• SoftLanding Job Scheduler Goes with the Flow

  August 19, 2015 Alex Woodie

  When it comes to picking a job scheduler, IBM i shops shouldn’t feel as though they must buy software from incumbents, like IBM or others. In fact, you may be surprised at the number of job schedulers available from third-party suppliers. One of these, the AUTOMON for iSchedule job scheduler from SoftLanding Systems, recently received some notable improvements. Job scheduling on the IBM i platform has largely been a green-screen affair. But as job scheduling gets more complex and job dependencies get more convoluted, prospective buyers are increasingly looking for job schedulers with graphical user interfaces (GUIs) to help

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• Linoma Simplifies and Strengthens MFT Lineup

  August 19, 2015 Alex Woodie

  Linoma Software delivered a major overhaul of its flagship managed file transfer (MFT) solution last month with the release of GoAnywhere MFT 5.0. Workers will appreciate the shiny new HTML5 interface that lets them set up and execute file transfers with a few touches of the mouse, while behind the scenes, enhancements to GoAnywhere’s logging, security, and reporting functions will win points with regulation-wary administrators. In launching GoAnywhere MFT, Linoma is making a big product positioning change for the GoAnywhere lineup. GoAnywhere MFT combines two of Linoma’s previous MFT products, GoAnywhere Services (GAS) and GoAnywhere Director (GAD). GAS was aimed

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• Sony Ends MO Production–What Are Your Long-Term Archive Options Now?

  August 19, 2015 Alex Woodie

  Sony finally ended production of its magneto optical (MO) media at the end of 2014, forcing customers downstream to look for alternatives, if they haven’t already. That includes a number of customers in the government and healthcare industries who use MO drives with IBM‘s midrange server. These customers have a number of options available to them. Sony’s decision to end production of all MO media, including 9.1 GB, 5.2 GB, 2.6 GB, should not come as a shock to anybody who is paying attention. The company had ceased manufacturing MO drives a while ago, but continued to make MO

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• RCAC in DB2 for i, Part 1: Row Access Permissions

  August 18, 2015 Michael Sansoterra

  In a world of hackers, every data asset is vulnerable to theft or tampering. Protecting data can be costly, yet being hacked is even costlier. Enter IBM‘s row and column access control. RCAC is a big deal as businesses are looking for effective tools to control security, in particular, database security. RCAC allows database security administrators to tighten the reigns on who can view data in the database. Even better, many of these security measures can be implemented without changing applications. Versions of DB2, Postgre SQL, Oracle, SQL Server (currently in preview with Azure v12 and SQL Server 2016),

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• Set Your Library List From A Job Description

  August 18, 2015 Ted Holt

  Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here. On August 4, 2015, I asserted that the proper residence of a library list is a job description. Talk is cheap. Now it’s time for me to put my money where my mouth is. I have a utility that gives me easy access to the library lists in job descriptions. I wrote this utility last year, and now I use it daily with great results. Today I make that utility freely available for you to use in your shop. If I were to follow IBM’s naming convention, I

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• An Introduction to Processing XML With RPG, Part 2

  August 18, 2015 Jon Paris

  Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here. In the first part of this series I introduced you to the basics of using RPG’s XML-INTO op-code. In that tip I showed how the provision of a count provided by RPG in the PSDS can be used to determine how many of a repeating element were processed. However, as I noted at the time, this can only be used when handling a repeating outer element. But what if there is a repeating element within each of those outer elements? In this second part of the series we

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• Magic Software Rises Despite Devaluing U.S. Dollar

  August 17, 2015 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Hot on the heels of its announcement of enhancements to an in-memory data grid for its Magic xpa application development environment that will eventually support the IBM i platform, Magic Software turned in pretty good numbers in its most recent quarter despite the compressing effects of current fluctuations that are affecting all global IT suppliers. In the second quarter ended in June, Magic said that it had increased revenues by 4.6 percent to $42.5 million. Gross profits were down 4.4 percent to $15 million, but the revenue bump was large enough to cover the gap and net income actually rose

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• Mobile Apps And The IBM i Fear Factory

  August 17, 2015 Dan Burger

  “It can seem scary when you look at all the different mobile devices and wonder how to develop something that works for everything.” Those are the words of mobile application developer Nick Hampson. Fear of the unknown is a powerful preventative. It’s not a happy place, especially if your job is to create mobile business applications for an IBM i-centric organization. Rid yourself of this anxiety right away. “I think the real stumbling block for IBM i people–if they are coming from SEU and PDM–is that there are completely new skills. It’s quite muddy for people to see. I talk

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• Staying Paperless On IBM i In A Post-It Note World

  August 17, 2015 Alex Woodie

  At some point during the move to the all-digital office, customers discovered they’re missing something that’s little, yellow, and slightly sticky. Since 3M launched the humble Post-it note 35 years ago, it has grown to become an irreplaceable component of the American corporate machine. In fact, it’s so ingrained in how we work that IntelliChief recently added Post-it note-like functionality to its workflow management software. “What we found was it’s really a Post-it note world,” IntelliChief marketing manager Tim Nissen tells IT Jungle. “It’s amazing how everybody understands the value of the mighty Post-it note. We thought, hey, if

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• BI On IBM i: A Fish Out Of Water

  August 17, 2015 Dan Burger

  A fish discovers it needs water when it is no longer in it. A business discovers it needs data when it can’t get it. Or, in many cases, it can’t get the data it wants, when it’s wanted, and how it’s wanted. In the IBM midrange, the term “operational reporting” has been around forever. Because we have a habit of changing the names of old things to make them sound new, the term “business intelligence” is more favored. What matters is getting information in a timely manner and in a friendly format. The underlying infrastructure doesn’t matter. Operational reporting is

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