• Domino On IBM i Poised For A Comeback

  September 24, 2018 Alex Woodie

  IBM hasn’t exactly been knocking the cover off the ball lately when it comes to the Domino family of products running on IBM i, or any platform for that matter. But when IBM and its new development partner HCL finally unveil Domino 10 to the world on October 9, it will be the start of a great comeback story.

  That’s the prediction of Domino consultant Kim Greene, who has been working with the software on the IBM i platform for many years. Greene has been closely watching events unfold since HCL Technologies partnered with IBM to develop Domino and related …

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• Guru: Phonetic Functions In SQL, Part 2

  September 24, 2018 Paul Tuohy

  In my previous article I discussed the use of the standard SOUNDEX and DIFFERENCE functions for phonetic processing. I also identified the major problems with SOUNDEX (based on U.S. English and the first character is static) and DIFFERENCE (loose because it is based on SOUNDEX).

  In this article I will discuss how to tackle these problems by writing a customized phonetic function to use in place of or in conjunction with SOUNDEX. The good news is that you do not have to become an expert in phonetics — others have already done the job for you. There are a number …

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• IBM Global Financing Deals To Push Power E950 And E980 Sales

  September 24, 2018 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  As we have pointed out many times before, Big Blue is not just a creator and manufacturer of technology, but as one of the largest renters and lessors of equipment with vast access to capital and a relatively strong balance sheet, it is also effectively a large bank focused on IT. And more times than not, it takes IBM Global Financing – and the economic might that parent IBM brings to bear – to close the deal, as much as any hardware or software technology does.

  At the moment, IBM is focused on increasing sales of the midrange “Zeppelin” and …

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• Disaster Recovery Can Cover Your ASPs

  September 24, 2018 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Disaster recovery planning can be fun, depending on your mindset. As Hurricane Florence was heading for the Carolinas, we watched the storm with great interest before landfall and worried for a little while there the simulations of the ensuing tropical storm showed that it was going to hook a little to the west and – I kid you not – go right over Guild Companies headquarters here in Boone, North Carolina. A high developed over the Ohio Valley and bounced the storm to the south and west a little, and we did not get 80 mph winds as expected, although …

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• County Battles IBM i Server’s Legacy Image – And It’s a Problem

  September 19, 2018 Alex Woodie

  Like many municipalities, Grand Traverse County in Michigan relies on an IBM i server to run day-to-day operations. And like many municipalities, it’s encountering a number of challenges as it seeks to modernize core applications, including usability and security concerns. But it’s also battling widely held perceptions that the IBM i platform is old and washed up.

  “We live in the computer age, but many of us live in a county that’s more Atari than PlayStation 4,” starts the September 8 editorial in the Traverse City Record-Eagle, a local newspaper that has documented the county’s IT challenges over the …

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• Serious Security Vulns Patched In IBM i

  September 19, 2018 Alex Woodie

  No good deed goes unpunished. Such as it is with cybersecurity, which demands unceasing attention paid to a never-ending stream of flaws and patches as the cost of remaining off the front page. To that end, IBM patched several more security flaws in IBM i last week, including two serious flaws in Node.js, five critical vulnerabilities in Samba, and one moderate flaw in OpenSSH.

  It’s easy to get lulled into a false state of security on the IBM i server, thanks to its unique architecture, cryptic file names, and reputation for strong security. It’s hard enough to find programmers, administrators, …

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• New Option for 24/7 IBM i Monitoring

  September 19, 2018 Alex Woodie

  It’s important to keep one’s eyes on IBM i server metrics in order to nip problems in the bud. But hiring a night-shift operator can be expensive, and moving your applications to a private cloud might not be feasible. A third option was presented last week by Data Storage Corporation in the form of IBM Power Monitor 24, a new service that promises to provide continuous 24/7 monitoring of client’s IBM i servers.

  Like all cloud service providers, Data Storage Corporation invests in systems monitoring and management. After all, if you’re running critical IBM i servers on behalf of clients, …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, September 19

  September 19, 2018 Jenny Thomas

  One can never have too many champions, and the IBM i is no exception. IBM is once again looking for champions and there is no reason someone from our ecosystem isn’t deserving of the prize. If you know an “innovative thought leader in the technical community,” use the link below to nominate that person. One such person, who we cannot nominate because he is an IBM employee, is participating in a webinar today to discuss current state of the IBM i. You can find the link at the top of the calendar section below.

  Top Stories From Outside The Jungle

  …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 20, Number 37

  September 19, 2018 Doug Bidwell

  The Spectre and Meltdown speculative execution vulnerabilities are the gift that keeps on giving in terms of security worries and hurried patches, and this week in the IBM i PTF Guide is yet another demonstration of this fact.

  See this link for full details on the new fixes, and check the tab in the Guide for SpectreMeltdown, which is new new.

  There are new fixes for PEX and Job Watcher on V7R3, check here for details.

  The Tech Refreshes are out, finally, for V7R3 and V7R2. Check the TR tab in the Guide for further information.

  Links this week: …

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• Adventures In IBM i Encryption

  September 17, 2018 Tom Woolaway

  Are you impacted by the New York Cybersecurity Requirements for Financial Services Companies? If you are a banking, insurance, or brokerage firm that uses a license to operate in New York, these regulations require specific cybersecurity practices be implemented. Section 500.15 Encryption of Nonpublic Information requires encryption at rest of non-public information. Or perhaps you have other reasons to want to encrypt your IBM i drives.

  This article focuses on encryption at rest of the disk drives of IBM i systems using 57XX-SS1 Option 45 – Encrypted ASP Enablement, where you end up with an unencrypted system ASP 1 and …

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