reverse engineering capabilities that AquaFold recently rolled out with Aqua Data Studio version 8.0, database replication can also mean replicating the entire structure of one’s database to another database management systems, which the company says will make it easier than ever for users to migrate from, say, Oracle or SQL Server to DB2/400 or MySQL.

Aqua Data Studio is a $399 utility that allows developers, administrators, and analysts to visualize, maintain,

Computer Guidance has landed its first customer for the application hosting service it announced in May. Republic Investment Services, a real estate management company based in Arizona, selected the hosted i OS software due to the promise of a quick implementation with low upfront IT costs and the capability to scale usage as needed.

Computer Guidance partnered with IBM server distributor and fellow Arizona company Avnet in the roll-out of its eCMS hosting service earlier this year. As part of the deal, Tempe-based Avnet supplies the data center and System i hardware, while Scottsdale-based Computer Guidance provides the IT

Worldwide Equipment, a big rig dealer with more than 30 locations, expects to save a lot of money and time as the result of a new payment system it implemented with the help of ACOM Solutions. The company used several ACOM offerings, including EZPayManager and the new iBridge spool file conversion tool, in the roll-out of the ACH payment network and check-printing system.

Worldwide Equipment sells, leases, and services medium- and heavy-duty trucks and trailers from manufacturers like Mack, Volvo, Kenworth, GMC, Hino, and Benson. The company, which is based in Prestonburg, Kentucky, operates 32 locations through five states

Human capital management software vendor Kronos last week announced it has acquired the assets of Stromberg, a developer of time and attendance software and related products that was bought by Paychex in 2004. The acquisition is expected to boost Kronos’ position in the market for time and attendance software for small and mid size businesses.

Stromberg has been developing time and attendance software since it was founded in Florida in 1989. After selling its Windows-based Time In a Box time and attendance package to Paychex in 2003, the payroll and human resources giant decided to buy the whole Stromberg outfit