Rochester, MN - As you know, IBM is a politically correct and an environmentally conscious company. Because of the success of the new System i and i on Power systems there has been a growing surplus of the old model AS/400s. With the concerns of overburdened landfills and in this age of recycling and protecting our environment, IBM has announced a new program for recycling these older AS/400s. The program is called RECYCLE/400. For a minimal fee IBM will take your old AS/400 and convert it to a useful product. You can choose from the following list:

1. Boat anchor
2. Coffin
3. Stereo component system rack
4. Gun cabinet
5. Security vault
6. Carnival fund raiser (10 wacks with a sledge hammer for $1)
7. Aquarium
8. Gym locker
9. Refrigerator
10. Shipping container for foreign aid
11. Slot machine
12. Rabbit cage
13. Planter box
14. Commercial oven (for bakery or pizza joint)
15. Hot dog vendor cart
16. Home shop work bench
17. Military practice target
18. Softdrink vending machine
19. Phone booth
20. Billiard table
21. Utility trailer
22. Retaining wall
23. Sauna
24. Wood burning stove
25. Tanning booth
26. Portable toilet
27. Garbage dumpster
28. Outdoor barbecue grill
29. Highway crash barrier

Contact your local IBM representative for details of this program.

Chicago, IL – COMMON user group president Randy Dufault has expressed concern at the increasingly low quality of people joining COMMON. He has decided to implement a new entrance exam required for all new applicants for membership into the group in hopes to weed out the undesirable. The exam questions are as follows:

1. What is twice the half of 1 3/7?
2. How many cubic feet of earth are there in a hole measuring 3’wide by 4’ long by 5’ deep?
3. Do you know how long cows should be milked?
4. Where was Queen Cleopatra’s temple?
5. In what month do Americans eat the least?
6. How many marbles can you put in an empty bag?
7. The produce manager at the local supermarket stands 6’ tall, has a 46” chest and wears size 13 shoes. What do you think he weighs?
8. If a duck came paddling down the Nile, where would it have come from?
9. How long will a seven-day grandfather clock run without winding?

Answers:

1. 1 3/7
2. There is no earth in a hole.
3. The same way that short cows are milked.
4. On the side of her forehead.
5. February; it has fewer days
6. One; after that it is not empty.
7. Apples, pears, potatoes, bananas, etc.
8. An egg.
9. Without winding it will run for no time at all.

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the announcement of the AS/400. Happy Birthday to an amazing computer system that continues to power thousands of businesses around the globe. The date was June 21st, 1988, when IBM introduced the Application System/400 (AS/400). The AS/400 quickly became one of the world’s most popular business computing systems. By 1997, IBM had shipped nearly a half-million AS/400s. Despite its several name changes, the current IBM i carries on the same legacy that began with the original AS/400. Long live the AS/400!

ARMONK, NY - Samuel J. Palmisano let the cat out of the bag at the recent Annual IBM Stockholders Meeting held in Knoxville, Tennessee. He announced that IBM is in the process of acquiring Nintendo Corporation. In an attempt to shake the reputation that IBM sells old technology and to lure the younger generation to IBM products, IBM plans to merge the System i, the System p, and the Wii gaming console into a single product. Since each system already uses the PowerPC processor Mr. Palmisano said it was a no-brainer. The new product will be named the IBMii.

Power = i + p + wii

IBM Power Systems unifies IBM’s highly successful integrated platform, IBM System i™, with its fast growing UNIX operating system platform, IBM System p™ and with the wildly popular Nintendo Wii platform. Now you can take advantage of this single platform for all of your Wii, UNIX, Linux and i applications, with mission-critical virtualization provided by PowerVM™.

Mr. Palmisano remarked, “To truly understand how IBMii revolutionizes computing, you have to try it for yourself. Quite simply, IBMii is for everyone. The ease of use and interactivity of the IBMii Remote and Nunchuk allows for a unique social computing experience for the whole family. You don’t just play IBMii, you experience it. Taking a cue from the power equation in physics — where power equals the time rate of doing work with the time waste of doing play!”

Glendale, CA - Cocoa is a hot new programming language developed by Nestle Microsystems. The language was originally designed for programming hot chocolate machines but Nestle soon realized that the language had the potential to do much more. Because it is “architecture neutral” it can run on any device with a microchip including PCs, the System i, Cray computers, Coke machines, Timex watches, car stereos, TVs, DVD players, mobile phones and microwave ovens. You can literally surf the net and bake a potato at the same time! With the Cocoa Virtual Machine (CVM) on the System i it can run all Cocoa applets. Applets can be created using Visual Cocoa from Microsoft or VisualAge for Cocoa from IBM.

Nashville, TN – The 2008 Annual Meeting and Exposition of the COMMON user group took place in Nashville, Tennessee. The opening session began at 3:30 pm on Sunday and what a session that was! First the audience was welcomed by COMMON president Randy Dufault where he outlined the highlights of the coming week. Then he dropped the bombshell when he announced the keynote speaker would be none other than Bill Gates of Microsoft Corporation. This was a shock and surprise to most attendees.

Dufault explained that Mr. Gates was invited to speak to help bring the IBM Midrange world closer to the mainstream software industry by following the Microsoft software development model. His speech was entitled: Software Quality through Perception, Not Reality. His company of course produces a number of software products and is very experienced in the above topic. Some of the concepts covered were:

• Marketing your software before it’s completed (or ever started for that matter).
• Convincing users a software bug is a feature.
• Crushing the competition and still being able to sleep at night.
• Putting a pretty face on old, out-dated code and reselling it as a new product. (see Windows Vista)
• How to sell a software fix as an upgrade.

The speech was very enlightening. Of course the concepts presented will require a very different mindset among IBM i developers but at least they will all be perceived as better information systems developers because of it.

Rochester, MN - IBM yesterday said it would expand its efforts to address the growing global waste data disposal crisis by teaming up with Data Waste Management, Inc. Together the companies will jointly introduce new services, technologies and financing to help enterprises facing the skyrocketing costs of waste data disposal.

Throughout the world companies produce billions and billions of bytes of data every year. As the data has grown the challenge to dispose of waste data has increased. At first enterprises tried Database Management Systems, then DataMarts and now huge Data Warehouses to store the enormous amount of waste data. As new government mandates require “greener” waste data disposal, this new partnership will help organizations with this undertaking by offering information and technologies in the following areas:

· Basic data disposal

· Hazardous waste data disposal techniques

· Data recycling and reclamation

· Awareness of illegal data dumping

· Government and EPA rules on waste data storage and disposal

Dr. Zwilinsky R. Romonowski, CEO and head of this partnership, stated the first step for any organization is to sign up for their basic introductory service which will provide a data dumpster at your location with monthly pickup and disposal service. Dr. Zwilinsky projected the average company would be able to save at lease 40% in waste data disposal costs in the first year.

We don’t know which is more fun – to poke fun of Microsoft or IBM. What’s best is when they both are talked about in the same article. This was on the front page of the November 2000 issue of Midrange Technology Showcase. Enjoy.

Are you a latecomer to the Internet? Have you only recently upgraded from a green-screen 5250 terminal? Is the Internet a little intimidating to you? Don’t worry, you can become a Master of the Internet!

Cupertino, Cal. (AP) — Symantec issued an apology to Microsoft yesterday after the security software maker’s AntiVirus Research Center issued an alert for a “widespread and lethal virus known to cause system crashes and data loss” that turned out to be the Windows Vista operating system. Symantec CEO John Thompson called it a “regrettable but understandable” mistake.