• Four Hundred Monitor, June 22

  June 22, 2022 Jenny Thomas

  It’s been said that no one needs a vacation as much as the person who just had one. Catching up after a vacation is not an easy task. I have just returned from two weeks on the road and my To Do list is two miles long as I struggle to catch up and offer apologies for missed and delayed emails. Still, it is important to make time for family and things other than work, so I will happily get my desk and inbox back in order. And since I have had my fun, let’s get back in the groove …

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• IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 24, Number 25

  June 22, 2022 Doug Bidwell

  It is beginning to feel a bit a bit like Groundhog Day at the IBM i PTF Guide. Yet more security vulnerabilities are surfacing in the IBM i platform. While the number of new security bulletins for IBM i is nowhere near what we see with Windows Server and Linux platforms, it has become a constant game of Whack-a-mole. So get out your rubber mallet and get the Aspercreme ready to fight tendonitis. . . .

  First, we have Security Bulletin: IBM WebSphere Application Server Liberty for IBM i is vulnerable to identity spoofing and port status query (CVE-2022-22475 …

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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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• Guru: The CALL I’ve Been Waiting For

  June 20, 2022 Ted Holt

  Christmas came to my house early this year. May 3, to be exact. Boy! Was Santa Claus good to me! IBM gave me two presents! The first was a CL enhancement that I had desired for years. The second was an improvement that, to my delight, almost obsoletes a utility I wrote years ago. Both have to do with the CL CALL command.

  CALL is arguably the most used and most important command in CL, yet for all these years it has remained untouched. I’m glad that IBM has seen fit to devote time and resources to the enhancement of …

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• A Frank Solstice

  June 20, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  When you are born in Minnesota, the seasons matter. Unfortunately, as Frank Soltis, the former chief architect of the AS/400 system and the creator of the single-level storage architecture of the System/38 and the AS/400 that is still a marvel, once quipped to us: “There are only two seasons in Minnesota: Winter, and Getting Ready For Winter.”

  And so, you have two options: Play hockey when you aren’t farming, or design excellent computer systems. That’s how supercomputer genius Seymour Cray did it from nearby Wisconsin.

  The AS/400 for which this publication was founded 33 years ago was born on the …

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• The Inevitable Wave Of Power9 Withdrawals Begins

  June 20, 2022 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  With the entry and midrange Power10 servers coming in a few weeks, and with the supply chains for chip, board, and system manufacturing having more kinks than a Slinky left in the hands of a group of seven-year-olds for several days, it is only natural for Big Blue to focus on lining up all of the parts needed for its Power10 iron and to stop worrying so much about Power9 features and peripherals. Even though it will be selling Power9 iron for quite some time and supporting it for a very long time.

  And that is exactly what will be …

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• Profound Logic Shows Off No-Code API for Salesforce

  June 15, 2022 Alex Woodie

  IBM i shops that are looking for a way to integrate their Db2 for i data with Salesforce applications may be interested in a new REST API unveiled by Profound Logic last month. What’s more, the vendor says the solution works without writing a single line of code.

  Profound API, which the company launched just over a year ago, is a Node.js-based offering that runs directly in a Web browser. The product contains several editors and a runtime that enables users to define their APIs, test them, manage them as they’re pushed into production, and monitor performance over time. …

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• Getting A Firm Handle On Power Systems And Storage Firmware

  June 15, 2022 Richard Warren

  Back in the old days of the AS/400 and the iSeries, most customers had a single box or maybe two, one for production applications and databases and one for development of high availability. And everything that box needed was inside of itself.

  And at most, you applied two kinds of PTFs – those for the operating system and those for the microcode – to the machine, and you did that maybe once or twice a year and every once in a while you might add some group PTFs to update security or other important features.

  But the world has changed …

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• Ragged Flash: A Smooth Solution to a Thorny Problem

  June 15, 2022 Alex Woodie

  There are many benefits to using IBM’s FlashCopy services, which delivers a nearly instantaneous copy of a customer’s IBM i environment. But there are also challenges, such as when a FlashCopy is paired with an IPL, which had the habit in busy environments of throwing the source and the copy out of synch. IBM has addressed this problem with “ragged flash.”

  Ragged flash is one of the new database features delivered in IBM i 7.5 (it’s not available in 7.4). Scott Forstie, the database architect for IBM i, identified the ragged flash as one of his most favorite new database …

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