• Guild Mortgage Takes The 20-Year Option For Modernization

  June 27, 2022 Alex Woodie

  When Kurt Reheiser returned to the IBM i server after a 15-year hiatus away the platform, things weren’t a lot different than how he left them. “My skills were more relevant than I thought they would be,” the former RPG developer said during last month’s POWERUp 2022 conference. Now as the CIO of a multi-billion-dollar company called Guild Mortgage, Reheiser is overseeing a modernization initiative that will keep building on the company’s successful history of custom development on the IBM i platform.

  Reheiser shared his and his company’s IT journey during a keynote address at COMMON’s annual user conference …

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• Managed Cloud Saves Money By Cutting System And People Overprovisioning

  June 22, 2022 Ron Venzin

  For most IBM i shops in the world, a unit of compute, storage, or networking on a cloud or a unit of time for a skilled IT specialist is always going to cost more than what it costs to have such talent in house. And so, you would think, putting an IBM i system in the cloud and managing all aspects of that system will always cost companies more money, right?

  Wrong.

  Here’s the part of the math that people rarely do, and that we do each time we close another cloud and managed services deal for an IBM i …

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• Plotting A Middle Age Career Change To IBM i

  June 20, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Not many colleges teach the IBM i and RPG anymore, which makes it hard for midrange shops to replenish talent that way. But organizations have another resource they can tap for technical personnel: slightly more experienced individuals who are ready to start a second career. This is the path taken by Shelly Petty, who recently shared her story at the POWERUp 2022 conference in New Orleans.

  Petty spent 12 years working in the banking field before making her career change to IBM i. Her previous job was a high-stress position that required her to handle securities on behalf of corporate …

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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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• POWERUp Brings IBM i Base Back Together in the Big Easy

  May 25, 2022 Alex Woodie

  After two years of lockdowns and Zoom calls, IBM i professionals were joyful to be face to face with fellow users this week at the POWERUp conference in New Orleans. The celebration lasted all week, and spilled over onto Bourbon Street at times, but that didn’t get in the way of the primary mission: Getting educated on IBM i. And with the latest enhancements, there was a lot to learn.

  For many POWERUp 2022 attendees and ISVs, COMMON’s annual conference is the first physical event they’ve attended since the pandemic started back in March 2020. With the easing of …

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• IBM i Integration Elevates Operational Query and Analytics

  May 16, 2022 Bill Langston

  Modernization, SQL, RPG, open source, cybersecurity, resilience, compliance, clouds, and AI are the trending topics in enterprise technology. As a result, IT professionals can easily overlook and undervalue software that enables real-time, operational query and analytics.

  In contrast, managers and mid-level staff in accounting, logistics, inventory, sales, customer service, and other departments still place a high value on data access and often wish their IT team could do more to help. Collaboration is the key, because your company isn’t realizing the potential of operational query and analytics if you have narrowly defined it as a dashboard and ad hoc file …

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• Simplified IBM i Stack Bundling Ahead Of Subscription Pricing

  May 16, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  There are a bunch of things that were announced on May 3 by IBM ahead of the POWERUp 2022 conference coming later this month and well ahead of the launch of entry and midrange Power10 machines in July. One of them was IBM i 7.5, and the other was the Modernization Engine for Lifecycle Integration, otherwise known as Merlin, for transforming old RPG code into free format RPG code.

  The third thing, which IBM has been talking around for a while and is getting more serious about is offering IBM i hardware and software on a subscription basis rather than …

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• IBM i Community Reacts to IBM i 7.5

  May 11, 2022 Alex Woodie

  With the first new version of IBM i in over three years, IBM has certainly captured the attention of the IBM i community. But what do users think of the new release? What’s catching their eyes? We queried a few members of the community to find out.

  IBM Merlin, a new licensed product that stands for Modernization Engine for Lifecycle Integration, appeared to capture the bulk of the initial attention around the launch of IBM i 7.5.

  Consisting of VS Code IDE, DevOps and CI/CD software from Git and Jenkins, and IBM i-native tools from ARCAD Software — all …

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• Database And Developer Enhancements In IBM i 7.5 And 7.4 TR6

  May 9, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBM has made a number of enhancements to the Db2 for i database with the launch of IBM i 7.5, which becomes generally available tomorrow. It also is bringing new features for developers, including changes to Integrated Web Services (IWS), which will improve REST integration.

  Most of the new features added to Db2 for i are only available in IBM i 7.5, which will give users a reason to adopt it. However, there are a few enhancements added in IBM i 7.4 Technology Release 6, which doesn’t ship until May 24.

  As we previously reported, IBM i 7.5 expands …

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• Announcement Day: IBM Lifts The Veil On IBM i 7.5 And 7.4 TR6

  May 3, 2022 Alex Woodie

  Big Blue today announced IBM i version 7.5, the first new version of the operating system in three years. Among the big new features with this release are enhancements to Db2 Mirror, better security configurations, and new database features. A new modernization framework called Merlin and a new IBM i subscription option were also unveiled by IBM, which also announced IBM i 7.4 Technology Release 6.

  One of the big headlines with the IBM i 7.5 announcement is Merlin, which IBM says stands for the Modernization Engine for Lifecycle Integration. Merlin provides a lightweight, browser-based development environment for creating new …

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