• IBM i Education Goes a Mile High at COMMON’s POWERUp 2023

  April 19, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The IBM i community is gearing up for POWERUp 2023, the annual conference and expo held by COMMON that is taking place next week in Denver, Colorado. While information on the recent IBM i Technology Refreshes will be in demand, the event in the Mile High City will showcase just about everything going on with the ever-popular midrange server.

  The fun starts bright and early Monday morning at 8:30 MT, with the COMMON POWERUp Opening Session. COMMON President Dawn May will give the community an update on the state of the user group, present awards to the top speakers from …

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• Spring Brings Events To IBM i Community, And More

  March 13, 2023 Alex Woodie

  As the calendar flips over from winter to spring, the IBM i community begins to stir in anticipation of in-person get-togethers. Many of the events continue to be virtual, but some, like COMMON’s POWERUp and WMCPA’s iCON, are expected to draw hundreds of people. And the calendar shows that IBM’s spring Tech Refresh can’t be too far away.

  The in-person fun kicks off tomorrow as members of the IBM i community descend on the Lake Lawn Resort in Delavan, Wisconsin, which is playing host to the Wisconsin Midrange Computer Professional Association (WMCPA) and its Spring Conference 2023.

   

  The three-day …

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• How Do You Stay In Touch With The IBM i Community?

  February 6, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The IBM i community is global and diverse. There is a lot of things going on in our part of the IT industry, and it can be tough to keep up with everything that is going on with the IBM i platform.

  But it is nonetheless important for us all to understand how people are keeping up to date on new technologies and other cultural and corporate things that are happening in our community. Which is why Tom Huntington, executive vice president of technical solutions at Fortra (formerly known as HelpSystems), did a quick poll during the 2023 IBM i …

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• Big Blue Decrees Its 2023 IBM Champions

  January 30, 2023 Alex Woodie

  IBM this year celebrates a bumper crop of IBM Champions, those technology experts who also display “extraordinary advocacy” for IBM products. In total, there are 839 IBM Champions hailing from 60 countries around the world, while in our little neck of the IT wood, there are about 90 members from the global IBM i community who gained the honor.

  IBM launched the IBM Champions program in 2008 as a way to honor IBM customers and business partners who not only are subject matter experts but who also are active in the community. Today, there are 11 categories for the IBM …

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• N2i Gains Traction Among IBM i Newbies

  January 25, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The YiPS made a big push to inject youth into the IBM i community over a decade ago. But when the youthful vigor ran low, members of the community regrouped, re-energized, and rebranded into a new group called New to IBM i (N2i). And judging from N2i’s recent success, the group has hit on something.

  N2i has its roots in the YiPS, according to Marina Schwenk, who was a YiPS member back in the day and now is active in COMMON and the WMCPA. But there’s a crucial difference between N2i and YIPS, she says.

  “The group that we’re …

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• 2023 IBM i Predictions, Part 2

  January 23, 2023 Alex Woodie

  Two thousand twenty-three is shaping up to be a transition year of sorts in the IBM i community, with midrange Power10 servers hitting the market, IBM i 7.3 (finally) meeting its end, and an economic recession looming. We tapped our network of IBM i prognosticators to help fill in the particulars with part two in this annual series.

  There’s been a security awakening in the IBM i community, and Robin Tatam, director of security technologies with Fortra (formerly HelpSystems), sees that translating into greater security controls as threats to the IBM i proliferate in 2023.

  “The IBM i community is …

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• 2023 IBM i Predictions, Part 1

  January 16, 2023 Alex Woodie

  What will happen in the IBM i world in 2023? Your guess is as good as ours, which is why we have corralled some of the most respected names in the industry to gaze into their crystal balls and give their prognostication for the year to come.

  Donnie MacColl, the senior director of technical support and GDPR data protection officer at Fortra (formerly HelpSystems), kicks off this year’s batch of predictions with an expectation of more automation, thanks to a lack of skilled employees.

  “Automated operations will accelerate along with migration to the cloud,” MacColl tells us. “Automation is key …

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• 2022: An IBM i Year in Review, Part One

  December 14, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Well, it’s that time of year again – time to look back on the year and contemplate what happened. It was another eventful year in the midrange, with new servers and new operating systems. The IBM i user and vendor communities also worked to make it a rewarding year.

  2021 started innocently enough back in . . .

  January

  Cybercriminals earned a gazillion demerits for their early 2021 Christmas present to cybersecurity professionals: Log4j, the most critical security vulnerability to hit the IT world in years. With a perfect CVSS severity rating of 10, Log4j sent security professionals scrambling in …

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• Want To Influence IBM i’s Direction? Consider Joining An Advisory Council

  December 12, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Do you want to make your mark on the future of IBM i? If so, there may be a volunteer position available to you on one the two advisory councils run by COMMON and COMMON Europe, which play important roles in advising IBM what new features and technologies should be added to the platform.

  Members of the COMMON Americas Advisory Council (CAAC) and the COMMON Europe Advisory Council (CEAC) play an important role shaping what new features and functionality are added to the IBM i platform. The two councils work closely with IBM to review and prioritize customer requirements submitted …

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• IBM Welcomes COMMON Advisory Councils to Rochester

  December 7, 2022 Alex Woodie

  One of the hallmarks of a good company is listening to customers. A company may not do everything that its customers wish, but it must show that it’s listening to maintain the relationship. This dynamic was in play during an IBM i meeting that took place last month in Rochester, Minnesota, between IBM and the advisory councils for both COMMON North America and COMMON Europe.

  The three-day meeting that took place November 14 through 16 involved a handful of members from the COMMON Americas Advisory Council (CAAC) as well as the COMMON Europe Advisory Council (CEAC). Both advisory councils had …

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