June, 2008

Jun 30 2008   1:17AM GMT

UGA VI- We will miss you - Go DAWGS!

Posted by: David Vasta
UGA, College Football, Offtopic

I didn’t cry this week when George Carlin died, I just wondered if he got his chance to meet God and God got to tell him he was wrong. I didn’t get upset when Bo Diddley died either, but I made me listen to his music for a few days. I felt bad when Tim Russert passed away all of a sudden and really just thought that was sad, but I didn’t get really upset. In the past few weeks we have seemed to lose someone important in America and this weekend one of the most important icons to me passed away.

Kelly read it to me out of the paper and I think we both cried a little, and I was heart broken. See here is the issue, UGA holds a special place for anyone who grew up in Georgia. I still have the collectors Coke glasses my grandfather purchased went The Bulldogs had the greatest season ever. I still think Hershal Walker is a magical person, and that name alone makes me warm inside. But when you say UGA, meaning the bulldogs that Sonny Seiler owned UGA and lived in Savannah, GA, then and only then do you get my true and undivided attention.

UGA VI you will be missed.

If they would have had an open public funeral I would have packed up Peaches and been off to Athens. I know he and all the other UGA’s before him will be happy in that special place watching those special games, being the most admired mascot in all of college football. Not only is UGA a Bulldog, an icon, be he is also like me and Peaches a Savannian! and a great one at that!

I am a little wet around the eyes now thinking about it all, farewell to a great DAWG, I think this year UGA needs to romp and stomp like a Bulldog does and show UGA VII what college football like played the UGA way! While UGA VI may have been the winninnest UGA, I want UGA VII to help inspire Bulldog Football to be the most impacting and hard football the SEC has ever seen. I want to them have another 1981 all over again. I want to watch good Georgia Bulldog SEC football and I want the LSU Tigers to know, you don’t bring a Tiger to a DAWG fight, cause your going to get Bulldogged all afternoon. UGA VII the weight of the Bulldog nation is upon you and I stand up proud, never have been to Athens, never have seen a Georgia Game in person, knowing I am from Georgia, I am from Savannah, and I own a Bulldog and I love UGA Football! Go DAWGS!

Damon Evans, the university’s athletic director, called it a “sad day for the entire Bulldog nation.”

Link 1: Link 2 : Link 3

Jun 23 2008   10:31PM GMT

IBM i (AS/400) turns 20!

Posted by: David Vasta
Happy Birthday AS/400, David on System i, IBM i, IBM News

It was almost 20 years ago when I got into IT, and my first desktop PC was an IBM AS/400 e90…I think it cost $3 Million. I of course was sharing it with 700 other users, but what a great beast!

I just wanted to wish the IBM i (AS/400) a very Happy Birthday, next year we can all go out drinking!

Link to Chris Maxcer’s Blog about the Birthday and IBM 

-Oh I was not invited to the events in Rochester this week and to say I am hurt is an understatment. From the leading IBM i Blogger on the web to, some goofball at in Charlotte writting about technology. It’s a long fall!

Jun 22 2008   2:58AM GMT

Chris Maxcer - i and AIX: Not Exactly the Same on Power Systems

Posted by: David Vasta
IBM i, IBM News, AIX on Power, Linux on POWER

Chris makes an interesting observation - LINK

“There are still some differences in how IBM is rolling out its converged System i and System p server lineup — though it’s not so much the hardware that’s different as it is the availability of the operating system. In the IBM i world, we’d pretty much always rather be first, but is being first really that critical?”

Jun 22 2008   2:56AM GMT

IBM i and ZEND -

Posted by: David Vasta
i for business, i on Power, IBM i, i, PHP on i

Link to the POST- Mike Pavlak

 Zend Blog

 ”I got the chance to attend the php|tek conference in Chicago last week and it really opened my eyes to a lot of things. You see, the event was attended mostly by members of the PHP community supporting the LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP…) stack. Since I was probably the ONLY i5 guy at the event I felt a little out of place. Aside from being over dressed (I wore a collared shirt) nearly everyone I talked to had not heard of the i5. And when Andi Gutmans, Zend Founder and CTO, gave the keynote and mentioned the i5 twice, nary a head was turning. But that’s OK. Maybe next year we will see a considerable improvement in the i5 community attendance, if you catch my drift.”

Great line from the post:

“Oh yeah, we got it easy…One of the sessions I attended was given by a network professional who specializes in clustering lots of little Intel boxes in order to scale PHP websites. I guess this is a cool thing for the Intel world. It involves a lot of complicated networking and servers and more. He went on and on about BGP and round robin DNS and all kinds of topics. The room was packed and the entire audience was absorbed! People really wanted to hear what this guy had to say. If only they knew. If only they were aware of the power of the Power systems like the IBM i. It was everything I could do to keep from shouting “Go get an i”! Maybe I should have. But, then again, I’d have to explain the benefit of scaling vertically vs. scaling horizontally. The benefits of having IBM on the speed dial and the fact that they can make a new machine appear out of thin air as long as your Business Partner completes the paperwork properly and on time”

Jun 22 2008   2:52AM GMT

Scott Klement Honored with Gary Guthrie Writing Award

Posted by: David Vasta
David on System i, IBM i, IBM News

Link to Post

 ”At the recent System iNEWS annual editorial conference in Boulder, Colorado, Scott Klement, tech editor extraordinaire, was honored with the Gary Guthrie Award for Excellence in Technical Writing, for his October 2007 System iNEWS article titled “RPG Rules.” The award goes to writers who exemplify the best in technical writing, content, and service to the System i community. Scott’s young son, Alex, proudly helped Dad accept the award. Way to go, Scott!”

Way to go Scott, Gary would have agreed. I was lucky to work with Gary at REAL Solutions and he always loved to share, just like Scott does, the award could not have gone to a more deserving person. I am kind of choked up right now. Bravo Zulu!

Jun 22 2008   2:48AM GMT

New Site is coming

Posted by: David Vasta
David on System i, i for business, i on Power, IBM i, AIX on Power, Domino on System i, i, Linux in System i, System i, Apple, SUN, Linux, FreeBSD, Ubuntu Linux, Lotus, Linux on POWER, Lotus News, OpenSolaris, POWER Systems

I am working on a new site, so between work, this site, writting for Search400 (which I hope they change the name of soon) and family, I have also found little time to start building a new site that will in the end be a hub for all things POWER based. I have to bring the community together under one web site.

So with that said, I am going to need people to provide content for the site. I need really dedicated insane people to help build the community from all parts of this equation. IBM i, AIX, Linux on Power, and POWER hardware. We need to come together in a big way and share. I am also going to cover Lotus, Ubuntu, OpenSolaris, OpenSuSE, FreeBSD and other things that interest me that I think are changing the way IT does IT.

Please send me an email and I will get you in on the fun, and if you know Joomla that would be great too…I am no expert on that CMS kit.

Jun 22 2008   2:43AM GMT

Do you come to ITKE, aka HERE, on the weekends?

Posted by: David Vasta
Offtopic

I was thinking after not posting much this week, not because I didn’t want to but because I just didn’t have much time….Do you come here on the weekends?

Jun 17 2008   2:12PM GMT

Download Firefox today!

Posted by: David Vasta
Firefox, Offtopic

You have to download Firefox today, first because it’s a damn good browser and second to help them set a world record and give “You Know Who” the middle finger.

New Features - Firefox 3 sets the innovation bar very high with exciting new features, including one-click bookmarking, the smart location bar and lightning fast performance.

Security - Keeping you and your personal information safe is our top priority. Firefox 3 includes phishing and malware protection, plus our new instant site ID info.

Productivity - With features like built-in spell checking, session restore and full zoom, Firefox 3 makes it possible to work faster and more efficiently on the Web.

Custimization - Your taste and needs set you apart from the rest. With Firefox 3 you can choose from over 5,000 add-ons that help you customize your browsing experience.

Pledge Map for todays world record!

Jun 13 2008   12:49PM GMT

IBM i Power Blades not selling….YET?

Posted by: David Vasta
IBM i, David on System i, i on Power, i, IBM POWER Blades, AIX on Power, System i, News, Linux, POWER Systems

COMMON 2008 announced the POWER platform. Which is of course just brilliant. The IBM i is now just an OS, and to beat all that IBM released some new blades that are POWER based, so in fact you could run any of the the greatest OSes on the face of the earth on them, IBM i, AIX, or Linux, so why are they not selling. I think it’s just a matter of time and IBM doing what they don’t do best, marketing.

I have tried everything to get the company I work for to replace some older System i units with Power Blades but they have the same fears that is pointed out by this article by Mark Fontecchio.

I would urge anyone who has a need for 515 and 525(520) based server to really take a long hard look at blades. I think over time you will see the blades are actually cheaper.

Jun 10 2008   5:44PM GMT

iPhone & Lotus Notes - What do we do now

Posted by: David Vasta
IBM News, Apple, Exchange, Lotus Domino, Lotus, Lotus Notes, iPhone, Lotus 8

Yesterday Apple released a new version of the iPhone and somewhere in the mix old Steve Jobs, who looks sick, left out talking about IBM and Lotus iNotes for the iPhone.

There is a good bit of chatter on Ed Brill’s blog about it and people are concerned.  Nathan Freeman weights in on the SDK problem.