• Power Systems Hit By The Pandemic In Q1 2020

  April 27, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Thirteen weeks ago, when IBM reported its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2019, we told you that the Power9 platform was entering the long tail, that part of the cycle of the this generation of Power Systems machines where the revenue would dwindle off between that time and when the Power10 servers launch sometime in 2021. That tail perhaps just got a little longer and skinnier thanks to the coronavirus pandemic.

  IBM doesn’t talk very much about the specifics of revenues and profits for the Power Systems line any more, just like it stopped talking about the iSeries …

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• IBM Grants Amnesty On Software Maintenance After License Charges

  April 20, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Ask and ye shall receive. Last week, we were asking for Big Blue to wake up and provide a stimulus package for its Power Systems business in general and its IBM i business in particular. And one of the things we asked for – an amnesty canceling so-called after license charges for Software Maintenance for IBM i and AIX platforms was actually quietly announced to business partners – unexpectedly at that – on April 13, the same day our essay ran and three days after we wrote it.

  We think this is a coincidence, not causation. And it’s a …

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• COVID-19 Response: Manta Cuts Training Prices, Offers Freebies

  April 20, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  Everybody is doing their part to try to cushion the blow of the coronavirus outbreak and also to stay in business themselves. It’s a delicate balance, and one that we are all trying to manage.

  Manta Technologies, which has been providing IBM i training for nearly the past three decades and online training for other platforms for more than four decades now, is doing its part. For nearly 20 years now, Manta’s library of more than 130 IBM i courses has been available online, and people all over the world use it to brush up on existing skills and …

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• Here’s What’s In the Latest IBM i Technology Refreshes

  April 15, 2020 Alex Woodie

  As expected, IBM today officially unveiled its spring Technology Refreshes for IBM i. Among the goodies that will become available for IBM i 7.4 TR2 or IBM i 7.3 TR8 (or both) are enhancements to Db2 Mirror, a new approach to tape library virtualization, improvements to open source, and new features and functionality around Db2, RPG, RDi, and security, too.

  Months ago, IBM execs circled April 14 on their calendars as the day for the big IBM 7.4 TR2 and IBM i 7.3 TR8 reveal, with the idea that the following week’s POWERUp conference in Atlanta, Georgia (now canceled, but …

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• Thoroughly Modern: Digital Transformation Is More Important Than Ever

  April 15, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  There are very few things in life that don’t have some kind of distribution across behavior patterns. Some phenomena are driven by bell curves or inverted bell curves or some other kind of distribution – including random. And as such, we all know that the companies that comprise the IBM i base fall on different parts of the spectrum of behavior with regard to how up to date their systems and their applications are.

  In normal markets, where some of the pressures are not so intense, it might not matter as much to have a modern system, software, and application …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, April 15

  April 15, 2020 Jenny Thomas

  While COVID-19 continues to dominate headlines worldwide, there is still much happening in the world of IBM i. Last week we told you about the new CEO of IBM, Arvind Krishna, taking the helm, and this week we fill you in on the latest Technology Refresh on what’s become available for IBM i 7.4 TR2 or IBM i 7.3 TR8. As much as we would all like for all business to get back to usual, it is nice to have some semblance of normal with the Spring announcements. We’ve got that story and the latest news below, followed by our …

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• Where Is The Power Systems-IBM i Stimulus Package?

  April 13, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  The governments of the world are spending to try to compensate for the economic slowdown in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, which is the right thing to do. We wonder why IBM has not done more to help its Power Systems business.

  Just before the coronavirus pandemic really started to kick in throughout Europe and the United States, and as the Power9 family of Power Systems machines was entering the long tail part of its sales cycle, IBM announced a deal in Europe that gave customers buying its so-called scale out (what we would call entry) one-socket and two-socket …

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• The X Factor: Home Base

  April 13, 2020 Timothy Prickett Morgan

  As you might imagine, New York City is on my mind a lot these days. And I have some advice for you as you are transitioning to tighter quarters and working from home – something I have been doing for 25 years now.

  Way back in the dawn of time, back in the wake of the launch of the AS/400 when I graduated from college and moved to New York City because it was the biggest, scariest thing that I could do, my brain sort of melted from the enormity of it all. At that time, a recession was underway …

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• Four Hundred Monitor, April 8

  April 8, 2020 Jenny Thomas

  The lockdown continues and while it may seem like everything has come to a screeching halt, the world is still spinning and businesses are carrying on as best as they can. Take IBM, for instance. The plan for introducing us to its new CEO has been in the works for some time, and pandemic or not, it came time for Arvind Krishna to take the reins. And on April 6, he did exactly that, and started the day with a letter, which you can see at the first link in the Top Stories From Outside The Jungle section below. Before …

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• Big Blue Changes Gears Slightly With IBM i TR Plan

  April 6, 2020 Alex Woodie

  The coronavirus has infected over a million people around the globe and forced hundreds of millions of employees to work from home. But it won’t stop IBM from announcing the next batch of Technology Refreshes, ostensibly IBM i version 7.4 TR2 and IBM i version 7.3 TR8, sometime in the next couple of weeks. Its plans for sharing the information, however, have changed.

  IBM has essentially shuttered its lab in Rochester, Minnesota, which falls under that state’s social distancing orders to help prevent the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. More than 80 percent of the United States is …

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