IBM i 25 - Join the party

In celebration of the 25th anniversary year of IBM i, we're joining IBM and many others in reminiscing about our experiences with this fabulous platform which has defined our careers. Check out the IBMi25 Facebook page (bit.ly/ibmi25)  - you don't need a Facebook account to see it - for some very clever vignettes and videos about our platform. Join the party.

We are still covering our earliest AS/400 experiences and, so far in the story, we haven't met each other yet. So we're including remembrances for each of us individually - Jon is first this time! 

Jon - Joining IBM and COMMON in Toronto

As I mentioned at the end of the previous "history" post, after 18 months on contract I joined IBM full time. The actual hiring was somewhat rushed through as (unbeknown to me at the time) my manager had decided that I was the prefect person to present two sessions on the new COBOL compiler at the upcoming COMMON conference in Toronto. As far as I can tell his decision was based entirely on the fact that my background was as midrange systems user and not a Lab Rat. It certainly was not based on my public speaking skills. The last time I had done any public speaking was more than 5 years earlier.

As the day approached I became more and more terrified. I think I barely slept for the two or three days prior to the event. That terror climaxed as I walked into the room and found myself faced with more than 100 eager faces - all waiting for me. I fumbled my heap of foils - scared silly that I was going to drop them and lose the sequence. "Foils" ? In those days of course there was no Powerpoint (or Keynote in my case) and no laptop connected projector. Just black and white transparencies and an overhead projector. I remember very little about the sessions - way too nervous I guess - but apparently I did well enough that over time I was tasked with more and more presentations at various customer briefings and User Group events.

That COMMON conference was a milestone in a number of ways.  For one it was the first to ever be held outside of the United States, second it was the first to feature the AS/400. I'll leave Susan to tell you about the other distinction that this conference held.

It was around this time that I first made contact with the lovely lady who is now my partner in every sense of the word. I was tasked with acting as the liaison between the COBOL team and the Rochester education groups. That included the folks in the Business Partner teams as well as the education groups who were responsible for updating users and the field force on upcoming product releases. This was when I first got to know people like John Sears and Ed Simon who many of you will remember from COMMON and the IBM Tech Conferences. It was in this role that I first communicated with Susan. We didn't meet (and then only a brief corridor introduction) until the subsequent COMMON conference in Chicago. At this point I should note that Susan remembers none of this which merely goes to prove that she is far more memorable than I am!

Susan - Introducing the Latest in Programmer Tools
In the fall of 1988, COMMON was in Toronto. It was an exciting time for those of us who had eagerly awaited this brand new system, the AS/400. This was the first COMMON conference after the announcement and for many attendees, it was their first chance to see and interact with one.

It was for that reason that a handful of intrepid IBMers (including me) decided to hold an impromptu "hands on experience" for attendees with the new programmer tool on this system - PDM. Since it was impromptu, we had lots of hurdles to overcome, including getting the AS/400 system we were to use down the hall to an appropriate room. Since the system was brand new and much in demand, you'd think we would have been very careful about this move. We weren't. We pretty much shoved the system (obviously one of the smaller boxes - well, small in its day) down the hall, sliding it along the carpet. It fell over a few times in the process. But of course, it got to the other end and IPLed just fine - just one of many stories of the ruggedness of AS/400. We had a few instructor-led exercises for attendees to go through to experience the new PDM tool for the first time. This was the beginning of the notion of holding lab sessions at COMMON - a traditional that carries on still today.

Of course, the irony of the many hoops I jumped through to convince programmers to use PDM in 1988 will not be lost on many of you who know that I'm currently spending a lot of time convincing people to stop using PDM & SEU and use RDP/RSE instead. But it's really not incongruous. PDM & SEU were the latest technology for AS/400 programmers in 1988. RDP is the latest technology for programmers on IBM i today. I'm still doing the same thing, 25 years later!

Don't Just Sit There - Vote Now!

Don't worry - we're not going all political on you, tempting as that might be sometimes. However, there's more than one vote that warrants your attention over the next few days - and it is as important for those of us who live outside the USA as those of our readers who do.

So what are we talking about? COMMON Europe's Top Concerns voting is what. Even though the Europeans organize this effort, it is aimed at a worldwide audience. This is now the 7th year that COMMON Europe have organized this poll and the results to date have been interesting. The fact that some categories such as "Aggressive marketing of IBM i by IBM" get a high ranking should come as no surprise, although the fact that it ranked only in 6th place in 2011 might surprise some. What beat it out? Well "Satisfy internal customers" came in first, followed by "Keep the skills current for existing staff" and "Attract the younger generation to IBM i". We have to believe that the majority of the votes for "Keep the skills ..." came from the "existing staff" themselves because training budgets always seem to be the first thing to go when finances get tight so it seems unlikely that managers were voting this way. It was good to see "Attract the younger generation ..." be recognized as a major concern.

Why is this poll important? Well IBM talk a lot to large users, such as those represented by the LUG (Large User Group) and also spend a lot of time listening to ISVs. But it is much harder for them to get a feel for what matters to "ordinary" users. This survey helps to fill that gap and has the added advantage of being open to all IBM i users around the world. In fact, even IBMers get to vote!

On the Top Concerns web site (www.topconcerns.org), you can vote for this year's top concerns - and maybe even win an iPod for your trouble. There are only a few days left to get your votes in for this year. While you are there don't forget to check out the results of the previous year's polls. The categories and polling method have changed over the years but comparing the results from earlier years can be interesting.

So stop reading - and go vote now.

All done voting? Good - well done! Time for some words on education.

First - for our European/Scandinavian readers, we're headed your way and we'd love to see you. We're working with COMMON Luxembourg  on 9 Oct and COMMON Belgium on 11 Oct. Then we head to Stockholm for the annual Data3 conference 14 - 16 Oct. Lots of i developer topics will be covered. Check it out if you're in any of those areas and don't forget to say hi! Last year's Data3 event was fun and informative and also very successful, so we're hoping we'll see an even bigger audience there this year.

Second - we thought we'd pass on a recent recent discovery in the area of education resources. Coursera.org is a company that partners with top universities around the world to offer high-quality university level education free of charge. Yup - completely free.

One upcoming course that caught our eye is Rice University's Introduction to Python. It is aimed at non-programmers, so that even those of us who wrestle with OO should find it useful. The whole programming environment is browser based so there is no software to load. Our friend (and former RPG compiler writer) Hans Boldt has often proclaimed, in our blog comments and elsewhere, his love of the Python language so this is a good opportunity to check it out. Usage on IBM i seems to be growing if recent forum postings and pieces in the trade press are anything to go by. The IBM i home base for Python seems to be www.iseriespython.com. Check it out.

 

New Champions; New Products

Last week's COMMON event was memorable in many ways--not the least of them being our rather
protracted trip home. The journey took more than 28 hours and left us with less than 20 hours before we left again for our next trip. Serves us right for wanting to go home and do the laundry at least!

One of the highlights of the week occurred during the conference's opening session when IBM announced the latest inductees into the ranks of IBM Champions for Power Systems. Three of our favorite IBM i friends--Scott Klement, Aaron Bartell and Jim Buck--were added to the list and we couldn't be happier. All of them have done so much to promote IBM i on Power and, in particular, to demonstrate just how far you can go with RPG. The page hasn't been updated yet, but eventually they should be appearing on the "Meet the Champions" page. Jon is hopeful Aaron might support his proposal that the champions be known as "Power Rangers." Susan, however, is less than thrilled with this idea.  

Not only was Scott named a "Champion" but he was also named this year's recipient of the Al Barsa Memorial Scholarship, which "honors an individual who exemplifies Al's commitment and dedication to the i community, is a mentor to others and is an advocate to the i community." We don't think you could write a better description of Scott if you tried--other than perhaps to add that he is also a terrific educator, dedicated father and train lover.

We're delighted to note that both Aaron and Scott will be speaking at our upcoming RPG & DB2 Summit in Minneapolis, so if you want to congratulate them both in person you could join us there.

New Products

We mentioned in a previous blog that we had had a sneak peek at a new product in the IBM i market that intrigued us and that we'd tell you more later. As it turns out there were such a wealth of new application-development products and major enhancements to existing ones announced during COMMON that we don't feel we can do them justice within this blog. Instead we are going to spend a little more time getting to know more about them and then we'll write a product roundup in a few weeks in IBM i EXTRA. If you want to be sure you don't miss it, you can subscribe on the IBM Systems Magazine website.

We will just briefly mention two that caught our eye. The first is the new Long Range product from Lansa. This product is targeted fair and square at the mobile market and is quite a departure for the company in that it not only supports use from Lansa, but also has an RPG version that allows you to write native mobile applications using RPG. The second involves Profound Logic's UI builder, which can now be used from other languages in addition to its role as providing the UI interface for Profound's RPG Open Access product. The initial roll-out demonstrates its use with PHP, which as regular readers know is a favorite of ours, but the company plans to document the tooling for use from any mainstream language on virtually any platform.

We'd like to mention more but you'll just have to wait for the IBM i EXTRA article to appear. There are just too many to talk about. We certainly live in interesting times.

Believers in Anaheim

This week, we are in Anaheim for the gathering of the clans otherwise known as COMMON. In fact it is now the last session of the last day, which is how we get the time to write this (slightly) belated blog entry.

Before we talk about COMMON we'd like to take a minute or two to give a quick shout out (and a virtual pat on the back) to the folks at looksoftware who organized last week's iBelieve event. In our previous column, we mentioned that there was a good lineup of speakers and that the event was free. What we hadn't expected was just how altruistic an effort this was on the part of look. Apart from a few banners, there was zero in the way of advertising and there were no product-specific presentations. Add to that the fact that they provided an excellent lunch for all attendees and you can understand why we feel they deserve a pat on the back.

The idea behind the iBelieve event was to inspire IBM i users to fully exploit their systems and to help them gather the ammunition needed to defend the system within their organization. With presentations by Dr. Frank Soltis, Trevor Perry and other IBM i zealots, it certainly achieved that. Jon talked about the free software out there and ways to use it to make yourself a hero to your users; Susan talked about the application development tools and features that tend to be underutilized. More than 100 people attended and all we talked to were delighted with the event and quite effusive in their thanks to the organizers. It was great to be a part of such an innovative idea. 

We are delighted that looksoftware took this initiative, it seems to us that this is exactly the kind of event that some group such as iManifest should be organizing. Events to "Rally the troops and arm them" shouldn't be left to a single vendor to fund -- they are too important.

COMMON

Having been away for a couple of years, it was great to meet up with some old friends that we just don't get a chance to see anywhere other than at COMMON. And of course it is always nice to have the chance to present to a really good-sized crowd. Jon even managed to attend a couple of sessions, which made a pleasant change. 

The location of the event this time around was the Disneyland Hotel which was "interesting." We have never seen anywhere quite so clean -- but on the other hand have also never previously experienced a hotel where waiting on hold for more than 30 minutes to order room service appeared to be the norm. That was not the "Disney quality" experience that we expected. 

We also learned (albeit not quite soon enough) that if you're at a COMMON event where food is being served, make sure you get your food in the first 20-30 minutes. Because even if the event is going on for 2 or 3 hours, any kind of substantial food will be gone in the first few minutes. So we had more than one "meal" made up of chips and Mickey Mouse rice krispie treats. Not sure if this phenomenon was due to the food budget being set too low or mismanagement on the part of the hotel.

The other thing that insidiously worms its way into your brain at Disneyland is the constant "happy music" that is piped throughout the complex. It had never occurred to us before that you could actually be made quite crotchety by such a constant barrage of artificial happiness. 

Those kinds of details aside, however, it was a great conference and we thoroughly enjoyed meeting up with old friends and making new ones! 

 

 

Back to the Future

That headline seems particularly apt for this week's blog. Why? Because on Thursday we head for Anaheim and the iBelieve event immediately followed by the COMMON conference. 

iBelieve is a new event, focused on the future of the IBM i platform. It's sponsored and organized by looksoftware and is free of charge, so the only barrier to admission is any travel costs you might incur in attending. There's a great lineup of speakers and topics so we encourage you to check it out. So that is the "Future" aspect.

The "Back" part relates to COMMON. This will be our first appearance at a  COMMON event for more than two years. During that period both of us have remained members and volunteers with the organization--we just haven't been speaking at the conference. We wrote extensively about why we had made the decision to take a break back in 2009. In the intervening period COMMON has indeed changed--not as much as we had hoped it would, but the changes coupled with an improved financial outlook for our own company make attending this year viable. It will be great to catch up with some old friends again.

But there's also a "Future" aspect to attending the COMMON conference. We've heard from a number of software vendors who are planning to launch new products at (or shortly before) the conference. Since our speaking load is lighter than at past COMMON conferences, we're planning on devoting more time to talking to the application-development tool vendors in the expo and will report back here on our findings. Some of the advance information hints at some really exciting developments. We've already had a sneak preview of one such product and we've tried it out ourselves (hint: on our iPad and iPhone!). We can't say more yet, but we'll fill you in after its announcement next week.

We don't want this to become a product review blog, but this is a critical time in the IBM application-modernization world and since we'll be able to discuss the products with the developers and other IBM i users it seems too good an opportunity to miss.

In addition to speaking and touring the expo we have two other public experiences planned. On Sunday evening we will be at the IBM Systems Magazine booth #404 from 5:30-6:30 for a "Meet the bloggers" appearance. Bit like a book signing but without the books? Then on Tuesday at lunchtime we will be manning the "Expert Bar" on the IBM stand. If you are the conference please drop by and say "Hi." We always enjoy meeting our readers.