• OpenShift Provides One Path To IBM i Modernization

  March 29, 2021 Alex Woodie

  The crown jewel in IBM’s $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat arguably is OpenShift, which is a Kubernetes-based container management system for running “cloud-native” applications. While it’s unlikely OpenShift will ever integrate directly with IBM i and its applications, IBM has high hopes the software will help usher in a new wave of application modernization and innovation among IBM i customers.

  IBM Power engineer Joe Cropper laid out the case for IBM i shops to get going with OpenShift two weeks ago during the IBM i Futures conference, which was hosted by COMMON. Cropper, you will remember, made a …

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• Some More Power Systems Stuff Swept Into The Dustbin

  March 29, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  With the Power10 machines starting to come out later this year, the Power9 machines in the field for three years or so depending on the make and model, and the Power8 machines looking long in the tooth (but still technically and economically viable), you have to expect that Big Blue will wind down the sale of more and more older features.

  In announcement letter 923-035, IBM has done just that. Nothing too big, but we think you need to be made aware of it just the same. And as you might expect, IBM also put a plug into the …

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• Quantum Computing and IBM i

  March 24, 2021 Alex Woodie

  At first glance, IBM i servers and quantum computers appear to be worlds apart. But considering the rapid advance of quantum computing today and the midrange server’s place in a long line of advances in business computing, they may not be as far removed as one might think.

  That’s the general conclusion one could draw from listening to Jack Woehr and Jesse Gorzinski discussing the topic of quantum computing during Woehr’s presentation, “From Hamilton to Hollerith: What’s the Use of Quantum Computers?” during last week’s IBM i Futures Conference, which was sponsored by COMMON.

  In addition to writing IBM …

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• Locking Down Exit Point And IFS Vulnerabilities On IBM i

  March 24, 2021 Pauline Brazil Ayala

  It’s true that the IBM i server is among the most securable servers on the planet. But all too often, customers do not take the time to secure their environments properly. This is particularly true for two of the most oft-neglected components of the IBM i environment: exit points and the IFS.

  IBM introduced exit points with the launch of OS/400 V3R1 way back in 1994. We remember that version well here at Trinity Guard, because soon after that, we developed the industry’s first exit point monitoring software for the AS/400 at PentaSafe, the spiritual predecessor of our company. …

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• RevSoft Leans On ‘Shadowing’ To Ensure Speedy Job Scheduler Failovers

  March 24, 2021 Alex Woodie

  There are several things that can prevent a high availability failover from executing quickly on an IBM i server, including data synchronization issues, communication failures, and other problems. With the “shadowing” feature in its job scheduler, RevSoft is determined that issues with synching job schedulers do not make that list.

  Jobs demand special treatment in the IBM i high availability world. Care must be taken to ensure that active jobs, including jobs that are in the job queue as well as jobs that are scheduled to run in the job scheduler, are replicated from the primary server to the backup …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, March 24

  March 24, 2021 Jenny Thomas

  IBM is all about the hybrid cloud these days, and it is frustrating that there is never much said about our favorite platform. Of course we all know it’s humming away taking care of business somewhere in the background, but wouldn’t it be nice if once in awhile IBM did a little dreaming about what might be in the future of the IBM i? That’s one of the many reasons we appreciate our IT Jungle editor in chief, Tim Prickett Morgan, who enjoys the occasional daydream about what he’d like to see, which is why we’re sharing his latest wish …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 23, Number 12

  March 24, 2021 Doug Bidwell

  While WebSphere Application Server V9.0 has been available for IBM i and other operating systems for many years, it is now getting the same treatment by the PTF People at Big Blue and now this latest version is being offered as a big bang upgrade to V9.0 through a PTF mechanism, just like all of the open source tools are. (Don’t get the wrong idea though. IBM has not open sourced WebSphere Application Server.) As you can see below, all four current releases are being offered a PTF update for WAS. IBM i 7.4 has some patches for Db2 for …

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• Don’t Be A Blowhard

  March 22, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  One of the things that made the AS/400 a great system, as well as the System/36 and the System/32 and System/34 before it, was that there were entry machines that had enough oomph to support the data processing and storage needs of small businesses within a reasonable budget and in a system that didn’t need a datacenter or even a data closet. They could be tucked under a desk, or left to run beside them.

  Way back in the dawn of time, there were special machines, even smaller than the original AS/400-B10 and AS/400 -B20, that were even smaller and …

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• As Data Security Deteriorates, Reconsider Your Exposure

  March 22, 2021 Alex Woodie

  The shift towards digitalization wrought by COVID-19 and the associated lockdowns has given new life to cybercriminals, who are exploiting the changes in computer access patterns to steal data and enrich themselves. For IBM i shops, the time to lock down vulnerable endpoints in the system-of-record was yesterday.

  If you’re not feeling a sense of urgency about the data security situation, then you’re not paying attention. Since the start of the year, numerous reports from security professionals have alerted the IT community to new and evolved dangers that are lurking online.

  Consider a report due this week from SlashNext Threat …

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• Guru: QCMDEXC Makes A Good CPP

  March 22, 2021 Ted Holt

  I’m a fairly decent typist, and chances are you are, too. A person doesn’t sit at a keyboard for decades and not improve. At the same time, I don’t get paid to type, and I do everything I can to reduce the number of keystrokes I have to produce while carrying out the duties of the job.

  If you find yourself keying the same old long commands over and over — and who doesn’t? — I’ve got a tip for you. I have an easy way to reduce long commands to just a few keystrokes. Maybe it will save you …

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