Four Hundred Monitor, May 20

May 20, 2020 Jenny Thomas

Depending on where you reside, you may be seeing some changes in the stay-at-home order most of us have been living under since March. In some parts of the U.S., restaurants and gyms have re-opened, while in other places, like here in southern California, we only just allowed back to our beaches (surfers and walkers only, no sitting on the sand) and all while under cover of masks. What does seem to be more common is the desire to get back underway again, with many businesses doing whatever is necessary to adapt and open their doors in some fashion. Hopefully wherever you are at, you are finding that safe balance between getting back to work and staying healthy. In the meantime, you can continue to rely on Monitor to bring you the latest industry news and happenings from a socially responsible distance.

Top Stories From Outside The Jungle

(Fast Company) Your laptop’s unused computing power can help scientists find COVID-19 treatments via a project from IBM and Scripps Research.

(Computing) Should you spend your time at home learning COBOL? This article looks at some of the reasons you might consider obtaining this new skill.

(IBM Systems Media) Chief architect for IBM i Steve Will explains why there’s no TR PTF Group for IBM i 7.4 TR2 and 7.3 TR8 in this IBM publication.

(IT Jungle) While killing time on quarantine, IT Jungle’s own Alex Woodie navigates IBM’s website in search of the elusive IBM i.

(TNW) IBM has released a free toolkit and an accessibility checker that will help developers fine-tune their applications for people with disabilities.

Redbooks, White Papers, Blogs, and Other Resources

(GoAnywhere) This on-demand webinar looks at replacing FTP scripts with Managed File Transfer.

(Seiden Group) This blog shows you how to configure Apache on IBM i for higher traffic.

(The Weather Channel) Get up-to-date info on COVID-19 in your area on this page powered by IBM’s Watson.

(Dawn May Consulting) IBM i expert Dawn May gives a complete round up of IBM i resources.

(Fresche Solutions) How are you leveraging your systems and innovating for the future? Fresche’s 2020 IBM i in Business Survey will provide critical understanding into the role that IT plays in business. Participants will receive a report and invitation for a live session about the results.

(COBOL) Join this Facebook group of COBOL programmers to find a heap of oldies, newbies, everyone in between and a lot of fun.

Chats, Webinars, Seminars, Shows, and Other Happenings

May 20-June 18 – Webinar Series – The Summit Lunch & Learn series is free online technical sessions for IBM i developers. RPG & DB2 Summit teammates Jon Paris, Paul Tuohy and Susan Gantner host live sessions led by guest instructors, including IBM Champions, IBMers from the Rochester and Toronto labs, and ISVs with developer-focused tools. Review and register for any or all of the topics here.

May 21 – Webinar – The Mid-Atlantic Group of IBM i Collaborators (MAGiC) will hold its May meetings online. Get more information on “The Zen of Using PHP without Zend Server” at this link. Membership is not required to attend these free meetings.

May 26 – Webinar – This session from LANSA will demonstrate how the Visual LANSA v15 update will enable you to share and retrieve previously siloed data, easily create dashboards, and apply universal rules down to the field level.

June 10-11 – Virtual Event – i-UG’s annual conference is going virtual and it’s free! Get the details and register here. On each day you will be able to choose from two streams of 45-minute presentations on topics relevant to today by industry specialists, some familiar and some new to i-UG conferences.

June 22-23 – Livonia, Michigan – The Michigan IBM Power Systems Technical Education Conference (MITEC) is still scheduled to take in June and will feature more than 45 sessions covering topics such as system architecture, application development, mobile applications, RPG, Python, business intelligence, disaster recovery, and performance monitoring.

July 22-24 – Virtual Conference – OCEAN TechCon20 is three days of inspiration and innovation featuring such many expert speakers including Liam Allan, Patrick Behr, Rob Bestgen, Jim Buck, Erwin Earley, Charles Guarino, Mark Irish, Scott Klement, Doug Mack, Aaron Magid, Dan Magid, Eamon Musallam, Mike Pavlak, Steve Pitcher, Alan Seiden, and Carol Woodbury!.

POSTPONED – August 31-September 3 – Tampa, Florida – POWERUp 2020 will offer between 350-400 sessions presented by more than 100 IT professionals, and features the largest exposition of its kind. This conference structured to give you the pure education and professional connections needed to best enhance your career.

May 3-5, 2021 – Framingham, Massachusetts – Plan now for the 2021 Northeast User Group (NEUGC) Conference. NEUGC is the largest technical conference in New England for IBM i.

COVID-19 Response Updates

(cheddar) IBM creates a blockchain solution in assist with the medical supply shortage resulting from the coronavirus pandemic.

(IT Jungle) Our own Timothy Prickett Morgan takes a look at the IBM I before and after the pandemic.

(IntelliChief) This blog looks at the push by many businesses to go paperless in response to COVID-19.

(Raz-Lee Security) In an effort to help organizations keep their employees and families safe while continuing business operations, Raz-Lee is offering its iSecurity Anti-Ransomware solution for free until July 1, 2020.

(iTech Solutions) This Q&A session offers some tips and tricks for working from home with your IBM i. Keep an eye on iTech Solutions website for more webinars to help you through the lockdown.

(COMMON) A new series aimed to help bring together COMMON community members with IBM i and remote work experts is happening on Wednesdays.

(IT Jungle) Will we make it through the current pandemic storm? Out editor-in-chief Tim Prickett Morgan has some thoughts.

(IT Jungle) Tim Prickett Morgan and Alex Woodie team up to profile how IBM i vendors are adapting to the new normal with news from Maxava, CNX, Rocket Software, New Generation Software, Infor, Raz-Lee Security, ARCAD Software, System i Developer, iTech Solutions Group, and COMMON.

(IT Jungle) Chordia Consulting offers our readers a significantly reduced rate for a remote IT healthcheck with a variant tuned specifically for IBM i shops and their special characteristics.

(Maxava) High availability software maker Maxava is making its Monitor Mi8 product, available free of charge to customers using its Maxava HA clustering software so they can monitor and manage their machines remotely

(IT Jungle) Our own Alex Woodie looks at how companies and conferences from our ecosystem is coping with the global pandemic.

(Fresche Solutions) A special deal for free licenses to Presto web development tools for IBM i to help companies with cope with remote workforces.

(System i Developer) RPG & DB2 Summit is planning to replace its March conference with a virtual conference beginning April 1.

(SQL iQuery) Stay in the know with Bob Cozzi’s map of the latest U.S. COVID-10 coronavirus statistics.