i Can Blog Archive

Technical Tips for i by Dawn May

Route FTP and SMTP Workloads to Their Own Subsystem

Way back in V5R1, IBM introduced the ability to route FTP and SMTP workloads to their own subsystems. By default, FTP and SMTP server jobs run in the QSYSWRK subsystem, along with a lot of other IBM i server jobs. The Server Table in the IBM i Knowledge Center documents all the IBM i server jobs along with the default subsystem in which they run. The server table does state the subsystem is configurable for these servers, but it doesn’t give you any more information.

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Stacked Charts Extend Graph History

With the 7.3 release, IBM introduced historical performance data collection and the ability to view your historical data graphically with Graph History. With the recent Navigator service pack (HTTP Server Group PTF SF99722 Level 7 or later), graph history was expanded with stacked charts.  Stacked charts allow you to display and compare a historical data metric over days, weeks, months, or years.

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Subsystem Configuration Documentation

Some of you may have read the subsystem configuration experience reports that were written way back in 2004, which was about when V5R3 became available. The experience reports were under the related information section of the Work Management topic. The subsystem configuration experience reports were covered in three sections:

  • Why multiple subsystems are important, along with how to configure subsystems for server jobs
  • How to configure interactive subsystems
  • How to manage server jobs
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PowerVM LinkedIn Group

One of the challenges with IBM i on IBM Power Systems is simply knowing everything you need to know. It’s what you don’t know that can get you into trouble! This blog generally focuses on IBM i information.  

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Copy an Open Spooled File

In the past, you could not copy a spooled file when it was still open; if you attempted the copy, it would fail with CPF3482, “Copy request failed. Spool file &1 is open.” The spooled file had to be completed before the copy would be allowed.

With IBM i 7.3, you can now copy an open spooled file.

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Here’s to the Women in IT!

Last March, I had the amazing opportunity to participate in the “Women in IT” conference that was held in Delavan, WI.  This event preceded the Spring Technical Conference for the Wisconsin Midrange Computer Professional Association.  I found myself among a large and diverse group of women who were either retired from the IT field, currently working in IT, or just starting out in their careers.  The icing on the cake was that we all have a background on IBM i! Also in attendance were college students from Gateway Technical College, and students from local high schools.

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February 2017 IBM i Announcements

Once again it is announcement time, with IBM i 7.3 Technology Refresh 2 and IBM i 7.2 Technology Refresh 6 being announced.  As is somewhat typical for these Technology Refresh announcements, the content for both releases is quite similar.  Steve Will’s blog Announcing IBM i 7.3 TR2 & 7.2 TR6 reviews the announcement overall.  I want to focus on a few enhancements that will make an IBM i administrator’s life a little easier.

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Optical Containers

A common problem many IBM i users have is getting the cumulative group PTF media to their machine in a usable form when using a USB thumb drive.  Many users would first carefully format that USB drive on IBM i, move it to an office PC, then copy the cumulative group from IBM distribution onto the thumb drive.  When the thumb drive was put back into IBM i, the PTFs could not be loaded.

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Automatic Download of Group PTFs with IBM i 7.3

New with the 7.3 release is the ability to automatically download PTF groups to your IBM i partition.  The PTFs are downloaded in save files and stored on your system, ready to be installed.  This enhancement was requested by requirements received through the COMMON Americas and COMMON Europe Advisory Councils.

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