• LinkIt Hooks IBM i to Windows

  October 29, 2013 Alex Woodie

  Several months ago, we told you about the new VTLBackup4i offering that VRTech launched in 2012. The folks at the Israeli software firm tell us they’re also having success with LinkIt, an integration tool that hooks IBM i applications to Web and Windows programs. According to VRTech, LinkIt provides integration between a midrange application and the data housed in Windows-based programs, including Word, Excel, Outlook, as well as document archives, document scanners, and biometric authentication. The software gives users another way to access data and documents from the IBM i environment and also provides another data and document output mechanism.

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• NSi Secures Printer Output

  October 29, 2013 Alex Woodie

  Notable Solutions (NSi) recently launched NSi Output Manager, its new offering designed to bolster the security of printed output by requiring a user to authenticate himself before retrieving the paper-based document at the printer. The software provides some IBM i and IPDS capabilities in its own right and supports an even broader array of source inputs as a part of NSi’s overall AutoStore suite. NSi Output Manager has two, interrelated roles. For starters, it’s designed to ensure that the person who sent a job to the printer is the one to pick it up, thereby helping to prevent sensitive information

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• Free Format RPG: It’s All About the Jobs

  October 29, 2013 Alex Woodie

  The upcoming free format enhancements that will debut with IBM i 7.1 Technology Refresh 7 (TR7) are good for the programming language and good for the platform as a whole. But according to IBM i educator Jim Buck, the biggest impact may be helping to attract a new generation of workers who are eager to find jobs. The free format RPG enhancements unveiled earlier this month will become available on November 15, when IBM ships a database group PTF that contains the free format updates to the RPG compiler. At that time, any developer working inside of Rational Developer for

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• Bytware Fights Advanced Security Threats with McAfee Update

  October 29, 2013 Alex Woodie

  Bytware has updated its IBM i malware detection software with the latest security technology from its business partner, McAfee. By adding the latest McAfee 5600 series engines to its StandGuard Anti-Virus offering, Bytware is giving IBM i shops the tools to detect the latest blended security attacks that combine multiple attack vectors, including viruses, worms, Trojans, rootkits, spyware, and other advanced persistent threats. It’s a well-known fact that Windows viruses and other assorted pieces of malware can reside in the IFS portion of an IBM i server. While the malware can’t infect the IBM i OS directly, the IFS

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• Actifio Supports IBM i with Copy Data Solution

  October 29, 2013 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops that are struggling to store and manage copies of their production data may be interested in a new solution unveiled this summer by Actifio. With the launch of Actifio version 6, the company added native IBM i support to its eponymous copy data software, which is a storage controller designed to centralize the storage of data, and thereby eliminate the need to copy and replicate data all over the place for various needs. Many IT organizations today are struggling to cope with ever-increasing storage demands. In many cases, it’s not the production data that’s eating an

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• Cloud and HANA Grow, Software Slows At SAP In Q3

  October 28, 2013 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The shift from software licensing for internal use to renting software on a cloud continues apace at application software giant SAP. In its third quarter, SAP’s software license sales were down and its cloud sales were up, and cloud revenues rose fast enough to more than offset license declines. In the period ending in September, SAP had €975 million in software license revenues, down 5 percent, but cloud subscriptions and support more than tripled to €191 million. SAP now has cloud revenues in excess of a €1 billion annual run rate, and has 33 million seats on its cloud.

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• ‘Puffery’ Claim Leads to Another Delay in Maxava-Vision Trial

  October 28, 2013 Alex Woodie

  The judge overseeing the legal dispute between IBM i high availability software vendors Maxava and Vision Solutions last month delayed the trial, which was scheduled to begin October 22. The judge decided to continue the pretrial conference until Halloween to give him time to respond to Vision’s request to restrict Maxava’s ability to introduce evidence of alleged statements by the defendants that were “mere puffery” and not violations of the law. At the September 23 pretrial conference, Judge George Wu rejected the Vision and Sirius “motion in limine” for an entry of judgment. That was one of two filings that

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• Avnet Makes Up Server Decline With Software, Storage, And Services

  October 28, 2013 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The Technology Solutions group at master distributor Avnet is one of the largest middlemen in the server distribution racket, and as expected, with Intel in the middle of processor transistors for its Xeon line, it was a bit tough going for system reselling in the first quarter of fiscal 2014 for the company. But sales of software, storage, and services were a different story. In the quarter ended in September, Avnet’s overall sales were $6.35 billion, up 8.1 percent, and net income was $120.6 million, up 20.3 percent thanks to product mix and cost-cutting initiatives launched earlier this year. In

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• Nothing Funny About Latest IT Jobs Numbers

  October 28, 2013 Jenny Thomas

  The economy added 148,000 jobs last month. Of course, all those people were hired to fix the Obamacare website. Funny, yes, but if only Jimmy Fallon’s recent Tweet on the latest job report were true, at least for our little sector of the world. The sad truth is the IT job market has been trending in the wrong direction and the September numbers marked the third month in a row of a slowdown in the creation of new IT jobs. The folks at Janco Associates watch the IT jobs market very closely and release their analysis of the national numbers

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• Reader Feedback On Modern, Free-Form RPG New Bloods

  October 28, 2013 Hey, Alex

  Well, maybe! As an IBM SE for many years, I found that business types could relate well to RPG as it was what it was, and they were not looking for bells and whistles. They were looking for solutions to problems for their companies. The new programmer learns on Windows and in most cases may know an awful lot but have little respect for the business of business. I loved helping these business types who were anointed to become programmers. I helped them know how to solve business problems with a business programming language. It was not so bad back

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