• Fans Revving Like Crazy On Your Power10? Check The Firmware

  July 15, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  It doesn’t happen very often, but sometimes a patch to firmware for Power Systems is defective, and when it does happen, we like to point it out.

  Defective PTFs happen fairly regularly with IBM i, as defective patches happen for other operating systems. Sometimes the effects of defective PTF patches are dramatic, sometimes they are just weird. Sometimes they are in between.

  Both IBM i 7.4 and IBM i 7.5 have a defective patch in the firmware for Power10 systems, and to be super precise it affects machine types 9105-22A (Power S1022), 9105-22B (Power S1022s), 9105-41B (Power S1014), 9105-42A (Power …

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• Big Blue Offers Managed Services For PowerVS Private Cloud Pods

  May 22, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  There are lots of ways to skin the cloud infrastructure cat. You can rent cloudy capacity and manage it yourself. That is called Power Virtual Server. You can buy your own virtualized Power Systems servers and manage them with the same control plane as is used for the PowerVS cloud. That is called Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, of PowerVS Private Cloud for short. (Sort of.)

  And now, with announcement letter AD24-0420, Big Blue is offering a version of PowerVS Private Cloud that has a managed services provider layer on top of it from the company’s own …

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• What Do Secondhand Power9 Machines Cost These Days?

  March 25, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Before IBM consolidated its Global Asset Recovery Services arm in the Systems group in the wake of the spinout of the Kyndryl outsourcing and services business, we could go out to the IBM web site every now and then and get a sense of what secondhand Power Systems machinery cost. But alas, that is no longer the case.

  And so, we went poking around the Internet late on a Friday night and stumbled across our old friends at Data Tech Computer Services in Alpharetta, Georgia, which have been in business nearly three decades peddling AS/400, iSeries, System i, and IBM …

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• StarWind Hooks VTL to IBM i

  March 13, 2024 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops that are looking to add a virtual tape library (VTL) to their IT mix may want to check out StarWind, a Rocket Division Software spin-off that provides a range of storage virtualization and software-defined storage offerings. The company recently added support for IBM i with its VTL solution, opening up a new market for itself in the midrange.

  StarWind bills itself as a provider of hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solutions for the enterprise remote office/branch office (ROBO), small and midsize business (SMB), and the edge. The company, which began in 2008 as a spin-off from Rocket Division Software …

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• PUB400: Your Free IBM i Playground

  March 4, 2024 Alex Woodie

  Search the Web for “free Linux server” and hundreds of results pop up. Do the same for “free IBM i server” and your results are much more limited. But what the universe of free IBM i servers lacks in quantity it makes up in quality thanks in large part to PUB400, a free IBM i instance that has been serving the midrange community for nearly a quarter century.

  Many IT Jungle readers undoubtedly are familiar with PUB400.com, which was started by Holger Scherer on a little AS/400 Model 150 back in 1999. Over the years, the site and the …

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• The State Of The Power Systems Base 2024: The Operating Systems

  February 12, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  What stays in the field longer? The hardware or the software? Well, if you are talking about the IBM i installed base, or indeed that of any legacy systems out there like z/OS or Windows Server, the hardware can often be upgraded easier than the software and so it tends to not stay in the field as long. On average, of course.

  In the real world, it all comes down to specifics. And you have to analyze and interpret the trend lines very carefully so as to not jump to the wrong conclusions.

  So it is with the decade long …

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• IBM Patches New Security Vulns In IBM i Components, Power Firmware

  February 12, 2024 Alex Woodie

  IBM has patched a series of moderate security vulnerabilities in IBM i products and Power firmware over the past two weeks. The IBM i flaws span Rational Developer for i (RDi), Access Client Solutions (ACS), and the Java development kit and runtime, while the Power flaw involves PowerVM and its communications with the Hardware Management Console (HMC).

  Concerns over security hit an all-time high in the IBM i community according to the IBM i Marketplace 2024 study conducted by Fortra. The survey found that 79 percent of IBM i professionals considered security a top concern, a 10 percent increase …

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• Hey, Where Did All Of The IBM i Redbooks Go?

  February 7, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Have you read any good IBM i Redbooks lately? Probably not, and we want to know why.

  Our intrepid colleague, Doug Bidwell, of IBM i PTF Guide fame among many other things, pointed out to us this week that it has been a long, long time since we have seen a Redbook or even a Redpaper concerning the IBM i platform. This seems peculiar to us, considering all of the new features and functions that have gone into IBM i 7.4 and IBM i 7.5. And even IBM i 7.3, which is going the way of all flesh.

  If you …

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• IBM Cloud Storage And BRMS Get Subscription Pricing

  January 22, 2024 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  As you are well aware, Big Blue is in the middle of converting the IBM i software stack from perpetual software licensing and Software Maintenance pricing to straight-up subscription pricing. Now, subscription pricing has come to IBM Cloud Storage as well as to the venerable Backup, Recovery and Media Services for i (BRMS).

  The new pricing was revealed in announcement letter AD23-0531, and it appears to be an option, not a requirement. Remember, for IBM i 7.4 and IBM i 7.5 themselves, perpetual licensing based on IBM i software tiers will only be available through the end of March …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 25, Number 49

  December 6, 2023 Doug Bidwell

  Welcome back to having to worry about security vulnerabilities and PTF patches. This week, there are two security vulnerabilities, a set of patches for IBM i 7.2, and HIPERS for IBM i 7.4 and IBM i 7.5 – among other things. Let’s do the vulnerabilities to start.

  First, we have Security Bulletin: IBM Java SDK and IBM Java Runtime for IBM i are vulnerable to a remote attacker causing integrity impacts due to the libraries component (CVE-2023-22049), which you can find out more about here. The IBM i PTF Group numbers contain the fix for the vulnerability. Future PTF …

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