• What’s The Best Web Language For IBM i?

  October 31, 2022 Alex Woodie

  What’s the best language for developing Web applications on IBM i – Python, PHP, or Node.js? That’s the loaded question recently posed by Mike Pavlak, who has been sailing IBM i’s open source waters for nearly two decades. As Pavlak’s presentation at the recent COMMON NAViGATE conference showed, the answer might surprise you.

  Initially, Pavlak aimed to fight for Python in his “Web Language Shootout” session at COMMON’s NAViGATE conference, which was held in St. Louis, Missouri, last month, while his Perforce Software, colleague, Guido Faecke, argued for PHP and Liam Allan, who recently joined IBM, backed …

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• Finally, IBM i Cloud Dev Instances That Are Powerful And Cheap

  October 24, 2022 Chuck Paolillo

  Back in the old days, when IBM had relatively inexpensive entry AS/400 and iSeries machines and was willing to lease them at special low rates to developers, it was possible for software houses and independent code slingers to get their hands on machinery to create and modify applications. Those days are long gone, and it has been very difficult to replace that cheap and usable functionality in the marketplace.

  With Windows Server and Linux platforms, things are a lot easier because developers can create a variant of their X86 server environment right on their desktops or laptops, and if need …

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• IBM Unveils Fall 2022 Tech Refreshes for IBM i

  October 12, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBM yesterday announced Technology Refreshes for its two most current IBM i operating systems, including 7.5 and 7.4. Security continues to be a big driver of new functionality with 7.5 TR1 and 7.4 TR7. But the fall TRs bring a bevy of enhancements across all areas, including the database, IBM i services, open source, application development, and analytics, among others.

  Security has been the number one concern for CIOs for a few years now, and IBM has responded with a number of new features in IBM i. Some of the new security features exist in IBM i Navigator, the GUI …

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• Are Code Freezes a Thing of the Past?

  October 5, 2022 Alex Woodie

  After months of work on your modernization project, the consultant helping you is almost done. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the consultant is now asking you to put a code freeze on changes to your old application. It’s not clear whether the code freeze will lasts two months or two years, but it’s absolutely necessary, you’re told.

  That’s the scenario that many enterprises have faced over the years. Whether it’s a monolithic RPG application running on IBM i or a distributed Node.js application running in the cloud, if there are tight dependencies in the components that …

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• What Is Code Transformation Even?

  June 20, 2022 Miranda VanHorn

  Transformation is a complex concept. It can mean many different things depending on whom you are asking. It could be UI transformation, where an improvement in the user interface provides all end-users a memorable, personalized, and deeply engaging experience.

  It could also refer to code transformation, which improves the performance of applications using a new language or architecture, or it could be a total digital transformation where the system is entirely modernized for business success.

  A transformation could also mean changing a physical process of using pen and paper (e.g., documentation or signing of contracts) into a systematic approach using …

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• Profound Logic Shows Off No-Code API for Salesforce

  June 15, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops that are looking for a way to integrate their Db2 for i data with Salesforce applications may be interested in a new REST API unveiled by Profound Logic last month. What’s more, the vendor says the solution works without writing a single line of code.

  Profound API, which the company launched just over a year ago, is a Node.js-based offering that runs directly in a Web browser. The product contains several editors and a runtime that enables users to define their APIs, test them, manage them as they’re pushed into production, and monitor performance over time. …

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• Marketplace Study Shows How IBM i Language Use Evolves

  February 9, 2022 Alex Woodie

  It’s no secret that RPG dominates development on the IBM i platform. SQL and Control Language (CL) are also heavily used in the day-to-day operations of tens of thousands of IBM i shops. But what about other established languages, like Java and C++? What about newer open source languages, like PHP and Node.js? The recent HelpSystems Marketplace Study provides us a clue into language use.

  HelpSystems published its first IBM i Marketplace Study back in January 2016, reflecting data collected in late 2015 from 834 IBM i professionals around the world. One of the questions it has consistently asked is …

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• SrinSoft CEO Ram Hari’s Long Road on IBM i

  February 9, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Ram Hari has had the sort of IT career that many dream of. Hired in the late 1990s as a Y2K programmer, the India native climbed the corporate IT ranks, and today runs his own 500-person consulting company called SrinSoft. The New York City-based company offers a range of IT services, but with interest in IBM i modernization and migrations spiking during COVID, Hari is finding it hard to satisfy demand.

  Hari’s career started in 1995, soon after earning an undergraduate degree in computer science and electric engineering from a university in India. After getting his RPG certification, he was …

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• Critical Log4j Vulnerability Hits Everything, Including the IBM i Server

  December 15, 2021 Alex Woodie

  Hackers gave themselves an early Christmas present this year with a critical security flaw in Log4j, a popular logging framework that is used across many programs, including some that run on IBM i. IBM i shops are encouraged to take this flaw very seriously, as the vulnerability already is being actively exploited in the wild. However, finding where Log4j exists in your stack is not always simple, which makes this particular flaw particularly nasty.

  The Log4j zero-day vulnerability, which was disclosed last week by security researchers with CERT New Zealand, was logged into the National Vulnerability Database as CVE-2021-44228 …

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• New OpenLegacy Product Creates ‘Tech-Agnostic’ Services

  November 17, 2021 Alex Woodie

  OpenLegacy recently announced OpenLegacy Hub, or OL Hub, a new offering designed to help customers create technology agnostic digital services from existing legacy applications and infrastructure. The offering supports IBM i and z/OS assets, among other platforms that are commonly grouped under the “legacy” banner.

  Since it appeared on the midrange scene back in 2015, OpenLegacy has been looking to help IBM i and mainframe customers extend their existing systems in new and profitable ways. Led by tech veterans from IBM and Software AG, the Israeli company created a development environment that could analyze legacy programs, such as 5250 …

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