• PHP’s Evolution On The IBM i Platform Continues

  September 28, 2026 Alex Woodie

  PHP was one of the first open source languages and runtimes to come to IBM i way back in the early 2000s. More than two decades later, open source is thriving on IBM i with hundreds of projects, while PHP is considered a hardened, enterprise-grade language for modern Web applications. This fall will see at least one new release of PHP coming to IBM i, version 8.6, and perhaps more.

  We are all indebted to the early backers of PHP on the IBM i platform, who saw the potential for the open-source project to evolve into the sturdy business language …

  Read more

• Protecting IBM i Data For The AI Revolution

  September 28, 2026 Richard Dolewski

  AI is a prime-time conversation in every walk of life. No longer just a buzzword. AI is changing the Enterprise Security model, so I ask, “Are you ready for this next IT transformation?” Organizations everywhere are accelerating artificial intelligence initiatives at a rapid pace and scale.

  Most conversations focus on what AI can do for business today and how fast it will be deployed. AI drives automated workflows, autonomous efficiencies, supply chain improvements, faster time to market, and productivity. True modernization comes from constantly reviewing how things are done, embracing new tools, protocols, and working practices to improve …

  Read more

• Guru: Two More Small But Handy RPG Enhancements: LIKE(*EXT) And %LOOKUPNE

  September 28, 2026 Gregory Simmons

  Not every trip into the field calls for hauling the whole pack, and not every search calls for scanning everything by hand. Two of the smaller enhancements in this batch of July PTFs for IBM i 7.5 and 7.6 are exactly that kind of quiet convenience: tools that let you reach for just the piece you actually need instead of doing more work than the job requires.

  DISCLAIMER: The mushroom names and file/field names used in the examples below are purely to give the sample programs some context and make them more interesting. Before foraging for or consuming any wild …

  Read more

• IBM i Integration Gives Costco Shoppers Real-Time Inventory

  September 28, 2026 Alex Woodie

  Here’s the scene: Janet is perusing the computer aisles at Costco when suddenly she sees it: The exact configuration of a MacBook Pro she’s been looking for, at a really good price. As she’s getting ready to buy it, Janet makes a grim discovery: Costco is out of that particular MacBook Pro, and the item on display is the last one in the store.

  Janet isn’t the first customer to be disappointed in this way. Retailers have long struggled to adequately reflect the actual warehouse product inventory with the items on display in the front of the store. Communicating out-of-stock …

  Read more

• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 28, Number 33

  September 28, 2026 Doug Bidwell

  Welcome to the 33^rd edition of 2026 of the IBM i PTF Guide. The good news is that there are lot fewer security vulnerabilities for the IBM i platform that we reported on last week. There are, once again, updates to IBM i 7.3 through IBM i 7.6 for various PTF groups.

  We will start with the security issues and patches, and count them off to keep track of them.

  1. Security Bulletin: Multiple Vulnerabilities in IBM Java SDK affect IBM WebSphere Application Server and WebSphere Application Server Liberty due to August 2026 CPU, which is available to …

  Read more

• IBM “Price Harmonization” Increases For Power Systems Coming In The New Year

  September 21, 2026 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  When we look back a few years from now, in like maybe 2032 or so, we will look at 2026 as the year of the price increase. Big Blue, along with other system makers and the component makers whose gear goes into those systems, have all had price increases – often very large ones, and sometimes with what looks to me like opportunistic pricing. That’s when vendors raise prices by more than you would think was warranted.

  Sometime in early September – I think it might have been on September 1, 2, or 3 – IBM announced a price harmonization …

  Read more

• Code For i Continues To Grow. Here Is What’s New

  September 21, 2026 Alex Woodie

  Code for i has been the hottest open source project in the IBM i community for several years, and that popularity is not dropping. In fact, the community behind the red hot project continues to improve the VS Code-based development environment, including new functionality that we can expect to see released in the future.

  Code for i is a VS Code plug-in originally created by Liam Allan in 2021 to make Web-based development possible for ILE developers on IBM i. The project has exploded in popularity over the past five years, with nearly 93,000 installs recorded on the Microsoft Marketplace …

  Read more

• PowerSC: Your One-Stop Shop For Security On IBM i – And Beyond

  September 21, 2026 Alex Woodie

  Keeping on top of changing security threats is difficult, to say the least. It is even harder to map changing threats to changing configurations on your IBM i server. When your IT network also includes AIX and Linux systems, the difficulty gets multiplied. For these types of environments, IBM provides a tool called PowerSC.

  When IBM launched PowerSC (which stands for security and compliance) as an IBM Lab Services product way back in 2010, it was primarily designed for setting up security configurations and running audits on AIX. That is not the case today, as the tool provides a plethora …

  Read more

• As I See It: You’ve Been Flocked

  September 21, 2026 Victor Rozek

  Perhaps you have had a similar experience. You’re hiking in a park or in a wilderness area and since it’s ungodly hot, you’ve taken care to eat well and hydrate. Now you’re miles from the trailhead and the nearest bathroom and you have to poop. Into the bushes you go. Ordinarily, not an event worthy of mention or concern. But these days, on at least one occasion, I’ve had a disquieting thought: I wonder if there’s a trail cam filming me?

  Privacy, if not dead, is on life support. It’s a safe bet that wherever you are and whatever you’re …

  Read more

• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 28, Number 32

  September 21, 2026 Doug Bidwell

  Another week, and another bunch of security vulnerabilities for the IBM i platform. Plus a slew of stuff to update IBM i 7.3 through IBM i 7.6. Let us start with the security issues and patches, as we always do, and count them off to 11 so we can keep track of them.

  1. Security Bulletin: IBM Db2 Mirror for i is vulnerable to Authentication Bypass by Spoofing [CVE-2026-18065], which you can read HERE. Affected Products and Versions:

  IBM i Release	5770-DBM 	PTF Numbers
  7.6				SJ11475
  7.5				SJ11474 
  7.4				SJ11471 
  

  2. Security Bulletin: IBM i Is Affected By Multiple …

  Read more

• Finally: Some Pricing Information On The Power S1112 Entry Server

  September 14, 2026 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  UPDATED: The entry “Bonnell+” Power S1112 server based on the Power11 processor – the only machine that has a P05 software tier for the IBM i operating system – has been shipping for six weeks now, and I have been digging around trying to get detailed, feature-level pricing for the new machine. I have yet to find that fine-grained pricing that I love to have my hands on, but I did get some help from some friends in the reseller community to get current prices for six different configurations of the Power S1112 – two tower configurations and four rack …

  Read more

• Rocket Automates Manual IBM i Tasks With AI

  September 14, 2026 Alex Woodie

  Rocket Software has a multi-pronged AI strategy that spans multiple products and platforms. When it comes to the IBM i platform, this AI push has resulted in Rocket adding AI features that will automate previously manual tasks across its application modernization, change management, and high availability products.

  AI continues to be the elephant in the IT room, but unlike those quiet elephants in that expression, which no one admits is there, this is the elephant that nobody can stop talking about and for good reason: The 2026 edition of AI appears to be the real deal.

  Take a KPMG survey …

  Read more

• Guru: Where’s The Table?

  September 14, 2026 Ted Holt

  It began with an irritation. I considered it a simple request. “Which file did my SQL query read?” I was using the Run SQL Scripts tool to modify an SQL query with unqualified table names. And yet I knew of no ready way to determine the schema (library) name of any of the files. How was I to know which tables I had just queried?

  Let me back up a bit. My SQL client of choice is the Run SQL Scripts tool, which is part of IBM’s Access Client Solutions (ACS). It is not unusual for me to copy and …

  Read more

• LaserVault Goes iSCSI With Virtual Tape Library

  September 14, 2026 Alex Woodie

  LaserVault, the popular virtual tape library (VTL) for IBM i environments from Electronic Storage Corp., has gained support for iSCSI, giving customers more connectivity options beyond Fibre Channel and SAS connections. The new iSCSI support will be particularly useful for customers running the LaserVault ViTL offering in the cloud.

  LaserVault ViTL is a disk-based backup solution that emulates LTO drives in IBM i and open systems environments. Customers have typically plugged the LaserVault device – either the appliance sold by Electronic Storage Corp. or the ViTL software running on an X86 server – into the IBM i server using those …

  Read more

• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 28, Number 31

  September 14, 2026 Doug Bidwell

  Big Blue is dumping a bunch of security vulnerabilities into your lap again, this time just ahead of the Labor Day holiday in the United States. We did not publish that week because we were on holiday, so we are playing catch up just like you now will be.

  Let’s start with the Security Bulletin: IBM i is Affected By Improper Authorization and Authentication Vulnerabilities in DDM / DRDA [CVE-2026-18175, CVE-2026-18221], which you can find HERE. Affected Products and Versions:

  IBM i Release	5770-SS1 	PTF Number(s)
  7.6			        SJ11231
  			        SJ11230
  7.5			        SJ11232
  			        SJ11233
  7.4			        SJ11262
  			        SJ11261	
  7.3			        SJ11234
  			        SJ11235
  

  Security …

  Read more

• Will Power Chips Get A Converged Arm Instruction Set Like Z Mainframe CPUs?

  August 31, 2026 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  One a decade for the past six decades, Big Blue launches an effort to converge its diverse system architectures. It almost never works, with the exception of the launch of the System/360 mainframes in April 1964 and the AS/400 minicomputers in June 1988. And to be fair, the AS/400 was itself based in part on technologies created in a failed convergence effort.

  Back in 1986, the “Fort Knox” project sought to converge the System/4300 air-cooled, entry mainframe lines with the System/38 (from 1978) and the System/36 (from 1983), and it failed. But in the failure, the Rochester Labs took some …

  Read more

• Thinking About Moving IBM i To The Cloud? Don’t Start With The Quote

  August 31, 2026 Josh Patterson

  We get asked a deceptively simple question all the time: “What would it cost to move our IBM i environment to the cloud?”

  It sounds like a pricing question. Usually, it isn’t. Before we start talking about cores, memory, storage, or monthly costs, there’s a much more important question to answer: Why are you considering cloud in the first place?

  Maybe your Power server is approaching a refresh. Maybe your data center contract is ending. Maybe an experienced IBM i administrator is retiring. Maybe your disaster recovery strategy no longer meets the business’s needs. Or perhaps your organization has adopted …

  Read more

• Precisely To Add Ransomware Protection In MIMIX 11

  August 31, 2026 Alex Woodie

  Traditional high availability software that relies on real-time replication of journals is great at protecting against conventional threats, such as natural disasters or server failures. However, HA software is not so good at protecting against emerging threats, such as ransomware. That’s a weakness that Precisely is looking to address with the upcoming launch of MIMIX 11, which adds a new continuous data protection (CDP) capability.

  While the IBM i operating system is generally protected from malware designed for Windows and Linux-based systems, it’s not immune from all attacks, including ransomware attacks. If left exposed on the Internet, the Integrated File …

  Read more

• It’s D-Day For Cybersecurity, AI Firms Warn

  August 31, 2026 Alex Woodie

  The idea of sophisticated AI agents coordinating among themselves to launch a cyberattack on a major corporation sounds like something out of a science fiction novel. But it actually occurred earlier this year, and the agentic attacks will get more sophisticated soon if we don’t act swiftly to shore up defenses in legacy systems (like IBM i), a group of AI firms warned this month.

  In an open letter, the leaders of 100 AI companies, including IBM, Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI, warned that the recent episodes of AI agents going rogue and launching sophisticated attacks on …

  Read more

• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 28, Number 30

  August 31, 2026 Doug Bidwell

  After the deluge of the past two weeks with so many security vulnerabilities and patches for the IBM i platform, you are going to get an easier week now. This may or may not have to do with the vacation schedules of IBMers who try to kill bugs, or it may have to do with the impending Labor Day holiday in the United States.

  Who knows? Take the easy week while you have it. We are off next week for the holiday, and we will catch you up on the patches and vulnerabilities when we return on September 14.

  Here …

  Read more

Previous Articles