• Kyndryl Inspects The Modernization Plans Of IBM i And Mainframe Shops

  November 6, 2023 Alex Woodie

  What paths are IBM i and mainframe users taking in terms of application modernization and digital transformation, and what sorts of results are those efforts producing? Those are good questions, and they are ones that Kyndryl, the former IBM Global Technology Services arm, provides some answers to in a new report.

  Kyndryl commissioned Coleman Parkes Research to survey 500 IBM i and mainframe shops from around the world about their plans for application modernization and transformation. The survey results form the basis for its appropriately named 2023 State of Mainframe Modernization Survey Report, which you can download here. …

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• Fall 2023 IBM i Tech Refresh Brings Something For Everyone

  October 11, 2023 Alex Woodie

  As expected, IBM yesterday unveiled its fall Technology Refresh (TR) for IBM i, with updates starting to become available on November 17. IBM announced no new products as part of the fall 2023 TR cycle, but it did spread the love around by giving just about everybody something to cheer about in IBM i 7.5 TR3 and 7.4 TR9.

  Lots of different products that make up the IBM i environment will see some pretty meaningful enhancements with this release. If you spend a lot of time in Navigator for i or ACS, you will see new stuff. We haven’t had …

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• The Science Of Lifting And Shifting To The Cloud

  October 11, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Companies in Japan have a long and deep history with IBM computing systems, both its mainframe and its midrange platforms. And in some cases, they have moved from one to the other to maintain the IBM style of integrated systems while attaining the benefits of what many customers still consider the more integrated, less expensive, and easier to use platform that Big Blue offers: Namely, the AS/400 launched in 1988 and its progeny up through the current IBM i generation.

  Such is the case with Kosei Securities Co Ltd, which was founded way back in 1961 in Osaka, a …

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• Thoroughly Modern: What’s New In IBM i IT Planning

  October 9, 2023 Chris Koppe

  When you picture a successful IT strategy, what comes to mind? Most would say that they picture the plan that defines how you approach your technical environment or a project. But after working on IBM i strategy and roadmaps for hundreds of organizations, I see it differently. Creating a successful strategy is all about asking the right questions. By taking the time to analyze your current situation, determine your desired outcome, and understand the reasoning behind it, you’ll be able to find a quicker and more cost-effective solution to achieve your goals. Strategy development is a conversation that leads to …

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• IBM Releases Db2 For i Extensions For VS Code

  October 9, 2023 Alex Woodie

  Interested in developing new ILE applications in VS Code that utilize the Db2 for i database? Then you’re in luck, because IBM recently created and released vscode-db2i, an open source database extension for Code for IBM i, the uber popular development environment that enables ILE programming in VS Code.

  It is tough to overstate the popularity of Code for IBM i, which Liam Allan created and released just over two years ago. The open source plug-in provides ILE functionality for Microsoft’s VS Code, enabling programmers to write and edit RPG, COBOL, C, and CL code in the lightweight, browser-based …

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• How Long Before Big Blue Brings Code Assist To IBM i?

  August 23, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  IBM Research and Big Blue’s Software group have been collaborating to bring generative AI capabilities to market through the Watsonx stack of large language models and related tools. Watsonx is a basis for customers to create customized LLMs based on data from their own businesses and to integrate the quasi-cognitive capabilities of LLMs into their applications.

  Watsonx is also being used by IBM to augment some tools of its own, and the most recent one that will be in tech preview in September and generally available sometime in the fourth quarter is called Watsonx Code Assistant for Z, which as …

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• Thoroughly Modern: Proven Strategies For Innovating IT And IBM i In A Digital Age

  June 12, 2023 Chris Koppe

  Over the past 20 years I’ve worked with countless organizations on their IBM i modernization and transformation strategies, enabling them to harness the value derived from their mission-critical applications. Transforming outdated RPG, COBOL and CA 2E (SYNON) applications not only lowers costs and mitigates risks, but it also unlocks new capabilities to innovate and future-proof your business. How are today’s organizations focusing their modernization and transformation efforts? Where should you start?

  What is Driving Innovation On IBM i?

  It’s important to begin by examining IT’s role in innovation. Over my 35+ years in the industry, I’ve worked with dozens …

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• Remain Launches AI Chatbot to Assist with Development on RDi

  May 17, 2023 Alex Woodie

  Developers who code in Eclipse-based environments such as Rational Developer for i (RDi) now have access to Ai Chat, a free ChatGPT-based chatbot launched last month by Remain Software. According to Remain CTO Wim Jongman, the coding copilot displays the programming chops of a seasoned RPG developer.

  The AI revolution continues to unfold at an unprecedented clip, driven in large part by large language models (LLMs) such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Bard, and Facebook’s LLaMA, among others. Trained on massive corpuses of data culled from the Internet, these LLMs “learn” what words are likely to go with one another, …

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• Inside IBM’s Efforts To Modernize The ISV Army

  May 15, 2023 Alex Woodie

  “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.” IBM executives must feel a bit like the eminently quotable Don Rumsfeld, former Secretary of the Department of Defense, as they marshal their assets in the battle for application supremacy. While some of Big Blue’s partners have honed their IBM i applications into modern weapons, others are fielding old equipment more suitable for a previous war.

  It’s no state secret that Big Blue has a legacy problem on its hands in the IBM i world. When the …

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• Thoroughly Modern: Unlocking the Full Potential Of Your IBM i Applications

  May 15, 2023 Greg Patterson

  IBM i is the backbone of mission critical applications for over 120,000 customers worldwide in every conceivable industry and company size, particularly with companies ranging from $50 million to $1 billion in annual revenues and specializing in manufacturing, distribution, financial services, and healthcare. In other words, IBM i supports a significant share of the global economy.

  Although the IBM i platform is very productive, there are many things we can do to modernize our applications and provide more value to the business. But this is easier said than done. Some of the biggest challenges that that we face relate to …

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