• How Long Before Big Blue Brings Code Assist To IBM i?

  August 23, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  IBM Research and Big Blue’s Software group have been collaborating to bring generative AI capabilities to market through the Watsonx stack of large language models and related tools. Watsonx is a basis for customers to create customized LLMs based on data from their own businesses and to integrate the quasi-cognitive capabilities of LLMs into their applications.

  Watsonx is also being used by IBM to augment some tools of its own, and the most recent one that will be in tech preview in September and generally available sometime in the fourth quarter is called Watsonx Code Assistant for Z, which as …

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• Generative AI Is Part Of Application Modernization Now

  August 21, 2023 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Generative AI is funny in that it is both an application in its own right when equipped with a chatbot interface and some intelligent prompting with guardrails to keep it from hallucinating and it can also be used as a tool to either generate chunks of applications based on large language models tweaked with a library of code.

  This is the first time that we can think of where the application is the tool or the tool is the application, and it presents a kind of chicken and egg conundrum for IT departments all over the world. Mainly: Where do …

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• Making Git Part of Your Modernization Strategy

  June 26, 2023 Daniel Magid

  Maybe the most important part of your IBM i modernization strategy should be modernizing the tools you are using to develop and maintain your applications. Most of the application development world has moved to tools centered around using Git for version control. There is no reason IBM i developers cannot do the same thing. IBM is solidly behind this strategy with their new Merlin product and most of the change management vendors have some kind of Git integration.

  By adopting Git for version control, IBM i applications can be managed with the same tools that are being used for development …

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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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• Inside IBM’s Efforts To Modernize The ISV Army

  May 15, 2023 Alex Woodie

  “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.” IBM executives must feel a bit like the eminently quotable Don Rumsfeld, former Secretary of the Department of Defense, as they marshal their assets in the battle for application supremacy. While some of Big Blue’s partners have honed their IBM i applications into modern weapons, others are fielding old equipment more suitable for a previous war.

  It’s no state secret that Big Blue has a legacy problem on its hands in the IBM i world. When the …

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• IBM i Pros Available for Hire from Programmers.io

  May 10, 2023 Alex Woodie

  If you’re looking for someone with IBM i and RPG skills to help modernize your applications or just to keep the lights on, you might want to consider Programmers.io. You might never have heard of it, but the Texas-based company has been in the IBM i consulting business for over a decade and has built up a considerable force composed of hundreds of IBM i experts.

  Programmers.io is an IT services and software development firm that employs over 600 engineers in the U.S. and India, about 280 of which are skilled in IBM i or RPG. The company got its …

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• PSGi Offers Field-Level Encryption for IBM i Database

  April 19, 2023 Alex Woodie

  IBM i professionals who are concerned about the disclosure of sensitive data in their legacy applications may be interested in a new field-level encryption utility from Precision Solutions Group (PSGi). The software essentially functions as an easy-to-use wrapper for IBM’s native Field Proc for database encryption, delivering flexible data protection for legacy applications.

  PSGi has made a name for itself by providing third-party maintenance and support for aging IBM i-based ERP systems. Customers running older applications like JD Edwards World, PRMS, PRISM, and KBM rely on PSGi to keep their ERP systems running well decades after they were first created. …

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• IBM i Has a Future “If Kept Up To Date,”‘ IDC Says

  March 22, 2023 Alex Woodie

  The slow demise and death of IBM i has been greatly exaggerated, at least in the eyes of IDC. In a white paper for Rocket Software, an analyst for the storied firm says that IBM i does indeed have a future in customers’ digital strategies, provided it’s “kept up to date.” That’s good news for the community, but there’s still a lot of work to be done.

  Application modernization has been an important topic for IBM i shops for decades, particularly when it comes to organizations that believe they’re still living in the early 1990s. While you technically can run …

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• RPG Use “Skyrocketed” Says IBM i Marketplace Report

  February 20, 2023 Alex Woodie

  RPG has always been the number one development language on IBM i, the platform with which it is most closely linked. But as open source languages like PHP and Java spread on IBM i, some speculated that RPG’s popularity would begin to slip. That hasn’t happened, according to Fortra’s most recent IBM i Marketplace Survey Results report. In fact, usage of RPG has “skyrocketed,” it says.

  From 2015 to 2020, the percentage of Fortra (formerly HelpSystems) Marketplace Survey-takers who chose RPG as one of their development languages stayed steady, hovering around the 84 percent to 89 percent level. Structured Query …

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• IBM i Debugger Comes to VS Code

  February 15, 2023 Alex Woodie

  At long last, IBM i developers can now debug their code in a development environment other than Rational Developer for IBM i or Merlin. The news came last week, when Liam Allan announced that the ILE debugging feature is now available in Code for IBM i, his third-party, IBM i-centric plug-in for Visual Studio Code.

  “Debugging ILE COBOL and RPGLE inside @code like it’s any other day!” Allan tweeted from his @Notesofbarry Twitter account. “I’m pumped for this release #ibmi.”

  Indeed, this day has been a long time in coming. Allan, who has not been shy about sharing his dislike …

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