Three Years of 'i Can'

You know the phrase, “My, how time flies!” And it seems it has! On Aug. 10, 2009, the first i Can blog, "Why i Can," was published. Since that time, the blog has been updated almost every week and somewhere around 140 blog entries have now been written. My list of topics to write about is as long as ever; there are always new topics as the IBM i development team continues to release new function via Technology Refreshes. The list of older topics to write about is endless.

One thing that has surprised me a bit about this blog is the frequency I use my own entries as references. I have referred back to them numerous times to refresh my memory on a topic. I often get asked questions and it's nice to simply point someone to a prior blog entry that provides the answer.

My favorite or most referenced articles include:

 

• Display CPU Utilization for all Partitions
• Tell You Why You're Waiting
• PTFs for Additional Work Management Controls
• Direct the use of Navigator? Or is that Navigate the use of Director?
• Measure Disk Response Times
• Achieve Faster IFS Save Times Using SAV with ASYNCBRING

Sometimes finding the older articles can be a bit challenging. I use three approaches:

• Internet search--This tends to be my first approach. A keyword or two about the topic along with “i Can” generally finds what I'm looking for.
• Using the Archives--You can find a list of all the articles, month by month or by the various categories by which they are organized.
• Going to the specific category that you are interested in from the main “i Can” page.

You can also subscribe to the blog articles via RSS. On the main IBM Systems Magazine page, there is an RSS link next to each blog. This approach is very handy since you don't have to make an effort to get to the website to read the articles.

Another thing that has surprised me a bit is how challenging it has been to keep track of what I have written and the list of topics I have yet to write about. In fact, I have resorted to a spreadsheet that lists all of the prior topics and also includes a worksheet on topics yet to write about. I am probably one of the most anti-spreadsheet people; I hate them! But I've found it's a good way to keep track of everything that's been written; I have also saved the URLs for each article so I can easily find one that is proving difficult to pin down otherwise.

I hope you have found these blog entries to be valuable. The content will keep coming. And please, if you have topics you'd like to see written about, feel free to comment on the blog or send me a short email with your suggestions.