• Forced Windows Migration Failures

  November 28, 2016 Dan Burger

  Here’s what 90 percent of the companies don’t do before, during, and after making the decision to migrate from IBM i to Windows. They don’t plan the way they would for any other major business event. Quite possibly that’s because management doesn’t understand the system they currently have and how it works, nor do they understand what the new system entails. Hasty decisions can be costly decisions. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are wasted. A recent blog post by Bob Losey on LinkedIn casts a critical look at these migrations and why so many of them are failures. Bob Losey

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• Calling SQL Functions From RPG, A Service Program

  November 15, 2016 Paul Tuohy

  Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here. In this article I would like to introduce a service program that provides RPG subprocedure “wrappers” for using SQL scalar functions. This means you can use an SQL scalar function as if it were an RPG built-in function. Using an SQL scalar function can be a lot easier than using the RPG alternative: Use the UPPER function instead of defining two translation strings and using %XLATE. Use DAYNAME function instead of calculating the day of the week and using an array to provide the day name. Using the

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• SQL PL–The LOOP Loop

  November 15, 2016 Ted Holt

  In the previous episode of this exciting series, I wrote about FOR, arguably the most useful of the SQL PL looping structures. Next in line of usefulness, in my opinion, is the LOOP structure. Like the rest of SQL PL, this is an easy structure to master, and I am pleased to write about it. In its simplest form, the syntax of the LOOP structure is as follows: LOOP - body - END LOOP Here is a more realistic version of the syntax: label: LOOP - body - END LOOP label The body contains any assortment of simple statements

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• QTEMP Is A Different Animal

  November 15, 2016 Hey, Ted

  I have a problem with an FTP script. I wish to send a file in QTEMP to a remote system, but the script tries to send the file from QGPL instead. The PUT command does not tell which library to send the file from because our standards prohibit the use of hard-coded library names. Any thoughts will be appreciated. –Al I commend you and other wise people in your shop for outlawing the hard-coding of library names, Al. The library list is a wonderful feature of IBM i, a feature that is sorely missing from other database systems. I have

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• IBM Cuts Core And Memory Pricing On Entry Power Iron

  November 14, 2016 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We are always trying to get IBM to do more to promote the IBM i platform and the Power Systems hardware that comprises the physical part of that platform. In days gone by, Big Blue used to make very public and loud pronouncements regarding its ability to bring customers more value for the dollar, often above and beyond the Moore’s Law capacity increases that are just part of the chip business and usually at the tail end of the product cycle as we are now with the Power8 machines that have been shipping since April 2014. IBM is not as

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• Vulnerabilities In 3DES Encryption Put It Out To Pasture In IBM i

  November 14, 2016 Alex Woodie

  IBM i customers should stop using 3DES, also known as Triple DES, ciphers due to the SWEET32 vulnerabilities that could leave sensitive information unprotected as it moves between client and server via the OpenSSL and OpenVPN protocols. This was the gist of a security alert sent last week by IBM, which also issued new PTFs to address the problems in its own IBM i products. On November 4, IBM issued security bulletin N1021697, which discussed what to do about so-called SWEET32 security vulnerabilities in OpenSSL and OpenVPN. The security problems, which are detailed in CVE-2016-2183 (for OpenSSL) and

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• IBM i Shops Do Less To Get More Done

  November 14, 2016 Dan Burger

  Offloading workloads seems to be a popular pastime for more and more IBM i shops. Some of that work goes to other platforms, but we also see the managed service providers (MSPs) with IBM i capabilities picking up jobs. Traditionally this has been disaster recovery service, but production environments are headed that way as well as shops take a closer look at internal IT staff capabilities and set business priorities. Workload distribution has become a strategic necessity. The trend of moving production IT environments to managed service providers continues to be steady among midsize companies with IT staff tied up

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• Mad Dog 21/21: Of Possible Interest

  November 14, 2016 Hesh Wiener

  Jacob ben Wolf Kranz was, in the second half of the 18th century, the Preacher of Dubno or, in Yiddish, the Dubner Magid. Dubno is a small city in the Ukraine. Two and a half centuries later, Virginia Rometty, the Big Cheese of Big Blue, appears to have heard at least one of the Magid’s tales. Assisted by the Magid’s sagacity, Rometty has soothed the savages of the sell side, beguiled the barbarians of the buy side and inveigled that illustrious investor on the outside, the Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffet. Janet Yellen: The head of the Federal Reserve Bank

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• You’re Hired! Finding Your Next IBM i Pro

  November 14, 2016 Dan Burger

  The skills shortage dilemma for IBM i shops is a reality. It’s also an excuse. New technologies are being introduced rapid fire in IT and each has a learning curve that is being handled by people who choose to do so. It takes time and effort. This is enterprise computing. It’s slightly more difficult than learning to play the kazoo. But nearly every IBM midrange system admin or RPG programmer started out being thrown into the deep end of the pool. You don’t find new employees with the enterprise skill sets of someone with 10, 20, or 30 years of

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• Is the IBM i Skills Shortage Accelerating Platform Migrations?

  November 9, 2016 Alex Woodie

  There are a lot of headwinds working against the IBM i platform, including a high up-front cost, a legacy perception, and executives who automatically default to X64 technology with technology decisions. These are all external challenges that the IBM i community can’t do much about. But there’s one headwind that’s internal to the IBM i community: A growing lack of personnel with the requisite IBM i skills. One company that’s transitioning off the IBM i platform due, in part, to a lack of skills is PRGX. For decades, the Atlanta, Georgia, company used IBM‘s midrange server to automate many

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