• As I See It: Sunshine Or Oxygen?

  February 22, 2021 Victor Rozek

  There is an intense debate within the print and electronic media about the future of the 1st Amendment. At core is the question: At what point does free speech become antithetical to a free society? And what, if anything, should be done about it?

  The answers to these questions call for great nuance and even greater caution. Is it even possible to fine-tune one of the foundational principles of our Democracy, while simultaneously preserving it? When does enthusiasm become incitement? What’s true and what’s false? What constitutes ignorance versus willful manipulation? What’s the dividing line between news and propaganda? And …

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• Looking For Some Insight On IBM i Security

  February 22, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  There is no question that one of the biggest challenges for IT infrastructure and the applications that frolic atop it is making it the whole shebang secure. And with companies needing to provide more access to systems with users being remote and new ways of allowing customers to directly place orders, rather than through normal distribution channels thanks to the acceleration of trends caused by the coronavirus pandemic, making sure IBM i systems are secure has never been more necessary.

  Oh, and did we mention that the Internet is a hostile environment, if not an outright war zone?

  People need …

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• IBM i on Google Cloud Appears To Be Stuck in Alpha

  February 17, 2021 Alex Woodie

  Companies that want to run IBM i workloads in Google Cloud will have to wait a bit longer, as the public cloud service is still in limited alpha, with no signs that it will become generally available any time soon.

  It has been close to three years since we first broke the news about the partnership between IBM and Google Cloud. At the inaugural POWERUp conference in San Antonio, Texas, in May 2018, IBM i chief architect Steve Will publicly discussed plans the two companies had made to run IBM i and AIX instances on the Power Systems servers …

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• Power Systems Security: More Than The Sum Of Its Parts

  February 17, 2021 Tony Perera

  The IBM i platform is no longer an island unto itself. In many companies, there is a diversity of different systems — Unix systems, Linux servers, and Windows environments, not to mention IBM i. Each of these environments brings its own strength and weakness. The goal is to not let these differences hurt something that’s important to you: security.

  Make no mistake: It’s a good thing that Power Systems servers can run multiple operating systems. From an IBM i perspective, it ensures more R&D dollars from IBM to support the hardware. It seems doubtful IBM would spend billions to develop …

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• IBM Unveils New FlashSystem Storage Arrays

  February 17, 2021 Alex Woodie

  IBM last week took the wraps off three new FlashSystem storage devices, including the enterprise-oriented FlashSystem 5200 as well as two entry-level offerings, the FlashSystem 5015 and 5035. All three devices make use of speedy NVMe flash drives in the primary enclosure, but can be outfitted with traditional spinning and less-speedy solid state drives (SSDs) in the expansion enclosures.

  Since early 2020, IBM has been phasing out its Storwize disk array line and emphasizing the FlashSystem line that replaces it. As part of that exercise, IBM renamed existing arrays, including the Storwize V5100, which became the FlashSystem 5100. It also …

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• Looking For Some Insight On IBM i Security

  February 17, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  There is no question that one of the biggest challenges for IT infrastructure and the applications that frolic atop it is making it the whole shebang secure. And with companies needing to provide more access to systems with users being remote and new ways of allowing customers to directly place orders, rather than through normal distribution channels thanks to the acceleration of trends caused by the coronavirus pandemic, making sure IBM i systems are secure has never been more necessary.

  Oh, and did we mention that the Internet is a hostile environment, if not an outright war zone?

  People need …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 23, Number 7

  February 17, 2021 Doug Bidwell

  This first bit in the news is a biggy for any Hardware Management Console (HMC) users. IBM has made an announcement regarding firmware for the HMC, and specifically, it regards FW950 and the required minimum HMC level of V9R2M950. What this means is that if the customer does not have a 7063-CR1 or Virtual HMC V9 appliance, they cannot HMC install/manage any Power9 server running FW950.

  See more at this link and look for more coverage in the next issue of The Four Hundred.

  Here is the rundown of PTF Groups by IBM i release level:

  PTF Groups 7.4: …

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• Big Blue Rolls Out Red Hat Power Stack

  February 15, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  A few weeks ago, we told you about some of the announcements that Big Blue was packaging up for Power Systems hardware and separately for the combination of its Red Hat systems software stack and Power Systems iron for on premises datacenters. These announcements are slated to go out on February 23, as far as we know, but the IBM Announcement Letter system often has other ideas and sometimes even violates the company’s own embargoes, as if it has a mind of its own.

  (For all we know, something that old and so full of data does have a mind …

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• A Conversation With Carol Woodbury on IBM i Security

  February 15, 2021 Dawn Winston

  Carol Woodbury has been a one of the most active and respected voices on IBM i security for decades. She is also an award-winning and internationally recognized speaker and writer on IBM i security. She has authored several books addressing IBM i security and is the only author with commercially available books dedicated to the topic.

  Currently, Carol Woodbury is the president, chief technology officer and co-founder of DXR Security. Precisely’s product marketing director, Dawn Winston, had a virtual Q&A session where she had a chance to discuss Woodbury’s insights on the current state of IBM i security.

  Dawn Winston: …

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• Guru: When An Outer Join Is An Inner Join

  February 15, 2021 Ted Holt

  When is a boy not a boy? When he’s abed! When is a door not a door? When it’s ajar! When is an outer join not an outer join? (Sorry, no dad joke here. Three dad jokes in one paragraph would have been too many, don’t you agree?) Let me answer that last question.

  In my work I often see outer joins that are not really outer joins, but inner joins. Oh, based on what I’ve heard from IBM, the query engine may treat them as outer joins, but the result set is the same as that produced by an …

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