• How To Celebrate IBM i Turning 35 This Week

  June 19, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The balloons will drop and the champagne will flow this week as the midrange community takes some well-deserved time to party like it’s 1988 and celebrate the 35th anniversary of the IBM i platform.

  Not every computing community gets to celebrate 10 years of success for their platform, let alone 35, as backers of the venerable IBM i server will have the honor of doing this week. Many of the folks who work on IBM i today were just starting their IT careers back when IBM launched the AS/400 on that hot June day in 1988, so this week will …

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• Guru: Comparing IFS Directories Using SQL

  June 19, 2023 Mike Larsen

  I use SQL almost every day at my job. It may be just a query in ACS, or it may be embedded SQL in an RPG program. A few days ago, I needed to compare the contents of one IFS directory to another. Combining a few different table functions, I was able to develop a nice solution.

  Note: The code for this article can be downloaded here.

  In this example, I have a directory that has five text files in it. I have a second directory that has three text files in it, and they are the same documents …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 25, Number 25

  June 19, 2023 Doug Bidwell

  Happy 35^th birthday to the AS/400! We hope that you take a moment and commemorate this wonderful platform that has given us so much over the years, and that we all have given so much to.

  It is one of those mercifully quiet weeks, so enjoy.

  The news this week is that Navigator will now use Java 17 if available (on 7.4 and 7.5).  Install Java 11 or Java 17 and latest Java group PTF to run Navigator with these versions of Java. Details on Java at: https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/node/6437873

  Here is the rundown of PTF Groups by IBM i release …

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• A Peek Inside Fortra’s Cybersecurity Catalog, And Its Cyber Future

  June 12, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The evolution of Fortra, formerly HelpSystems, from a small IBM i systems management and monitoring provider from the Minneapolis area into one of the top 10 cybersecurity solution providers with an estimated $800 million in annual revenue is an interesting story, and one that we have already written. But what, exactly, does Fortra do in the security realm?

  The cybersecurity space is changing quickly at the moment, as hackers look to exploit vulnerabilities in software and human processes. Lots of security software vendors are trying hard to keep up with the rapidly evolving threat landscape, so where does …

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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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• Guru: Speeding Up RPG By Reducing I/O Operations, Part 2

  June 12, 2023 Gregory Simmons

  Legacy code. Often one admits they have legacy code either with a chuckle or a wince. Nonetheless, it usually is admitted with bad connotations. We must remember though – legacy code becomes legacy code because it works. It performs its tasks day in and day out for many years and is forgotten about. Only the squeaky wheel gets the grease, right?

  The problem with this code is that, while it works, decades slip by, and technology evolves. As these decades roll along, we don’t just end up with a few programs that fit this ‘legacy code’ stereotype, we often end …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, June 12

  June 12, 2023 Jenny Thomas

  One of the many nice things about the IBM i ecosystem is how we all try to look out for each other. Take reader Michael D. Mayer. Michael is a IBM i Power System Admin who developed and manages an “IBM i Reference Page” blog. He recently shared it with us in hopes that we could spread the word about this free resource, which is his contribution to the IBM i community. The blog is updated often and “It’s something I wished I had when I was working my way through the early days of the AS400, iSeries, i5, etc.,” …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 25, Number 24

  June 12, 2023 Doug Bidwell

  It is one of those quiet weeks in PTF Land, which probably means next week or the week after won’t be if history is any guide. This week, we have Security Bulletin: Multiple Vulnerabilities in IBM Java SDK affect IBM WebSphere Application Server and IBM WebSphere Application Server Liberty due to April 2023 CPU. More information is available here. Below are the affected products and versions.

  Affected Product(s)				Version(s)
  IBM WebSphere Application Server		9.0
  IBM WebSphere Application Server		8.5
  IBM WebSphere Application Server Liberty	Continuous delivery
  

  Here is the rundown of PTF Groups by IBM i release level since we …

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• IBM i Delivers Sizable Benefits, Forrester Consulting Reports

  June 7, 2023 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops have firsthand knowledge of the positive characteristics of the platform relative to industry-standard X86 servers. We often hear anecdotes about the platform and share them with you through these pages. But IBM would like to get beyond mere anecdotes and get to some hard numbers on the IBM i advantage. That’s when it turns to Forrester Consulting.

  According to Forrester Consulting’s latest Total Economic Impact (TEI) report, a typical IBM i customer can expect to save about $2.6 million over three years as a result of the IBM i platform’s uptime, productivity, and efficiency. The report, …

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• SBOMs Will Come to IBM i, Eventually

  June 7, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The Biden Administration’s push to make software bills of material (SBOMs) mandatory may not be moving ahead as quickly as hoped. But the SBOM requirement is still marching ahead for federal agencies and the vendors who supply them with software – running on IBM i or any other platform – with a major self-attestation deadline.

  The federal government’s SBOM push began back in 2018, when the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s (NTIA), an agency within the Department of Commerce, spearheaded SBOM work with private-sector partners in an attempt to get better visibility into security vulnerabilities.

  The SBOM movement got a …

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