• IBM Improves Run SQL Scripts with ACS Update

  September 22, 2021 Alex Woodie

  In recent years, Access Client Solutions (ACS) has become an indispensable utility for a range of tasks involving the IBM i. A good reason for that success is the adoption of Run SQL Scripts, which has been enhanced with the latest Technology Refresh for IBM i 7.3 and 7.4.

  ACS is a Java-based product that IBM first unveiled in 2012 and that has replaced other versions of Client Access, including the dedicated Windows utility. No matter what type of computer or device you’re using to work with the IBM i server, be it Windows, Linux, or Mac, you can access …

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• Some Power9 Tweaks And Withdrawals

  September 20, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  It is a very rare announcement cycle where IBM announces a new machine and does not offer some tweaks to or withdrawals for older machinery. And, as we always expect, Big Blue did both as part of the September 8 IBM i and Power E1080 server announcements.

  In announcement letter 121-052, IBM made some tweaks to the NVM-Express U.2 form factor solid state flash drives for the Power9 entry, midrange, and high end servers. The new U.2 flash drives have an 800 GB capacity and are aimed at AIX and Linux partitions that have 4K block sizes. These drives …

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• Eradani Drives Simplification with API Tool Update

  September 15, 2021 Alex Woodie

  Eradani has always sought to simplify the application programming interface (API) enablement process as much as possible for its IBM i customers. And with the launch of Eradani Connect version 4.1, which features a new GUI, pre-built templates of APIs, and a catalog for the REST-style Web services created with the tool, the Northern California company is taking the simplification mantra to new levels.

  The world is chock full of Web services. Whether it’s real-time weather data, a shipping services, an ecommerce application, or a tax calculator, somebody somewhere is providing information over the Internet. These external APIs generally are …

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• IBM Drops Power10 Into Big, Bad Iron First

  September 8, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  After a long, long wait – it has been nearly four years since the first Power9 machine was launched in the “Witherspoon” Power AC922 supercomputing node back in December 2017 based on the 24-core “Nimbus” Power9 processor and just over three years since the high-end “Fleetwood” Power E980 system debuted with the 12-core “Cumulus” Power9 variant – the first machines out of IBM based on the Power10 processor are being unveiled.

  The expected three-year cadence between processor generations set by IBM a long time ago has worked out almost precisely for high-end Power Systems shops, with today’s launch of the …

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• Public Cloud Dreams Becoming A Reality for IBM i Users

  August 23, 2021 Alex Woodie

  For years, IBM i professionals have looked on as their X86 colleagues moved data and applications to the cloud, where they take advantage of sophisticated analytics and AI offerings, while they dutifully tend to their Power Systems boxes, as they have for years. But with IBM i runtimes in at least two public clouds (and possibly more in the works), IBM i shops are finally starting to realize their public cloud dreams.

  The nature of the IBM i cloud solution that Meridian Group International is offering has changed over the years. Like many other IBM business partners, the Deerfield, Illinois, …

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• Calling All IBM i Platforms. . .

  August 16, 2021 Daniel Magid

  In a microservices world, all elements of what used to be monolithic application programs are now chunks of code linked to each other using any number of application programming interfaces, or APIs. Those APIs can be based on a remote procedure call, or RPC, architecture, which is a kind of generic distributed client/server approach, or the REST – short for representational state transfer – architecture favored by parts of the commercial Web software stack that has dramatically grown in popularity in the past two decades. Either way – and in fact, there are more than two ways – APIs are …

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• No More Shouting The Name “Power” (Well, Except In Our Title Here)

  August 2, 2021 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The marketing people at IBM have been at work again, apparently, and it looks like there will be some subtle branding changes coming with the launch of Power10-based servers later this year, very likely by September or maybe October.

  One of my pet peeves about the IT industry is that vendors sometimes feel compelled to shout their company names or product brands when it is completely unnecessary. They seem to choose a brand and then work backwards to come up with some abbreviation that they think is clever. It’s when they overreach that it gets annoying, and language is my …

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• Comarch’s PowerCloud Gives IBM, Microsoft, And Google A Run For The Money

  July 14, 2021 Tomasz Wachnicki

  If you are looking for a cloud provider that has expertise in Power-based systems and that has datacenters in the United States, Europe, and Asia – so they are local to those geographies – and yet available on a truly global basis, and backed by deep experience in managed services for IBM i and AIX platforms, you have an option that you might not be aware of. The company is called Comarch, and it is taking on IBM, Google, and Microsoft/Skytap for IBM i and AIX business in the cloud.

  For those of you who are unaware of Comarch, it …

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• Ransomware Attacks Hit Closer To Home

  July 12, 2021 Alex Woodie

  Fifteen hundred organizations around the world had their data locked up in the latest ransomware attack, including grocery store chains and schools. It’s unclear if any IBM i shops were included in the attack, which a Russian hacking group claimed credit for. But it’s clear that ransomware is a growing threat to all organizations, including IBM i shops.

  On July 2, as hundreds of millions of Americans hunkered down for the long Independence Day holiday weekend, hackers using the REvil were just getting started. The Russian-affiliated hacking group had already done the hard work of exploiting a five-year-old security flaw …

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• Illumio Adds IBM i Support with Zero-Trust Security

  June 30, 2021 Alex Woodie

  Illumio this week announced that it now supports IBM i with its zero-trust security framework, which is designed to isolate data and applications with “microperimeters” that prevent the spread of malware and hackers once they have breached the corporate firewalls.

  The zero-trust security model is gaining steam as organizations attempt to stop hackers from infiltrating their networks and pilfering valuable data or encrypting data as part of a ransomware attack.

  Previously, security experts recommended that the best way to keep bad guys out of internal networks was to implement multiple overlapping levels of security. This approach incorporated network security devices …

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