• Investment And Integration Indicators For IBM i

  January 22, 2018 Dan Burger

  Steve Will can talk a blue streak. IBM, sometimes referred to as Big Blue, pays Will to do that. As chief architect of the IBM i operating system, he has a lot of other responsibilities, too. One of them is to listen. He travels around the world talking with and listening to IBM i customers.

  Last week, Will stopped by Southern California to attend the OCEAN user group meeting in Orange County. In his keynote session, he talked about IBM i strategy (that’s a bigger part of his job than listening), investments, and commitment to the future of the platform. …

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• Guru: Using Curl To Interact With Web Services

  January 22, 2018 Jacob Holt

  There have been times where I have had to collect or enter data into vendor websites. While usually this was not a hassle, it was an uncommon function of my job. However, it wasn’t long before the standard business process got unbearable. I began looking for ways to automate those tasks by using the command-line program Curl to get and post data to vendor web services.

  Curl is an open-source program that supports a plethora of internet protocols for transferring data. With its wide-ranging parameters, this program offers much power for automating tedious tasks. But just like other highly flexible …

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• Syncsort Finds Security Key To Business Resilience

  January 22, 2018 Alex Woodie

  Syncsort is keeping up the tradition started 10 years ago by Vision Solutions, which it now owns, by publishing a State of Resilience report. This year’s report focuses the spotlight heavily on one particular aspect of IT operations that’s on everybody’s minds following a turbulent 2017: security.

  After surveying 5,632 IT professionals from January through July of last year, Syncsort found that security was the initiative at the top of most IT pros’ minds. Looking out over the next 24 months, security emerged as the top initiative, accounting for 49% of the votes, followed by high availability.

  Specifically, IT professionals …

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• IBM’s Systems Group On The Financial Rebound

  January 22, 2018 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  We like to start with the good news here in 2018, and the good news is that IBM had a very good quarter in its systems business, so we can all start breathing a little easier and Hitachi can put that checkbook away because Big Blue ain’t going to be selling off its System z and Power Systems business any time soon.

  (We are joking there. We think. . . . and hope.)

  In the final quarter of 2017 ended in December, the mainframe saw sales shoot up 71 percent thanks to the System z14 refresh that started in …

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• Security Still Dominates IBM i Discussion, HelpSystems’ 2018 Survey Reveals

  January 17, 2018 Alex Woodie

  HelpSystems released its much-anticipated annual survey of the IBM i installed base this week and the least surprising finding is this: Security remains the biggest concerns of IBM i shops. However, while security dominates the discussion, the survey revealed that most IBM i shops have no concrete plans to do much about it.

  HelpSystems started its annual Marketplace Survey way back in 2014 (with the first survey published in early 2015), and over the years it’s become one of the most cited references for data about the IBM i installed base. Other vendors conduct surveys too, and IT Jungle …

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• Industry Speaks: IBM i Predictions For 2018

  January 17, 2018 Alex Woodie

  It may just be another day on the calendar, but there’s something special about January 1. The beginning of a new year gives us a chance to ponder industry trends and anticipate what’s likely to occur over the next 364 days. We’re two weeks into the new year, but it’s not too late to turn the mic over to IBM i industry insiders for their 2018 predictions.

  Here’s what they had to say:

  “Extending and stretching applications is the order of the day. Refactoring and modernizing. More and more shops running legacy apps will come out of the shadows as …

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• Will Security As A Service Relieve The Pressure On IBM i Shops?

  January 17, 2018 Dan Burger

  Security is all about control. Either you are in control of your data or you are out of control, possibly unaware that security exposure and vulnerabilities exist, and most importantly unable to respond in a coordinated and logical manner. Lack of security acumen and a fear of what a data breach could do to cripple or destroy a business has many companies searching for answers. It gets mentioned often enough by iTech Solutions Group customers that it led to iTech offering security as a service, which helps companies devise a security policy, puts controls in place, and monitors system security …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, January 17

  January 17, 2018 Dan Burger

  Forward-looking RPG programmers are modernizing legacy systems and making it clear IBM i is not the dinosaur that some folks think it is. Along with modernized thinking, comes the need for education and training and learning the skills needed to build next-generation applications. Where does that skill set come from? How long does it take to be skillful? Hear what two insiders have to say on the subject.

  Other stories topics in Monitor this week include: the complexity of multi-cloud environments, the dismantling of IBM Global Technical Services, and the IBM i trends that indicate good things to come, as …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 20, Number 2

  January 17, 2018 Doug Bidwell

  Spectre and Meltdown. Just the names are scary, and kind of remind you of a James Bond thriller! From an IBM i perspective, we should be ready, but hold on just a little bit longer until the story plays out. There is a licensed internal code, or LIC, PTF out for each of the release:

  • V7R3 – MF64551
  • V7R2 – MF64552
  • V7R1 – MF64553

  These can be ordered individually, but are not as yet included in either the HIPER or Security PTF Groups. (That seems strange!)

  In the cover letters for the LIC PTFs, it states that they can be …

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• Update On The Spectre And Meltdown Patches For Power

  January 15, 2018 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  When it comes to the Spectre and Meltdown speculative execution security vulnerabilities that hit as the new year was getting going, the important word to ponder is “mitigated.” Everyone is talking about mitigating the issue, but no one is using the word “fixed.” As we discussed last week, one of the two types of Spectre vulnerabilities – the Variant 2 known as branch target injection – is particularly tricky to hack and to fix, so IT vendors are choosing their words very carefully.

  The odds were that unintended consequences for such a low-level fix will occur, so you can …

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