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Security Threats, They Are a Changin’
November 17, 2021 Alex Woodie
Ransomware came into 2021 like a lion, but rather than going out like a lamb, it seemed to get bigger and meaner. Even IBM i shops, which so often are protected from the wider security storm, felt the panic and sense of helplessness of having their previous data held for ransom. But early indications are that the security threat we’re talking about this time next year may be entirely different.
It’s tough to overestimate the impact that ransomware had on American businesses and other institutions through the course of the year. We had indications that something big was unfolding a …
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Four Hundred Monitor, November 17
November 17, 2021 Jenny Thomas
While those of us in the Jungle are looking forward to the Thanksgiving break next week here in the U.S., which brings some much-needed downtime to recharge before the race to the end of the year, the folks at IBM are charging forward in the week following its formal separation from Kyndryl. Much of the news this week is focused on the aftermath and what we can expect from IBM now that it can redirect its all of its energies toward itself once again. Hopefully this refocus will result in good news for our little slice in the week and …
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Four Hundred Monitor, November 10
November 10, 2021 Jenny Thomas
“Parting is such sweet sorrow” is an oxymoron Juliet cries to her lover, Romeo, when he departs for the evening. It might also appropriately describe IBM’s separation from Kyndryl, which was finalized last week and now allows the two companies to begin focusing on their own priorities while looking forward to a time when they might be reunited in the domination of their chosen space. For IBM, it’s back to full attention on AI and the hybrid cloud. And as we see from the news this week, Big Blue is wasting no time in refocusing its efforts and we hope …
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Four Hundred Monitor, November 3
November 3, 2021 Jenny Thomas
Fast foodies might have caught the recent news the IBM is working with McDonald’s to help automate the drive-thru window. It’s hard to ignore that this development will eliminate jobs, but artificial intelligence makes for interesting reading for our audience so we figured it was worth mentioning. Turns out, McDonald’s has already piloted an AI drive-thru system in 10 stores in Chicago. Those restaurants saw 85 percent order accuracy, with only one-fifth of orders needing a human to intervene and help. It’s rage inducing to leave a drive-thru without everything you ordered, so those numbers are not super impressive, but …
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Expanding Fields Is A Bigger Pain In The Neck Than You Think
October 20, 2021 Andrew Ireland
Remember the Y2K problem, when companies had two-digit dates for years in their applications and the millennial turn was coming and they suddenly needed a four-digit date so all the math would work out right comparing the present, future, and past? Well, every time you need to change a field length in your source code – which almost always means making it bigger, not shorter – you have to suffer through a mini Y2K crisis.
Yes, the Y2K crisis did not bring an end to civilization as we knew it, as some were prognosticating and maybe a few were hoping, …
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Guru: Fall Brings New RPG Features (And So Did Spring!)
October 4, 2021 Jon Paris
When I first sat down to write this tip my focus was on introducing you to the new RPG features that were added alongside the latest September Technology Refresh (TR). However, when I tried to reference one of the enhancements from the spring enhancements, I quickly discovered that I had never written those up for the Guru column!
Oooopppps! As a result, this “tip” will cover all the RPG enhancements added this year, both in the April and September announcements. It will be in two parts. This first part will cover the array-oriented features.
RPG’s range of array-processing options has …
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IBM Patches Nine Security Flaws in IBM i
September 29, 2021 Alex Woodie
IBM patched issued three security bulletins Friday alerting IBM i users to the availability of patches for nine newly disclosed security vulnerabilities in OpenSSL, HTTP Server, and a WebSphere Liberty components. Some of the vulnerabilities are potentially serious and should be patched immediately.
IBM patched two security flaws its OpenSSL API that potentially could have devastating consequences on impacted systems, including enabling a hacker to take over the server, to read sensitive information, and execute a denial of service (DOS) attack. IBM patched these flaws in IBM i 7.1 through 7.4, according to the security bulletin, which you can read …
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Four Hundred Monitor, September 29
September 29, 2021 Jenny Thomas
You know what they say about the best laid plans, and so does COMMON when its plans for POWERUp recently went awry. Despite the best efforts, as reported by IT Jungle’s Alex Woodie last week, COMMON made the decision to remove the in-person option and go totally virtual for the conference that begins next week on October 4. The good news is this isn’t COMMON’s first virtual rodeo so it can rely on past experience to switch smoothly into online mode. You can still register to attend, read on to find more details on POWERUp and the news of the …
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Value Stream Management: Bringing Lean Manufacturing Techniques To IBM i Development
September 20, 2021 Andrew Ireland
When resources are tight, it is important to optimize their usage and maximize the business value they deliver. This is the very foundation of what is called lean manufacturing or just-in-time manufacturing, which more than a few IBM i shops know a thing or two about because this platform has been used for decades by process and discrete manufacturers to automate their businesses.
The move toward DevOps has allowed software engineers to adopt many of the best practices developed by manufacturing over the last 100 years. These include automating the flow of code, a repository of standard components and a …
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PHP Decisions Loom as Original Distro Reaches End of Life
May 24, 2021 Alex Woodie
IBM i shops have five more weeks until Zend Server Basic, the PHP runtime used by thousands of IBM i shops over the years, reaches end of life and will no longer be offered, supported, or updated with security fixes. Customers that want to continue using PHP safely beyond July 1 will need to obtain a new license or move to a new PHP runtime.
The long history of Zend Server Basic stretches all the way back to 2006, which was the year when the PHP runtime became one of the first open source technologies to be adapted to run …
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