• IBM i Technology Refreshes and PTFs: Be Careful

  October 24, 2011 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Starting last year, IBM started doing what it calls Technology Rrefreshes for the IBM i operating system that provide support for new systems and peripherals as they come to market. These Technology Refreshes are numbered–TR3 came out on October 12 with the new Power Systems servers–so you can keep track of them. But it may not be entirely obvious how you should deal with them if you are used to patching your system with PTFs. Doug Bidwell, who puts together the System i PTF Guide that is published at IT Jungle, offers some insight and advice: The latest technology

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• IBM Chooses Power Systems Champions

  October 24, 2011 Dan Burger

  Real innovation and emerging trends can get lost in the IT world where buzzwords show up and disappear like the phases of the moon. The IBM Power Systems universe is no different. Maybe the buzz isn’t as deafening and maybe the innovation and trends sometimes get buried under the weight of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” status quo–a place where “No Innovation” signs are nailed to all the fence posts–but the Power Systems users have their moments of glory. Giving the innovators a bigger stage is the idea behind the IBM Champions, a group of IT professionals, developers,

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• CUoD Processor Activation Prices Cut In Half for Big Power7 Iron

  October 24, 2011 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  As we report elsewhere in this issue of The Four Hundred, the high-end of the new Power7-based Power Systems line did particularly well on the growth front in the third quarter (albeit against some easy compares), and IBM wants more in the fourth quarter. Late last week, in announcement number 311-155, Big Blue snuck out a Power7 Capacity Upgrade on Demand (CUoD) discount promotion that offers customers with Power 770, 780, and 795 machines that were installed as of October 1. Under the deal, IBM is cutting the price of activating cores on certain processor cards used in

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• Vision Expands Sales and Marketing Efforts with New Team

  October 24, 2011 Jenny Thomas

  It’s been said that there’s no “i” in “team,” but high availability software and services provider Vision Solutions may take issue with that expression. Vision recently made several new appointments to its sales and marketing team, and Bob Johnson, who was tapped as executive vice president sales and marketing, has his eye on the IBM i platform. “The System i is our heritage and still represents the majority of our revenue stream,” said Johnson. “You might be surprised to hear me say this, but I am as excited as I’ve ever been about the future of the i.” And he

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• Return a User Profile Listing to a .NET Client

  October 19, 2011 Hey, Mike

  I am a VB.NET programmer and am looking to retrieve a list of all users and their expiration dates on our AS/400 system. I stumbled across the cwbx library and have been able to connect to our system, but not much else from there. Can you suggest how this info can be retrieved from VB.NET? Thanks. –Elliot Hi, Elliot: The easiest way to retrieve this user info is to use the i/OS Display User Profile (DSPUSRPRF) command and dump the results to a table (also known as an outfile): DSPUSRPRF USRPRF(*ALL) OUTPUT(*OUTFILE) OUTFILE(QTEMP/LSTUSRPRFP) The above command (assuming you have the

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• Dealing with Faulty Logic

  October 19, 2011 Ted Holt

  Supposedly computer programming is a logical science. One would think, then, that computer programmers would be logical thinkers. It is not so. Let me provide a few examples of illogical thinking taken from real production programs. Then I will show a simple, low-tech way to deal with logical expressions so that they don’t end up illogical. Let’s start with this example taken from fixed-format RPG specs. I suggest you find the bad logic yourself before reading my comments. TYPE IFNE 'A' TYPE IFEQ 'S' XCODE CABNE 'S' CONTIN ENDIF TYPE IFEQ *BLANK XCODE CABEQ 'S' CONTIN ENDIF ENDIF This code

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• Admin Alert: Adding Redundancy to Power i SMS Monitoring

  October 19, 2011 Joe Hertvik

  In an earlier column, I discussed how to use email addressing to send text message alerts to Power i administrators when a problem occurs. This week, I’ll discuss how to enhance that solution by providing redundancy for i OS text messaging, so that urgent messages can always be delivered regardless of whether or not your email system is running. The Coverage Plan, Phase I In my previous article, I outlined a monitoring plan for using cell phones, email, and text messages to alert administrators when critical iSeries, System i, and Power i events occur. This plan consisted of

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• New Xcase Release Propels DDS-to-SQL Migrations

  October 18, 2011 Dan Burger

  If you think IBM DB2 database modernization is a time-consuming, money-gobbling adventure into the unknown, you’re right. But that’s the correct answer only if you try to wade through it while depending on manual procedures. Automation will save time and money, as it always does when the alternative is dependent on heavy manual labor. That’s exactly why Resolution Software designed and is selling Xcase Modernize-DB, which last week became generally available in version 9.1. Databases at typical IBM i shops are like roadkill. The older they are, the more likely they are to smell. If you’re around them all the

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• MPG Launches Web Interface for IBM i Performance Metrics

  October 18, 2011 Alex Woodie

  The IBM i server performance experts at Midrange Performance Group have created a new product that displays key IBM i performance metrics such as CPU, disk, and memory consumption in a graphical user interface. Called EXPO (short for Executive Performance Overview), the new offering uses color-coded graphics to quickly show managers how their IBM i server is running, and allows them to drill down into more detailed performance data to get to the root of potential problems. MPG has been showing IBM i performance data in a Web browser for a few years now. According to MPG’s Randy Watson, the

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• Gamma Partners with Taylored for Integrated Time Clocks

  October 18, 2011 Alex Woodie

  Gamma Software, a developer of accounting and human resources software for the IBM i OS, has hooked up with the IBM i consultancy startup Taylored Software, the companies announced last month. The two companies have worked together to create a direct interface between Taylored’s new NetShift time clock system and the GammaSoft Executive Suite. Typically, when two or more IT vendors are involved with the same customer, you can count on there being a bit of work involved to get those products to talk to each other. It just goes without saying that the system integrators will get

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