• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 24, Number 48

  December 5, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  To start right off, there is a security vulnerability in the Hardware Management Console, so those of you who have larger Power Systems that have their logical partitions managed by this out-of-band controller had better listen up. Specifically, check out Security Bulletin: Vulnerability in Bind (CVE-2021-25219) affects Power HMC, which you can read about more here.

  The fixes for this security vulnerability are as follows:

  Product		VRMF			APAR			Remediation/Fix	
  Power HMC	V9.2.950.0 SP3 ppc	MB04373		MH01944
  Power HMC	V9.2.950.0 SP3 x86	MB04372		MH01943
  Power HMC	V10.1.1020.0 SP1 ppc	MB04363		MF70302
  Power HMC	V10.1.1020.0 SP1 x86	MB04362		MF70301
  

  As we …

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• IBM “Harmonizes” Power Systems, Storage, And Software Prices Upward

  November 28, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The worsening economic conditions and the strengthening of the U.S. dollar against other currencies is forcing companies to do two things: Raise their prices in the United States in some cases, and raise their prices a little more than that in Canada, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Japan.

  Last week, IBM did the latter on Power Systems and storage hardware and software, with the price increase taking effect on January 1, 2023. So if you are outside of the United States, you have time to close whatever deals you have in progress at the lower prices if you hustle …

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• Get Help To Batten Down The Hatches On Your IBM i

  November 28, 2022 John Fehr

  If you have a person on your IT staff that understands the complexities of aggressive malware, ransomware, viruses, and other kinds of hacking and is actually jazzed by this sort of thing – in a good way, a white hat kind of way – and who knows how to use security tools and a deep knowledge to defend your IBM i (and probably your Window Servers ) against such attacks, well bully for you. And if they work for next to nothing, you must be living in some sort of dream world.

  For the rest of the IBM i community, …

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• IBM Alleges Micro Focus Stole CICS Code

  November 28, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBM last week sued Micro Focus over the alleged theft and reverse-engineering of its CICS software that runs on IBM’s mainframe systems. Micro Focus denied the claim, stating it believes it is “without merit.”

  In IBM’s suit, which was filed November 21 in U.S. District Court in New York, Big Blue alleges that Micro Focus illegally copied its IBM CICS Transaction Server for z/OS software and reverse engineered it to create the Micro Focus Enterprise Server and Micro Focus Enterprise Developer products.

  In its lawsuit, which you can read here, IBM says Micro Focus took advantage of a …

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• IBM To Stop Unencrypted Fix Downloads In February

  November 28, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We have caught word from the IBM business partner community that starting on February 15, 2023, Big Blue will stop allowing customers to get operating system software patches that are not encrypted.

  The notification, which you can see here, was sent to business partners on November 23, just before the Thanksgiving Day holiday in the United States. Various IBM support methods, including IBM Electronic Fix Distribution (EFD), IBM Electronic Customer Care (ECC), and IBM Fix Central are all affected by this change.

  “Many leaders of the internet industry – such as World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Internet Engineering Task …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 24, Number 47

  November 28, 2022 Doug Bidwell

  It is a busy, busy week for the IBM i PTF Guide, folks. So get some coffee. There are a bunch of security vulnerabilities that you need to take a look at, and there are also some recommended fixes that are not included in either the PTF groups or the cumulative PTF updates.

  First, there is Security Bulletin: IBM Transform Services for IBM i is vulnerable to denial of service, buffer overflow, and allowing attacker to obtain sensitive information due to multiple vulnerabilities, which you can read more about at this link. The fixes for this vulnerability can …

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• 7 Reasons To Be Thankful For IBM i

  November 16, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Despite problems around the nation, Americans still have a lot to be thankful for. We have really good schools, a strong U.S. dollar, and a tech sector that’s the envy of the world. And while the IBM i server plays a smaller role in the day-to-day running of our country than it used to, there are still many reasons to be thankful for platform.

  IT Jungle will take a break from publishing next week to rest, eat turkey, and think about what we’re thankful for, which definitely includes the IBM i. Thankfully, we have prepared a list ahead of time …

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• IBM Debuts GRS, A New Data Replication Service in the Cloud

  November 16, 2022 Alex Woodie

  If you run your IBM i workloads in the IBM Cloud, there is a new data replication offering available that could help you recover more quickly from a disaster. Dubbed Global Replication Services (GRS), the offering is only available for Power Systems Virtual Server customers running in two IBM data centers at the moment. But IBM says GRS could eventually be used with on-prem Power and FlashSystem deployments, too.

  GRS, which IBM introduced in a September 22 blog post, provides asynchronous data replication for IBM i, AIX, and Linux data, as well as failover and failback mechanisms. The offering …

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• Security Is Top of Mind at VAI

  November 16, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Kevin Beasley hasn’t added “security” to his title yet at VAI, the Long Island-based IBM i ERP software and services provider. But the longtime CIO may just yet, considering all the security activities he’s overseeing for VAI’s on-prem and cloud customers alike.

  “We’re constantly looking at new things,” Beasley tells IT Jungle. “Obviously, the security landscape out there is phenomenally dangerous. There was a local government attacked here, and we’re constantly working on security.”

  The top threat at the moment is ransomware, which is typically perpetrated through email or text phishing schemes. Nearly a dozen VAI customers have been hit …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, November 16

  November 16, 2022 Jenny Thomas

  Next week is Thanksgiving, so today we are giving thanks for all of you. We feel quite lucky here in the Jungle to have survived another year, and are looking forward to thriving in 2023. We are also looking forward to a little holiday break – as I am sure are all of you – so look for Monitor again in early December before we close out for the year. Until then, get your fill of the latest industry news and happenings below, and enjoy a little family (and turkey) time. You have our deepest gratitude for your continued support, …

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