• Applications Misfire When Database Integrity Ignored

  September 24, 2012 Dan Burger

  By the time the cow is out of the barn, it’s too late to close the door. For many companies, including those in the IBM midrange community, applications that have served well for many years with patches and fixes are needing attention just like that barn door. The choice between proactive and reactive problem solving is one way of looking at the situation. The choice between application-centric development and data-centric development also awaits. Just about every IBM i shop is engaged in application-centric development, which is both good and bad. Application development is the engine that drives business and can

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• Python On IBM i: Why?

  September 24, 2012 Alex Woodie

  Why might you want to run Python on the IBM i platform? According to the folks at iSeries Python who manage the port of the open source language to IBM i, Python is so readable and easy to learn that it gives programmers a big boost in productivity when they use it, particularly for reporting purposes. And with the recent completion of the port of the Django framework to IBM i, there is one more reason to consider adding Python to your quiver. The iSeries Python project, which is the brainchild of Per Gummedal, began around 2004. Since then, Gummedal

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• Power7+ Systems Due To Launch October 3

  September 24, 2012 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Ladies and gentlemen, start your checkbooks. We’ve been telling you all about the impending Power7+ processors and speculating on the related servers for so long you probably think they are already here and can’t figure out why they aren’t available from IBM‘s business partner channel. It looks like we won’t have to wait much longer to see what Big Blue is going to do to ratchet up its assault on Oracle and Hewlett-Packard in the RISC/Unix racket while preserving its IBM i platform and keeping the X86 legions at bay. It’s a delicate bit of maneuvering that IBM has

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• Admin Alert: Eternal Users: A Common Problem With IBM i Batch Jobs

  September 19, 2012 Joe Hertvik

  Many IBM i shops have problems with eternal users. Eternal users are user profiles previously used by former IBM i power users that are still on the system. Although these users have left your organization, you can’t delete their user profiles, because the profiles are used in IBM i functions used to run batch jobs. This week, let’s look at eternal users and how to weed them out of your system. How The Gotcha Gets Ya Eternal users happen when administrators use their own or other power user profiles for submitting batch work to the system. Batch jobs are frequently

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• OSHA Changes To IBM Battery Handling Affect Cache Battery Replacement

  September 19, 2012 Hey, Joe

  I’m scheduling cache battery replacement for my production machine. Since this machine is never off-line, do you have any best practices or recommendations for how to change these batteries while production is running? –Ben Due to a recent United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) change, changing the cache batteries on your IBM i partitions isn’t as easy as it used to be, especially on a production machine. Here’s what happened. IBM uses batteries in its disk controllers to provide disk drive caching. The batteries have a useful life of about 2.75 to 3 years and the system will

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• The New Basics: Indicators

  September 19, 2012 Jon Paris

  The history of indicators pre-dates even the earliest versions of RPG and takes us all the way back to the old tabulating machines, perhaps even earlier depending on how broad a definition one uses. What is without doubt, though, is that indicators in the sense of *INnn and *INLR were introduced to the RPG language as a vehicle for translating those old tabulator board programs. RPG has grown a lot since those early days, and yet many people still write code using the old-style numbered indicators. LR? Well, we’re kind of stuck with that, but there hasn’t been a need

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• RJS Strikes Again

  September 18, 2012 Alex Woodie

  For the second time in two months, IBM i document management software provider RJS Software Systems has acquired a software development firm in the Twin Cities area. Last week, RJS announced it bought EpicScience, a St. Paul-based managed services company specializing in IT support, network administration, and custom program development. The 20-year-old company provided hosting services for a range of servers and networking gear. It also provided custom development and integration services. “We look forward to adding our IT experience to the RJS team and are excited to offer our skills and services to RJS Software’s broad customer base,” EpicScience

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• Global IT Spending to Hit $3.6 Trillion, IDC Says

  September 18, 2012 Alex Woodie

  Backed by strong sales of business software in the first half of 2012, global IT spending is on pace to reach $1.9 trillion for the year, a 6 percent increase over total spending in 2011, IDC said last week. IDC said that better than expected sales of software by businesses looking to boost efficiency, as well as strong showings in storage, networking, and mobile device sales, helped prop up the global IT market during the first six months of the year, as sales of PCs, servers, peripherals and telecom gear lagged. IDC’s forecast was issued in constant currency terms. The

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• Rocket Ships New Release of PASSPORT Web to Host

  September 18, 2012 Alex Woodie

  Rocket Software last month announced the availability of a new version of its Web-based terminal emulation software, PASSPORT Web to Host 2012. Rocket says the new release of the former Zephyr product runs on Windows 8 and has an “updated look-and-feel that is compatible” with Microsoft Office applications. Rocket acquired Zephyr and its PASSPORT lines of products earlier this year to bolster its existing line of emulators, which included the BlueZone products obtained with its Seagull Software acquisition in 2006. PASSPORT Web to Host is based on Microsoft ActiveX technology, and supports displaying multiple 3270, 5250, and VT sessions or

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• Wholesaler Mobilizes IBM i App with Help from Profound Logic

  September 18, 2012 Alex Woodie

  WinWholesale, a Dayton, Ohio-based conglomerate of more than 520 wholesale companies, has mobile-enabled its homegrown IBM i-based ERP system with Profound Logic Genie. With the capability to access the ERP system through an iPad, the company now has an interface that is suitable for the 21st century. WinWholesale is a collection of wholesale distributors of plumbing and heating supplies, including pipes, valves, fittings, pumps, refrigeration, and air conditioning equipment. The company has equity stakes in 470 companies displaying the “Win” prefix and another 70 under Noland Company. The privately held company develops and runs its own IBM i-based ERP system

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