Four Hundred Monitor, February 14
February 14, 2018 Dan Burger
Old code is today’s technical debt. New code is tomorrow’s technical debt. Maintaining code is the albatross around our necks. What can you do besides kick your tech debt down the road? Find some food for thought on that topic in Monitor this week.
You’ll also learn a few things about where small to midsize businesses are spending the bulk of their IT budgets, which you can then compare to your own budget. And finally, an article that points out that CEOs are investing more in advanced technologies such as AI, but they aren’t planning to invest in retraining their workforces for this technology.
Top Stories From Outside The Jungle
(InformationWeek) The code we write today will become the technology debt of tomorrow. Think of all the code we’ve written in the past five decades and all the places it’s running. Add to that all the code we’re writing now and will write in the coming years. It’s unsustainable. It’s not an immediate pain-point, but technology debt is a can that just keeps getting kicked down the road.
(ZDNet) Small businesses will spend nearly $602 billion this year on IT software and services. According to the research firm IDC, SMBs will spend the most on personal computing devices, peripherals, and mobile phones. Second to that is application spending, led by resource management software, content applications, customer relationship management systems and collaboration software.
(InformationWeek) Is your workforce ready to compete in a data-driven, cloud-enabled, digitally transformed environment? CEOs are investing more in advanced technologies such as AI, but they aren’t planning to invest in retraining their workforces for this technology.
Redbooks, White Papers, and Other Resources
(ARCAD Blog) The technical definition for source code management includes version control and revision control. That doesn’t tell you much. Truth be told, it looks different depending on your goals and the scope of the development staff.
(HelpSystems) The annual IBM i Marketplace Survey is one of the most cited references for data about the IBM i installed base. It measures Power System hardware releases, operating system releases, user concerns, development preferences, and many additional metrics. The 2018 report features data collected in late 2017.
(Rocket Software) “9 Ways to API-Enable Host-Based Enterprise Apps” is an E-book that describes building application programming interfaces (APIs) that provide real-time access to enterprise app functionality without invasive and potentially risky changes to the code.
(IBM) Full IBM support for i 7.1 will cease in April. Will you be upgrading to 7.2 or 7.3? Read the official 7.1 withdrawal announcement from IBM and check out the information on OS upgrades that is available here.
(Seiden Group) The Git trend makes perfect sense as IBM i teams adopt languages such as PHP, JavaScript, and Python to develop Web user interfaces, APIs, and other functionality. That said, Git also supports the traditional IBM i language, RPG.
(Profound Logic) This survey of the IBM i community is focused on modernization projects completed and projected. Among its findings are that more businesses have upgraded to the latest versions of IBM i and RPG compared to last year and that companies remaining on the platform are embracing options to optimize IBM i for their modern enterprise. There’s plenty here to discover and discuss.
(CEF) The COMMON Education Foundation (CEF) has added a new video library containing live-session recordings from COMMON Conferences and webcasts. Business development and technical development topics, presented by respected authorities, are included in the new library, which is available 24×7.
Chats, Webinars, Seminars, Shows, and Other Happenings
February 14 – Webinar – Whether you have green screens or a drab GUI, outdated apps can benefit from modern source code, modern GUIs, and modern tools. In this session, Profound Logic’s Alex Roytman and Liam Allan demonstrate how free-format RPG and Node.js can be used to modernize legacy RPG code, create modern application interfaces, and extend RPG applications to include Web Services and NPM packages. The presentation begins at 10:30 a.m. Pacific Time.
February 20 – Costa Mesa, California – JavaScript, HTML and CSS, building blocks of Web and mobile design, will be the featured topics at the monthly meeting of the OCEAN User Group. Patrick Behr–a professional programmer, analyst, designer and integrator of new applications featuring modern RPG, SQL and database design—will be the guest speaker. Dinner and networking begins at 6 p.m. with the presentation at 7. The meeting location is National University located at 3390 Harbor Boulevard.
February 20 – Coppell, Texas – RPG editors other than SEU and RDi will be on the agenda during the monthly meeting of the Metro Midrange Systems Association, a user group for the Dallas and Fort Worth metro areas. Guest speaker Aaron Bartell, one of the top guns in IBM i open source technologies, will be presenting the information. The event begins at 6 p.m. MMSA meetings are held at the IBM Global Solution Center located at 1177 South Belt Line Road.
February 20 – Eden Prairie, Minnesota – IBM i business continuity expert Debbie Saugen will explain the latest hardware and OS updates that help meet recovery time objectives and recovery point objectives during the monthly meeting of QUSER, the local user group for IBM midrange professionals in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. The presentation begins at 2 p.m.The meeting begins social time at 1:30 p.m. at the HelpSystems offices located at 6455 City West Parkway.
February 21 – Westbury, New York – The Long Island Systems Users Group monthly meeting will include two presentations by Architect for Open Source and Java on IBM i Jesse Gorzinski. At 5 p.m., Gorzinski will discuss open source utilities supported by IBM i. At 7 p.m., he will explain the integration opportunities between IBM i and Watson. In between the sessions is time for networking, cocktails, and dinner. LISUG meetings are held at the Westbury Manor located at 1100 Jericho Turnpike.
February 22 – Parsippany, New Jersey – Guest speaker Jesse Gorzinski, architect for open source and Java on IBM i will discuss open source tools at the meeting of the Northeastern Systems Technology Users group. Topics will include various ways to edit open source code on IBM i, accessing and using shells, and how to be a productive open source user and developer. The event begins at 5 p.m. and will be held at the Spice Grill located at 111 US-46.
February 22 – Webinar – “Building and Sharing RDi Templates to Improve Developer Productivity” is an online session that’s free to COMMON members and $99 for non-members. The session focus is on improving productivity by reusing code created by others. Using Rational Developer for i to create templates and snippets and share them with other developers will be discussed. The presenter is Ray Everhart of Fresche Solutions. His presentation begins at noon Central Time. Non-member register procedure begins with the link to “Create a new account” on the registration page.
February 26 – March 8 – Six European cities – The IT Leadership Forum is an opportunity to meet and hear from leading IBM i experts, industry thought leaders, other IT executives and special guests from IBM. Discussion topics will include how IBM i shops are innovating for the future, overcoming modernization challenges and leveraging existing systems to build a solid strategy for IT. There will be an emphasis on prioritizing initiatives pertaining to security, improving agility and developing a forward-looking IT strategy. Key speakers include Alison Butterill, Trevor Perry, Mike Pavlak, Emmanuel Tzinevrakis, Donnie MacColl, and Pascal Polverini. The events are hosted by Fresche Solutions.
March 13 -15 – Delavan, Wisconsin – The Wisconsin Midrange Computing Professionals Association Spring Technical Conference is the largest conference in the Midwest. It features more than 50 informative presentations on current topics such as SQL, PHP, RPG, .NET and IBM administration. The tech conference includes a vendor expo and is hosted by the Lake Lawn Resort.
March 19-22 – Las Vegas, Nevada – Think 2018 is a new IBM conference that highlights topics such as IT transitions to the cloud, data and analytics, application development, IBM research, the Internet of Things, IT infrastructure, mobile, security, collaboration, and Watson. Programs available for C-level executives, IT managers, developers, and academics.
March 19 & 20 – Dallas, Texas – IBM i Chief Architect Steve Will and a select group of CIOs will be discussing the potential of modern IBM i applications during the IBM i CIO Summit. The CIO Summit is an executive-level forum facilitating the exchange ideas in a confidential setting whee they can talk candidly about the challenges they face and to learn what works for their peers. Conversation will be supplemented by brief talks on select topics such as staffing, how to attract young RPG developers, and IBM i direction. The CIO Summit is a free, by-invitation-only event open to a limited number of CIOs or IT directors whose IT staff includes developers.
March 20-22 – Dallas, Texas – The twice-a-year, spring and fall, RPG & DB2 Summit returns to the Southwest for its next technical conference with an agenda of in-depth sessions that covers new and traditional topics. In addition to the three-day Summit, an optional fourth day of hands-on workshops provide intensive education into popular IBM i development technologies.
April 23-25 – Framingham, Massachusetts – The Northeast IBM i User Group Conference features more than 70 educational sessions in seven skills categories. It offers the opportunity to learn about new technologies, engage with vendors to discuss packaged software advancements, hear IBM i executives and lead developers discuss products and roadmaps for the platform, and gain knowledge that can benefit your company and your career. The user groups that combine to organize this conference come from the states of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
May 20-23 – San Antonio, Texas – PowerUp 18 (formerly the COMMON Annual Meeting and Exposition) is the largest IBM i educational event of the year. It includes more than 300 sessions related to IBM i, as well as AIX and Linux. Open source, high availability, security, DB2, and application development are a few of the popular skill-building topics. The agenda includes all-day pre-conference workshops, open labs, and a wide variety of lecture-type sessions presented by subject matter experts. Pre-conference workshops (May 19) are also planned. An early registration discount that saves $200 on the registration is available through April 27.
