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Hire New IT Staff, Leverage Your Team, Or Supplement with 3rd Party Tools?

In our last blog post, we focused on preserving your investment in your IBM i legacy system by integrating newer applications that address your organization's need for more mobility. But to meet mobility goals for the future, IT leaders have more on their minds than their system alone. In this blog, we’ll address key considerations for preserving another significant investment; that is, your IT staff.

How to Integrate New Functionalities with Older Legacy Applications

Enterprises know they should be adopting the best that modern technology has to offer to stay competitive and on top of their game. But for many, the thought of having to upgrade their legacy systems in order to “stay modern” is something that feels overwhelming. 

The new year can be a good time to address head-on those same old IT challenges that have been lingering for too long. So what are YOUR manufacturing company’s IT objectives this year? 

Freeing up internal staffers so they can focus on higher-value projects? Gaining more control over fluctuating IT costs? Tackling the security beast?  

This article has been updated after original publication in 2016.

It’s been close to three decades since IBM launched the AS/400, and in the technology industry, that may just feel like an eternity. But for people wondering about the marketplace for the AS/400’s progenies (Power i and IBM i) — and where things are headed in the future — there’s good news: there are plenty of signs that serve as reminders that IBM ensures this platform truly is built to last, and here to stay.  

After a recent announcement, the word is slowly rippling through the IBM user community: IBM will be discontinuing support for IBM i 7.1 on April 30, 2018.  

For major projects like an IBM i system upgrade, most companies will readily recognize the need for specialized, outsourced services. In many cases, this means seeking out a traditional managed service provider (MSP) to handle the system essentials – from performing the upgrade, to troubleshooting system problems, to ensuring stable OS performance. For the same project, that same company may also need application expertise and support — in other words, an additional resource to perform the application upgrades that are required to stay compatible with the upgraded OS.  

It’s been close to three decades since IBM launched IBM i, and in the technology industry, that may just feel like an eternity. But for people wondering about IBM i's place in the marketplace — and where it is headed in the future — there’s good news: there are plenty of signs that serve as reminders that IBM ensures this platform truly is built to last, and here to stay. 

It has been a long time since the release of version 6.1 of IBM i. In fact, that version was released in January of 2008, and there are still some companies that have yet to upgrade. We’re also working with several companies that are just now upgrading to 6.1, but most of them are only doing so because IBM will soon no longer support prior versions. However, supportability is not the only reason you should keep an eye on updates. There have been several since the release of 6.1, and this post will focus on the critical components of the latest version, 7.3.