System i Addict

So I got my session evals from COMMON. I didn’t do all that bad, but one comment made me laugh and sad. First it was my first year giving everything but, Do You Ubuntu? So all this material is stuff I know just need to work on the delivery, hey cut me some slack!

This comment was from my Shell Scripting Session:

“This session was a waste of time. The instructor is an embarrassment to IBM!”

My Comments: I didn’t that I did so bad I embarrassed IBM, good lord, do you think they know I am an embarrassment. The joke here is I don’t work for IBM and the last time I was even remotely connected to the was when I was a contractor in 1998. While I have been an embarrassment to many people in my life I didn’t know I stunk so bad as to offend a company that has nothing to do with me, and for that matter I am probably an embarrassment to Blogging too….

Thanks for the comments. Shell Scripting while important is not my best session, yet it got one of the nastiest comments and some of the better scores, hell the session I thought I knocked out of the park got crappy reviews. The Bloggers session was “average”. Lordy lordy we are in trouble.

I also got some other more useful and correct comments like:

“David is a great speaker and knowledgeable. “ - WOW thanks!
“Very simple and well shown - thanks! ” - That is nice
“Was very good. Was late and seemed a bit unprepared. Could be a great presenter. “ - In my defense I could not find the room? But at least I could be great!
“Found out about Web min - good tool!” - Webmin Rocks!
“We could have used more time, great handout.” - I miss being with you too!

LINK to STORY

I was just at COMMON in Nashville with Al as most of you were. This past Friday Al Barsa Jr. passed away. I had to read it a few times as I did not think it was right or maybe it was some other Al Barsa but in the LIST I found people talking about it. I would like to send out my heart felt condolences to the Barsa family, this must have come as a shock. Al did not look great at COMMON this year and had a band-aid over his right eye the entire time. Sad sad news.

Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t get to talk to Scott as much as I would like but I get to hear about Scott plenty. He is one of the nicest people I know. He is alwasy wiling to help and he comes to COMMON for the people. He is here to help. Chris Maxcer got a chance to talk with him and this is what Scott said.

Thanks Scott for what you do. You a very kind person to give as much as you do. The community moves forward because you share what you know.

Since I started in this career path in 1990 I was constantly told by “others” the AS/400 is dead, then the iSeries is dead, after that the System i is dead. So now it’s dead right?

Wrong.

It’s larger than all the other systems in it’s space.Today during the Town Hall Meeting at COMMON, Mark Shearer released a gigantic can of industrial sized whoop ass on the competition. I know I have said it before and I meant it but this is the right move at the right time. The System p and System i become POWER. The i5/OS has become i, yeap just i. See it’s simple.

Mark showed a slide that was one of my favorites, where is showed IBM Power trending up while HP and SUN were both trending down and not even close to the number of installations or server IBM had. This gap is going to grow wider now and anyone thinking of moving off the i to Sun or HP should be sent home and consider a new line of work. IBM is the owner of the midrange space and now with a entry level server and a blade that runs any of three OSes, i, AIX, and Linux is just way to powerful a statement for the Solaris and HPUX people to ignore.

also showed off the Power blades for the “S” Blade Center. The idea some 18 years ago of running a i on a card about the size of an old SPD card or laptop was a silly thought. Now if I wanted to put my Websphere AIX server, my JD Edwards i server and my Linux File and print server all in one foot print with disk I can and I can do it with POWER. So what about Windows? You can place intel based bladed in the “S” and run it there too, right next to the i, AIX, and Linux.

What does David think about this move?

We now have a name that can work for the OS/400, i5/OS and it’s i, just i and it works for me. The i is for buisness logo is awesome. All the new logos are awesome and very nVidia like. I have been in the loop with IBM and nothing they have told me about today has made me think negative things at all. These changes are all what most of the forward thinking people in the community have been thinking all along.

As I get more details I will share them, the event was worth the price of admission. I am a proud member of the i community and today was what most people call an industry earthquake. IBM took it’s most powerful assets and leveraged them into POWER!

We hop to see many many more combined advertising and educational activities in the future, while IBM promised it I still don’t know if they have a plan. This was all very fuzzy and very PC at the same time. I would have liked to have seen a plan for advertising, and after years of being blasted for not doing much you would have thought they would have shown up with a marketing plan. That would be my only comment about the new release.

Lastly someone at IBM needs to take the i OS and find all the places where it says AS/400, OS/400, iSeries, System i, or anything other than POWER or i to remove it. The i needs a clean up.

IBM also released what has to be some of the best looking logos to date and I will post them all soon.
Thanks IBM for a great COMMON!

Sorry Ken no Video Card, but I can tell you this is way better!

Maxed Out - Please head over and read what Chris has written. He puts it all in such wonderful words.

So the TOWN HALL MEETING they usually have on Sunday is today. I will post an update ASAP if anything comes out of this meeting. I have a feeling that because of the timing, in that they changed the date and bumped sessions to do it there is going to be significant information.

I found my new friends at COMMON this year!

I have been wearing my kilt at COMMON every year since San Antonio which I think was 2004 sometime. I love wearing my kilt and at this COMMON there is a booth or company that has decided to sport a kilt or two, or even four.

ARCAD Software 

So as you may have read I did my first session yesterday. I have the day off today. So I have spent a fair amount of time practicing my session and at the same time have been rewriting them. I think I was trying to pack to much into them and in the end I am cheating the people who showed up for my session. I don’t want to do that.I have 3 sessions left to give and I am working on all three. The “Do you Ubuntu?” session is pretty much in the bag and I am making sure it flows right. The other two Linux Administration and Shell Scripting are in a huge state of flux right now. Hours before they are being delivered and I am nervous. I know I should have done this months ago, but with a new job, travel almost every week, moving from Denver to Charlotte, and a six year old I have been a bit busy and while I try to make time to work on them it’s never enough time. Wish me luck! 

While on the COMMON floor I was able to look at the new System i Power Blades that IBM is saying will fit in your current “H” & “S” blade centers. It’s a four core Power6 blade that you can use any number of ways. It’s important to me because now I have my “pizza box” and they are also talking about a 2 core blade on the way that will of course be much like a System i 515 or 520 depending on how you use it.

As a Lotus person now I get excited about the oddest things. I would love to get about 3 new 4 core bladed and run a few Domino servers on them on System i and System p? Wouldn’t that be fun?

I have made a post on my other blog about what I am presenting @ COMMON this year and some of my plans. I would like for you to head over there and take a look.Link : ITKE Presenting at COMMON 

I need some help people!

I need access to a System i for some very small tasks. Mostly to build screen shots of items I am going to be training on, and while we have a few at the company I work for gaining access is rather restricted. Soooo, if any of you know of a System i I can share, not abuse, just look around and write some QSHELL scripts them please let me know about it either in the comments on the post or you can email me. If you know of a service then post it here. I would like to know more.

I try not to get to “big headed” about my status in the System i community and other technical things. I have always had a profound respect for favorite my aussie blogger, Mr. Trevor Perry, and I have know him to sound a little like Angus the IT Chap at times as well.I just found out that I will be presenting at COMMON this year with Trevor,and oh what and honor that will be. I think Trevor is the reason I started all of this.There are many other fine bloggers that I hope we can have there as well and pay them some respect too. I would love to see everyone who attends COMMON show up and give us feedback, but I am not sure how that will happen without giving away a new System i Express to each of them. 

Here is a link to what I will be presenting at COMMON this year.Link : David Vasta 

So I am now confirmed to present at COMMON this year in Nashville. I am reworking all the sessions a bit to make them “much more better” as Captain Jack Sparrow would have put it. Here is the list of what I am presenting. Mostly Linux on System i and Do you Ubuntu?

So it’s kind of out there but not really that I was accepted at a Subject Matter Expert (SME) for COMMON. I will be apart of the SME team that handles Linux on System i. I am really excited about this and it tickles me to no end to be apart of a team with twp legends of Linux on it already. You guys know  who you are. So I plan on trying to make the Linux track (for Nashville) at COMMON and little more spicy and exciting is that is possible with emphasizing the used for Linux on System i and with bladed out now it only going to get better.

For those of you who are going or thinking about going the COMMON Focus is coming up in October. I think they still have seats open and this is not a full blown convention like we are all used to, it’s Focused! HA HA. I didn’t need to do that but in my head while I was typing it sounded funny. Oh Well.

It looks like it will be a good time, I only question the location. Why not somewhere more fun? Not to say Colubus Ohio is not fun but why not one of these equally fun cities:

Puducah, Kentucky   Greeley, Colorado    Boring, Oregon     Hutchinson, KS

Why not Orlando, New York City, Atlanta, Savannah(I had to put that in), New Orleans, or Chicago (COMMON is based out of there and it would save money.)

Just my two cents. I think if I were working for COMMON I would have just had it in Chicago. I took issue with the locations a few years back and didn’t get anywhere so here I am again wondering what we all did to deserve to have to spend the week in Columbus, Ohio? Oh and I am not going. I would have liked to but maybe next year. I would like to present.

Make sure you vote in the COMMON election. There are 3 spots open and 4 people in the wings. All of them are great people. You can’t go wrong with any of them. So it’s going to be hard to pick.

I will have to say I have to be pushing for the local favorite, Wayne, as he is in very close proximity to me and we do cross paths from time to time. Not that Wayne would ever do anything unprofessional but I like Wayne, he is a stand up person and is really very vocal in the System i and COMMON community. So if that is an endorsement then there you go, but again they are all great people. I have had the opportunity to hear them all speak (I think). We should just create a fourth position so we can have them all on the board?

While I was sitting in the front row I was not taking notes and wished I had. I found someone who did take notes and wanted to link to them in case you missed the session and all that went on.

Link to The iSeries Blog and COMMON 2007 Opening Session 

While it was no Steve Jobs performance it had it’s moments. The IBM team needs to work on their theatrics while on stage and doing skits…..oh well. It’s IBM they are still a little stiff at the top, but they did become flexible and present the 515 and 525 Systems.

I was privileged to attend Randall Munson sessions while at COMMON this year. I am so sorry I have avoided his sessions because he was not “technical”, and boy was I wrong. He made being at COMMON a pleasure. If you have never attended his sessions you have missed out on a treat. Randall is very funny and the session where he talks about presenting is very informative and helpful.

here are some funnies I liked for today. I want you to laugh and enjoy them:

Actual Church Bulletin Announcements

1. Don’t let worry kill you. Let the church help.
2. Thursday night Potluck Supper. Prayer and medication to follow.
3. Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our church and community.
4. For those of you who have children and don’t know it, we have a nursery downstairs.
5. This afternoon there will be a meeting in the south and north ends of the church. Children will be baptized at both ends.
6. The rosebud on the altar this morning is to announce the birth of David Alan Belzer, the sin of Reverend and Mrs. Julius Belzer.
7. Tuesday at 4 p.m. there will be an ice cream social. All ladies giving milk will please come early.
8. Wednesday, the ladies Liturgy society will meet. Mrs. Jones will sing, ‘Put Me In My Little Bed’, accompanied by the Pastor.
9. Thursday at 5 p.m. there will be a meeting of the Little Mothers Club. All wishing to become Little Mothers, please see the minister in his private study.
10. This being Easter Sunday, we will ask Mr. Vassilas to come forward and lay an egg on the altar.
11. The service will close with Little Drops of Water. One of the ladies will start (quietly) and the rest of the congregation will join in.
12. Next Sunday, a special collection will be taken to defray the cost of the new carpet. All those wishing to do something on the new carpet will come forward and get a piece of paper.
13. The ladies of the church have cast off clothing of every kind and they may be seen in the church basement Friday.
14. A bean supper will be held on Tuesday evening in the church hall. Music will follow.
15. At the evening service tonight, The sermon topic will be, ‘What is Hell?’ Come early and listen to our choir practice.
16. Weight Watchers will meet at 7 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church. Please use large double door at the side entrance.
17. The 1991 Spring Council retreat will be hell May 10 and 11.
18. Pastor is on vacation. Massages can be given to the church secretary.
19. Eight new choir robes are currently needed, due to the addition of several new members and the deterioration of some older ones.
20. Mrs. Jones will be entering the hospital this week for testes.
21. The Senior Choir invites any member of the congregation who enjoys sinning to join the choir.
22. Please join us as we show our support for Amy and Alan who are preparing for the girth of their first child.
23. The low self esteem help group will meet Thursday at 7:00. Please use the back door.
24. Scouts are saving Aluminum cans, bottles and other items to be recycled. Proceeds will be used to cripple children.
25. The Associate Minister unveiled the church’s new tithing campaign slogan last Sunday:
26. I Upped My Pledge - Up Yours.

So this was one of the ever so cool things to come out of COMMON this week. The System i got PHP a few years back and that was great, then this week they announced that you will be able to run MySQL on your i nativly. Not that DB2 is going anywhere but if you want a small DB for an app or want to run an app on WAS and need MySQL now you don’t have to go buy a new server, just put it on your i. Nice work Rochester and the team @ MySQL

So today was pretty typical I guess. Training all day and a few stops off at a booth or two to talk solutions. It’s too bad IT doe snot have money like they used too.

There are some great solutions out there that every IT shop with an i5. I will write more later. Going to bed now. Later.