• Data Is Streaming Into The Cloud, Including From IBM i

  November 14, 2022 Alex Woodie

  We are in the midst of a vast migration of data into public clouds, as companies seek to leverage technological innovation occurring in the cloud for competitive advantage. While there are no IBM i runtimes in the public cloud yet, IBM i shops are still getting value by moving their valuable Db2 for i data into the cloud, often using streaming technologies and tools like Apache Kafka and Apache Camel, as well as an updated ETL offering from IBM.

  It is tough to understate the magnitude of the transition to the public cloud is having on the $4 trillion IT …

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• Db2 Web Query Gets ML-Powered Insights, Cloud DW Connection

  November 2, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Organizations adopting the latest release of Db2 Web Query will find new capabilities in the graphical designer, an automated insights generation function that uses machine learning as well as new capabilities in the data migration tool that will help customers move data to cloud data warehouses, among other capabilities.

  Db2 Web Query is IBM’s flagship business intelligence offering for the IBM i platform. The software is based on WebFOCUS, the BI offering developed by Information Builders, with whom IBM has had an OEM relationship since 2007. In 2021, Information Builders was acquired by TIBCO Software, which has continued …

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• IBM Mulls Using DataMigrator as Cloud Warehouse Pipeline

  June 29, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBMers are playing around with an update to a little-known ETL tool called DataMigrator for i that would make it easier for IBM i shops to move transactional data to cloud-based data warehousing platforms. The update would use Apache Kafka for the final connection to the cloud.

  DataMigrator ETL Extension, as the product is formally known, is an extract, transform, and load (ETL) tool created by IBM back in 2015. The product was developed to work with Db2 Web Query, the Java-based business intelligence tool that it OEMed from Information Builders (now owned by TIBCO).

  DataMigrator for …

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• COMMON Set for First Annual Conference in Three Years

  May 18, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Don’t look now, but COMMON is about to hold its first annual conference in three years. Starting on Monday in New Orleans, POWERUp 2022 will be the biggest gathering of the IBM i community since the pandemic started more than two years ago. There is still time to register for the conference, which will feature a raft of presentations on the newly released IBM i version 7.5.

  COMMON’s annual conference scheduled for the New Orleans Marriott next week is shaping up to be a good one. More than 100 speakers are scheduled to present more than 300 sessions on …

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• Big Blue At Your Power Systems Service

  February 14, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  IBM may have spun off its managed services and system hosting businesses into Kyndryl, but it still has a sizable remaining technical support, systems integration, technology consulting, business transformation, and application operations business that represents close to 40 percent of its revenues. And so it is very keen on selling Power Systems shops all kinds of services.

  To that end, IBM made two announcements last week regarding the Power Systems hardware platform.

  The first, in announcement letter 222-033, is a new plan to offer Software Maintenance – what IBM i shops and resellers and even IBM itself usually call …

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• The Mod Squad Comes Together to Modernize Old RPG

  October 6, 2021 Alex Woodie

  In the early 70s, a group of fictional social misfits joined up to solve crimes on the hit television series The Mod Squad. Now a group of real-life IBM i professionals of the same name are uniting to solve an equally pressing problem: modernizing old RPG code, including some that dates back to the 1970s.

  “You’ve heard of IBM‘s upward compatibility,” says Rich Ollari, an IBM i veteran who is one of the ringleaders of the new Mod Squad. “Code that ran back in the 80s, even the 70s, is still running today, and that’s what we’re fighting with. …

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• Additions To The Db2 Web Query Family

  November 9, 2020 Alex Woodie

  Change is in the air for Db2 Web Query, the primary business intelligence tool for IBM i environments from Big Blue. Earlier this year, IBM launched two new versions of the product, and this fall, IBM delivered version 2.3 of the product. Finally, there’s been a change of ownership of the third-party company behind the software.

  Let’s start with the change in ownership. Last month, TIBCO Software announced its intent to acquire Information Builders, the privately held New York City business intelligence software company that Gerald Cohen founded way back in 1975. IBI’s primary product is WebFOCUS, which forms …

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• What’s New With Db2 Web Query?

  May 11, 2020 Alex Woodie

  Db2 Web Query, which is IBM’s strategic business intelligence tool for IBM i, doesn’t follow the same release cycle as the operating system itself. But as part of activity surrounding the latest round of Technology Refreshes (TR) for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4, IBM discussed the recent updates that it’s made to Db2 Web Query, along with new features that are due very soon.

  To get the lowdown on the new Db2 Web Query features, we tuned into a recent presentation made by Doug Mack, IBM’s Db2 Web Query product manager. Mack presented a session with Db2 for i …

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• Here’s What’s In the Latest IBM i Technology Refreshes

  April 15, 2020 Alex Woodie

  As expected, IBM today officially unveiled its spring Technology Refreshes for IBM i. Among the goodies that will become available for IBM i 7.4 TR2 or IBM i 7.3 TR8 (or both) are enhancements to Db2 Mirror, a new approach to tape library virtualization, improvements to open source, and new features and functionality around Db2, RPG, RDi, and security, too.

  Months ago, IBM execs circled April 14 on their calendars as the day for the big IBM 7.4 TR2 and IBM i 7.3 TR8 reveal, with the idea that the following week’s POWERUp conference in Atlanta, Georgia (now canceled, but …

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• Db2 Web Query Lives On (Just Not V2.1)

  November 13, 2019 Alex Woodie

  There have been some rumors that IBM is going to sunset Db2 Web Query for i, or replace it with Cognos. Neither of those rumors is true, according to IBM, which recently made some changes to Db2 Web Query support.

  Db2 Web Query for i, of course, is the OEM version of Information Builders flagship BI and analytics tool, WebFOCUS, that IBM brought to market in the 2007 timeframe. The Java-based tool enables users to write queries for the Db2 for i database (and other databases) and view the results in a variety of pre-canned and custom dashboards and reports. …

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