• IBM i Shops “Attacking” Security Concerns, Study Shows

  July 8, 2025 Alex Woodie

  Faced with ever-growing security concerns, IBM i shops are “attacking” the problem and taking real steps to improve their security posture, Fortra says in its latest State of IBM i Security study. It is the second straight year that Fortra has noticed an improvement in IBM i shops’ approach to security. However, there are still areas that require improvement.

  Fortra and its predecessors (HelpSystems, PowerTech) have been running the annual State of Security study for 22 years, providing a unique glimpse into the security configurations of IBM i customers that is unmatched in the industry.

  Every year, a new group …

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• Security Top of Mind as Massive Hacks Continue

  December 4, 2024 Alex Woodie

  The calendar indicates peace and joy, but instead a sense of dread and fear permeates business, as the number and scope of security breaches grows and new regulations loom on the horizon. Ransomware, in particular, is proving itself to be a thorny issue for companies of all sizes, including IBM i shops.

  The latest mega-hack involved Chinse state actors infiltrating the American telecommunications backbone, where they not only accessed huge numbers of call detail records (CDRs) – which they used for counter-espionage purposes – but also read text messages and listened to Americans’ phone calls.

  Known as Salt Typhoon, the …

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• Shield Revs HA Software for IBM i

  September 25, 2024 Alex Woodie

  Companies protecting their IBM i servers with Shield Advanced Solutions’ HA4i will enjoy several new capabilities when they upgrade to the latest release, including faster save while active processing, improved object compression, and new Nagios monitoring functions, among other enhancements.

  Shield Advanced Solutions has been developing and selling an IBM i high availability solution since 2007, when it rolled out Receiver Apply Program/400 (RAP/400), which it dubbed “DR for the masses.” In 2010, the Toronto-area company overhauled that product and debuted its replacement, HA4i at version 6.1. Over the ensuing years, Shield steadily added new features to the …

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• IBM Bolsters Run SQL Scripts In ACS 1.1.9.6

  August 12, 2024 Alex Woodie

  IBM last week shipped a new release of Access Client Solutions (ACS) that contains several user-requested updates for Run SQL Scripts (RSS), the popular tool that allows users to execute SQL statements. ACS 1.1.9.6 also brings enhancements to the data transfer, IFS, and 5250 emulator components of ACS, among others.

  ACS, of course, is the universal Java-based utility that IBM unveiled 12 years ago to replace Client Access. It’s a must-have tool for any IBM i user, as it contains a slew of facilities for interacting with the system, including RSS, data transfer, IFS file viewing, spool file management, 5250 …

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• Guru: Web Concepts For The RPG Developer, Part 3

  July 22, 2024 Chris Ringer

  Greetings everyone. Articles part one and two were both an introduction on how to build components in an HTTP request. In part three, we will begin to connect the dots and discuss how to asymmetrically sign a simple string. If you ever need to send a secure HTTP request to a government agency or financial institution, you likely will authenticate with a signed token. So, here we go!

  Base64 Take Two

  In part one, the SQL scalar function BASE64_ENCODE embedded in RPG converted a string to base64. This technique will cover most use cases, but what if you need …

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• SoCal Gears Up for OCEAN Tech Con 23

  July 17, 2023 Alex Woodie

  Southern California’s IBM i community is getting ready for the biggest event on its calendar: OCEAN Tech Con 23. The three-day, in-person event kicks off next week with a full slate of speakers and presenters who will discuss the latest advances in the platform.

  The OCEAN user group’s annual summer soiree starts the morning of Thursday, July 27, with a one-hour keynote by IBM’s IBM i chief technology officer, chief architect, and distinguished engineer Steve Will. The title of the address, “IBM i @ 35: integrate + innovate,” gives you an idea what Will will talk about.

  The educational component …

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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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• Fortra Issues 20th State of IBM i Security Report

  May 24, 2023 Alex Woodie

  IBM is celebrating 35 years of its midrange platform next month, and there is no doubt it will be an exciting moment for the IBM i community. But there’s another occasion you might not be aware of: the 20th annual State of IBM i Security Study, which was issued last month by Fortra (formerly HelpSystems).

  Back in 2004, the security experts at PowerTech took it upon themselves to analyze the configurations of customers’ actual iSeries and AS/400 servers (there were still AS/400s around) and write a report sharing what they found. As you might imagine, the state of security, as …

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• Using The Public Cloud For IBM i Disaster Recovery

  April 24, 2023 Ash Giddings

  Disasters can strike at any time, and it’s essential for organizations to have a disaster recovery plan in place to ensure business continuity. However, creating and maintaining a comprehensive disaster recovery plan can be a daunting task, particularly for organizations that rely on IBM i servers, often running business critical applications that perform key functions together with many interfaces into other servers and applications.

  Previously, investments in IBM i disaster recovery solutions were an expensive outlay, requiring significant capital investment in both hardware and software, in addition to the sizable costs associated with running a datacenter.

  Fortunately, with the advent …

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• IBM Bolsters New Nav With Job Scheduler And More

  April 24, 2023 Alex Woodie

  IBM i professionals finally can access the Advanced Job Scheduler from Navigator for i as a result of the new Technology Refreshes (TRs) that IBM unveiled on April 11. But the job scheduler is just one of a number of new capabilities that IBM is bringing to the snazzy new Web-based interface for administrators and power users, which Big Blue would very, very much like for you to use.

  When IBM debuted the new Navigator for i in the fall of 2021 with release of IBM i 7.3 TR11 and 7.4 TR5, it figured it had the luxury of time …

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