• Quantum Boosts Disk Array and Tape Library Capacity

  November 15, 2011 Alex Woodie

  Quantum today announced it’s boosted the capacity of its largest DXi-Series disk array and de-duplication device to 320 TB, giving customers a 60 percent increase in total storage. The company also unveiled an upgraded iScalar tape library that features dual robotics and a secret compartment for hiding tape archives that won’t get customers dinged on application license fees. Quantum’s latest stuff is available to IBM i shops through its recently renewed partnership with Tributary Systems. Quantum is battling market leader Data Domain for a share of the data de-duplication market, which is valued somewhere between $2 billion and $3

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• NGS Updates IBM i-Based BI Suite

  November 15, 2011 Alex Woodie

  New Generation Software last week unveiled a new release of NGS-IQ, its suite of reporting and business intelligence tools for the IBM i server. The vendor has enhanced several aspects of the NGS-IQ suite with version 7.l, including better formatting of reports for mobile phones and tablets, new charting and drill-down capabilities, and a new query search feature that should make it easier for developers to find stuff they’ve already built in NGS-IQ. NGS-IQ is a large suite of IBM i- and Windows-based BI and reporting software that’s used by a reported 25,000 IBM i users around the world. The

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• RVI and Quadrant Debut Remote Signature Capture for iPads

  November 15, 2011 Alex Woodie

  Real Vision Software (RVI) and Quadrant Software this week are unveiling a new iOS and IBM i-based signature capture solution that dramatically reduces the time it takes to log a signature–such as proof of delivery–into an IBM i application. The offering, which combines RVI software that turns an iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch into a signature capture device and Quadrant’s IBM i-based document management software, enables users to send bills electronically within minutes of capturing a signature. RVI employees looked into signature capture technology at the urging of a couple of customers who use its IBM i-based document imaging software,

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• PlanetJ Unveils Free Edition of IBM i Web App Dev Tool

  November 15, 2011 Alex Woodie

  PlanetJ recently announced a free community version of WOW, its Web application development framework for IBM i and other servers. The free version gives any IBM i shop the capability to build read-only interfaces to their existing RPG or COBOL applications, and to do so fairly quickly. The announcement marks a change in business strategy for PlanetJ, which is looking to boost its profile and get its solutions in the hands of more IBM i customers. WOW (Web Object Wizard) is a model-based rapid application development tool and runtime that excels at delivering data-driven Web interfaces to existing applications and

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• ASNA Readies Wings Update For Next ‘palooza

  November 14, 2011 Dan Burger

  Having application development tools at your disposal is all well and good, but having the skills to make use of them in a big way is what really makes the boat float. That’s why a company like ASNA came up with the idea 11 years ago to host a tech conference for the users of its products. If you are admittedly not one of the sharpest knives in the drawer when it comes to developing and modernizing applications the ASNA way, the ASNApalooza conference is a wise choice to hone your skills with hands-on lab sessions, meetings with the big

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• John Opel, Former IBM CEO, 1925-2011

  November 14, 2011 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  John Opel didn’t want to run a hardware store after college and the great irony (pun intended) is that he ended up running IBM, the largest data processing hardware company in the world at the peak of its mainframe and midrange prowess. Opel, who was 86, died on November 3. He was IBM’s fifth CEO and without a doubt one of its better ones. Ginni Rometty, who will be IBM’s ninth CEO when she takes over on January 1, has several sets of big shoes to fill. (Well, the assumption is that Lou Gerstner’s were not that big physically,

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• Profits Grow Faster Than Sales At Jack Henry In Fiscal Q1

  November 14, 2011 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Jack Henry & Associates, a software and services provider for the financial sector that has a decently sized IBM i business, has turned in another good quarter of sales. In the quarter ended in September, which was Jack Henry’s first quarter of fiscal 2012, hardware sales, which includes Power Systems running IBM i as well as other platforms, rose by 7 percent to $15.8 million. Software license sales skyrocketed 30 percent to $12.3 million, and support and services revenues were up a more modest 5 percent but weighed in at $220.3 million. (Within the support and services segment, Jack

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• Help Fund the Al Barsa Memorial Scholarship

  November 14, 2011 Jenny Thomas

  The Al Barsa Memorial Scholarship, created in 2008 to honor the beloved advocate of the AS/400 platform, is looking to up donations with a challenge grant. The challenge grant is sponsored by midrange.com, which has pledged to contribute a dollar for every dollar contributed by other people (up to a maximum of $300). The challenge will count for any donations made between now and December 24. Contributions should be made directly to the COMMON Education Foundation here. Midrange.com needs your help tracking the donations, so after you make your contribution, please email midrange.com owner, David Gibbs, here,

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• Reader Feedback On Fun With IBM i Software Pricing

  November 14, 2011 Hey, TPM

  You said: “So, if you have an entry Power 710 or 720 machine, you are paying $7.29 per day to use IBM i 7.1.” I’m based in the United Kingdom, so the numbers are different over here, but how does that stack up compared to the utilities cost per employee, I wonder? And maybe the phone bill? And the cost of IT support staffing to keep everyone up and running? I’m sure I heard that the corporate rate for IT support was horrendous for Windows and it’s not like you can access an IBM i without using Windows these days,

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• Get Thee To The i Cloud, IBM’s Kugler Says

  November 14, 2011 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops should take a long, hard look at cloud computing and see if it makes sense for them, IBM‘s director of business development for the IBM i business, Ari Kugler, said in a webinar last week. During his presentation with IBM i cloud service provider Symmetry, Kugler said that the security and scalability of the IBM i platform, coupled with the price/performance of the Power7 servers, has opened new opportunities for cloud computing. “The time for cloud is now,” he said. Since he joined the IBM Rochester team last year, Kugler has become one of the

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