Month: September 2022

The IBM i OS and the Power Systems platform have stood the test of time for good reason. It’s not just the continuously evolving technology; it’s the people and how they rally to solve common challenges—like the skills gap.

 
In this new TechChannel e-book, you’ll find insight from iTech Solutions president Pete Massiello on how mentorship and IBM i education can effectively close the skills gap on Power Systems.

 
The strong community is also what has kept so many brilliant technologists in the ecosystem around for the long haul, as you’ll read in this e-book’s “Recognizing Influential Women of the IBM i Community” feature spotlighting Alison Butterill, Susan Gantner, Dawn May, Marina Schwenk, Peg Tuttle and Carol Woodbury.

 
Brilliance deserves recognition, and this community is full of brilliance. Read all about it here.

When it comes to advanced IT automation, technology leaders should become familiar with both current as well as future trends that may affect your organization. It is a fundamental task to make an appraisal of one’s data center infrastructure and to analyze what is being done now and what needs to be done in the future regarding IT processes. A more specific question regarding the present and the future is, how can one achieve the benefits made possible by automation? It is essential to clearly identify problems and even out areas of disruption you aim to eliminate or better manage within your datacenter infrastructure.

Some questions to begin with are, do you exclusively rely on IBM i? Or do you utilize IBM i with additional platforms? Are you in the cloud or on-prem, or utilizing a hybrid environment? Additionally, most data center infrastructures are operating with overworked staff and facing a host of new challenges including growing demand for information availability.

From the remote user simply accessing information, to the central data center infrastructure, a slew of information with a lack of organization can only provide frustration especially amongst an increase of moment-to-moment non-stop demand.

Once all problems and challenges can be clearly identified, then these issues can be prioritized and dealt with. Then, technology leaders can make positive progressive steps towards minimization or even complete removal of process inhibitors and other obstacles. This encapsulates the process of IT automation.

Defining IT Automation

First, let’s start by defining IT automation and why it’s helpful. IT automation is the reduction of manual or human intervention while using technology, essentially using technology to manage technology for an IT process with the goal of delivering and receiving data securely and efficiently with no disruption.

An IT automation “Think Tank” concept can help to identify and build an active list of specific areas to focus on and logically develop a better method of organization. This method of organization can help to arrange software tools and new technologies in order to better manage, control, schedule, alert, escalate, forecast, report, audit and trend, in order to enhance and optimize automation for applications and resources that run the organization.

Get Started With Your IT Automation Think Tank 

First, list your specific and current contributing factors and challenges for 2022-2023!

When making this list, review the below as contributing factors:

 

Growing demand for your data in real time, or how to expand one’s user community
Adopting new applications, ERP, CRM, SCM, etc.
Upgrading existing applications, ERP, CRM, SCM, etc.  
Expanding user access via mobile devices
Acquisition/merger
Migrating to the cloud
On premise/cloud/hybrid IT environment
Industry compliance requirements
High availability/disaster recovery (HA/DR)
Data/cybersecurity
DevOps methodologies
Service-level agreements with customers, vendors, users, etc.
Global demand for your data and information spanning across different time zones
Optimal use of current resources (people, technology, budget, etc.)

Keep in mind that it could be one or a combination of the above that you need to consider.

Then, review the following list to identify challenges you may be facing:

 

Monitoring critical messages and alerts for a robust production application utilized by a large enterprise and heavily used ERP
Missed notifications from a critical IT process, thus causing larger problems due to slow human response
Interdependent batch job schedules that need to run in different global/regional time zones
HA/DR environment needs to accommodate batch job schedules between production and replicate environments in order to optimize role swap and recovery readiness
HA/DR RTO and RPO objectives with advanced IT process automation requirements
When an application process faults, the need to issue alerts or kick-off a process on another server on a different platform
Running a 24-7-365 IT department, and the requirement for advanced automation so as not to miss application or process alerts
The need for a more efficient and secure method to schedule and successfully transfer files cross platform
Currently running multiple software products on multiple platforms that do the same thing regarding IT automation
Using an automation solution that does not meet current requirements for the enterprise and feeling stuck because of migration concerns, preventing movement to a more advanced automation solution
Annual IT budget
The need for unified visibility regarding enterprise server activity for multiple applications and multiple platforms

This is not an exhaustive list, but new challenges can be added to your specific scenario and requirements.

A Helpful Analogy for Addressing IT Process Problems

As you clearly identify current contributing factors as well as possible challenges you may face, a “reality checklist” will begin to form for your IT automation “Think Tank.” In a sense, consider it a doctor’s visit for your organization. Rather than telling your doctor an umbrella statement such as, “It hurts all over!” you can specifically address certain aspects, and highlight the areas of pain that have been the causes of frustration.

The doctor at this point would find it easier to focus all resources in order to better diagnose the nerve centers and better address the point that needs remedy. Using this analogy as a technology leader can prove to be an easier method to address the specific IT process problems one needs to tackle.

Asking the Right Questions

After going over the results of your checklist, ask yourself some questions to help prevent things from growing out of control. Some of these questions might include:

 

Is it a small adjustment to a current IT process that will fix the problem, or does my IT team require more training in the software solution currently in place?
Will the current problem self-correct as the result of a temporary occurrence, or is it time to look for a replacement, possibly including the addition of a new advanced IT process automation software?
Should I do more independent research before I begin consultations towards further action, or do I need to include others on my IT team as well as including department leaders in my organization to help identify problems?

Be sure to include timelines and identify the person responsible for each of the assigned items on the checklist. This will contribute to organizing all your objectives and track progress to achieve desirable results.

Find Problems, and Take Action 

As we are aware, customers, end users, mobile devices, vendors, partners, products, supply chains, workflows, services, communications, providers, social media, current demands, future considerations, etc. are all information and data driven. Information Technology requires advanced and secure process automation. As the technology leader realizes and assesses all challenges facing an organization in a parsed down and logical manner, success grows ever more in reach.

By using the above process to create an IT automation “Think Tank” you will be able to internally gather and list current contributing factors and challenges faced by your organization. The list will grow and shrink, essentially existing in a flux. As old problems are addressed and solved, new problems appear. Further, your IT automation “Think Tank” is the ideal concept for making those active steps needed for discovering and realizing specific automation problems.

You don’t need to be told that the IBM i community, and its client base, are unique. For starters, the IBM i OS and Power Systems hardware run in some massive corporate IT environments worldwide. In terms of their size and influence, these large customers are obviously important to IBM.

 
Of course, there’s another set of IBM i clients that exists on the opposite end of this spectrum—and, for all practical purposes, in another world. Many of these clients run their entire business on a single box. Many have little to no in-house IT staff. A single employee may be responsible for maintaining that box, that responsibility being just one entry on a lengthy list of job duties that generally fall outside of computer operations. But because there are thousands of these installations, these clients, in terms of their vast numbers among various other reasons, are also obviously important to IBM.

 
And it is this unique set of clients that stands to initially benefit from this week’s significant IBM announcement: the introduction of the IBM i System Subscription.

 
The System Subscription bundle consists of new Power10 hardware—an S1014 server running one active IBM i core, loaded with software from the P05 tier, and operating on-premise—coupled with access to IBM client support and problem resolution/proactive problem avoidance services.

 
IBM’s Dylan Boday, vice president, Product Management, Hybrid Cloud, Systems and AI, describes the System Subscription as an “as a service (aaS) IT solution.”

 
“It is a cloud-like experience: You sign up for the bundle over the terms, and you get capacity on-prem,” he says. “I view it as Platform as a Service (PaaS), because I think about it as the database, integrated with IBM i, with the customer just needing to bring their application on top.” 

Built for Affordability and Simplicity

IBM i System Subscription is designed for affordability as well as simplicity. As Boday points out, on a per-user basis, the bundle runs around a $50-55 per month list price—typically less than what you’d pay for your smartphone plan. The plan is billed annually, with clients allowed to choose initial subscription terms of three, four, or five years, with renewal options of one or more years. Payment terms and price do not change over the duration of the subscription, making it easier for the business to make and carry out its planning. But as new technology becomes available, clients can update their subscription at any yearly interval.

 
The support options are also a critical component of the System Subscription. Through this offering, one-box IBM i shops will now receive access to advanced levels IBM support that was once limited to multinational, multi-conglomerate clients housing hundreds of servers. IBM i System Subscription features:

24-7 support, including 30-minute response times for Sev 1-2 events
Remote code load of firmware
Recommendations on OS updates/upgrade planning 

In addition, IBM i System Subscription provides for case monitoring and engagement, and problem avoidance assistance in the form of code-level assessments, communication of planned events to appropriate support team analysts and more.

Illuminating IBM i Businesses

Throughout the process of crafting the System Subscription solution, Boday admits that the feedback that IBM solicited and received from small and midsize (SMB) IBM i businesses was illuminating.

 
“Some light bulbs went on for us is how I would describe it,” he says. “Most of our customers, they want variable capacity and the economics associated with that along with everything else. These small customers—who are betting their business on IBM i—naturally they want that great capacity and great capability, and they want to maintain technology currency. However, they want to remain on-prem, efficient, secure and available. And they prefer a set capacity that they know will work for them, along with a consistent payment that won’t vary over time.”

 
He adds: “We’re extending the simplicity and robustness of Power and the capabilities of IBM i, and the integration of that all into a single subscription offering. We’re meeting our clients where their challenges are. Now they can focus their resources on other high-value projects elsewhere within the business, because we’re taking care of much of their IT environment for them.”