• The IT Balancing Act

  May 1, 2023 Bill Langston

  Medical research suggests that how well you can maintain your balance is a powerful predictor of your longevity. Balance is also a good indicator of longevity for your IBM i environment. The challenge is striking the right balance between “vertical” technology that helps your company work efficiently and accurately, and “horizontal” technology that reduces risk.

  Over the past few years, unprecedented forces shifted IT priorities and may have knocked your company’s IBM i environment off balance.

  Enabling IT Balance

  IBM i exists because of how well it runs complex business applications and manages data. We take for granted that the …

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• IBM Looks To Grow New Power College Program From The Ground Up

  May 1, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The “DANGER” sign is flashing red when it comes to IBM i skills. There simply aren’t enough people with IBM i skills to fill the market need, and the situation seems to be getting worse year by year. The good news is that IBM is aware of the problem and has launched a new program that executives hope will lead to more students learning IBM i skills and getting good jobs in the industry.

  The worker shortage is a nationwide problem and is impacting multiple industries. From waiters and truck drivers to teachers and programmers, there just aren’t enough workers …

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• IBM Updates Performance Guide For Latest Power10 Iron

  May 1, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  No matter what system you are talking about, no matter what kind of applications you are running, there are always ways to squeeze more performance out of the system. The IBM i platform running atop Power10 and earlier processors is no exception, and to that end, for several years now Big Blue has provided some guidance on pushing performance with each new CPU family and as new features are added to the OS/400 and IBM i software stack.

  The latest such update, according to Steve Will, chief architect of the IBM i platform, has just been published, and you can …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 25, Number 18

  May 1, 2023 Doug Bidwell

  A new week, a new security vulnerability in the IBM i platform. This time around, we have Security Bulletin: Vulnerability in libtasn1 (CVE-2021-46848) affects Power HMC, which you can read more about at this link. The Affected products and versions are: HMC V10.1.1010.0, HMC V10.2.1030.0, and HMC V9.2.950.0. The remediation/fixes for the vulnerability are:

  Product	VRMF			APAR		Remediation/Fix
  Power HMC	V9.2.950.0 SP3 ppc	MB04397	MH01954
  Power HMC	V9.2.950.0 SP3 x86	MB04396	MH01953
  Power HMC	V10.1.1020.0 SP1 ppc	MB04388	MF70701
  Power HMC	V10.1.1020.0 SP1 x86	MB04387	MF70700
  Power HMC	V10.2.1030.0 ppc	MB04401	MF70890
  Power HMC	V10.2.1030.0 SP1 x86	MB04400	MF70889
  

  …

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• IBM i at 35: A Walk Down Memory Lane

  April 26, 2023 Alex Woodie

  You may have heard that the IBM midrange platform is turning 35 this year. IBM has a number of events planned in honor of that milestone, culminating with a big birthday bash on June 21. IBM execs gave us a sneak peak of the festivities to come at this week’s POWERUp show in Denver, as well as a technical look back at exactly how we got here.

  The day the AS/400 launched in 1988 was notable for several reasons. IBM i CTO Steve Will, who was just starting his distinguished engineering career at IBM, recalls lots of excitement in the …

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• An Update On Power From POWERUp 2023

  April 26, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  After so many years of not normal, it is comforting to do something to feel normal, like travel to what used to be the COMMON spring user conference and what is now called POWERUp, and in particular POWERUp 2023. (I am only using the official capitalization there because Jenny will change it during edit if I don’t.) I don’t want to leave the hill I live on, especially after so many years of traveling many times a month, but I must say that I enjoyed myself and had my share of boisterous conversations, beer, and food.

  And work, of course. …

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• COMMON POWERUp 2023 – Reporter’s Notebook

  April 26, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The international IBM i community descended upon Denver this week for COMMON’s annual POWERUp conference, which continues through tomorrow. By all accounts, the show was a success among attendees, educators, exhibitors, and IBM. Here are a few observations on the show.

  COMMON’s top-notch education was the big draw in the High Plains of Colorado, with more than 300 sessions planned over the four-day event. Sessions containing information about the latest Technology Refreshes (TRs) of IBM i, including 7.5 TR2 and 7.4 TR8, were well attended, including those from IBM i CTO Steve Will and his business architects, including Scott …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, April 26

  April 26, 2023 Jenny Thomas

  This has been an exciting week for the IBM i ecosystem. The world’s largest IBM i conference POWERUp 2023 is wrapping up soon, and our team came back with lots of news that you will be reading in The Four Hundred in the coming weeks. If you were (or are) in Denver, you might have seen editors Tim Prickett Morgan and Alex Woodie hopping into sessions or roaming the expo floor. So while they finish up in Colorado and start working up the latest news, read on for the latest news from in and around the industry. More to come …

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• What the Spring 2023 TR Brings Db2 for i

  April 26, 2023 Alex Woodie

  As the beating heart of the IBM i platform, the Db2 for i database received its share of attending from Rochester for the Spring 2023 Technology Refresh. Among the goodness becoming available next week are enhancements to the database proper as well as a gaggle of new and improved IBM i services.

  One database enhancement common to both IBM i 7.5 TR2 and 7.4 TR8 is an improvement to SQL-based Web services using specific data types. The database and its SQL dialect already supported working with character large object (CLOBs) from the SQL HTTP REST functions, and provided commands for …

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• Storage Helps Power Systems Grow In The First Quarter

  April 24, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Here is a peculiar thing: It is almost like there are two different Power Systems customer sets. Those that spend big in the second quarter and fourth quarter of every year and those that spend less big in the first and third quarters of every year.

  While we understand the normal Q4 bump that happens because there are decades of traditions, founded on good budgetary and capacity planning practices, we are a bit perplexed why when it comes to the Power Systems market at least, Q2 is almost as good revenue-wise as the prior Q4. We admit fully that this …

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