1. A Roadmap to CRM Implementation and Management

CRM can improve customer satisfaction, increase sales, and boost profitability, but it doesn't just happen. Read about some of the requirements for CRM success. By Joel Klebanoff In the final analysis, it all comes down to sales. Compan

2. i5/OS V6R1 Looms on the Horizon

Will it be The Joy of Six (V6, that is) or The Annoy of Six? In all likelihood, the correct answer is: it all depends. In July, IBM announced that it would deliver a new release of i5/OS, V6R1, sometime in 2008. When in 2008 is not yet

3. Product Review: Vision replicate1

Vision replicate1 simplifies the real-time or scheduled sharing of data, including in complex, heterogeneous IT environments.     Over the years, many, if not most, organizations have become saddled with at least a few in

4. Product Review: Vision Solutions' Data Manager

Data Manager reduces storage costs and improves application and infrastructure software performance by archiving obsolete data.     Data Manager, from Vision Solutions, is a sophisticated archiving tool that can help com

5. Taking the Initiative on Education

The IBM Academic Initiative for System i is building System i skills, enhancing IT programs at colleges and universities, and helping to improve students' lives. If your outlook on the future of System i ever sours and you feel dishearten

6. Partner TechTip: Maintain AIX Availability Even When Running on System i

Provide the same robust high availability and data protection for AIX on System i as for native i5/OS environments. For years, IBM and others have suggested using the LPAR and multiple operating system capabilities of System i to consolidate

7. Laughing with, Not at, Computers

In her 1883 poem Solitude, Ella Wheeler Wilcox wrote, "Laugh, and the world laughs with you; Weep, and you weep alone." These days, even computers are laughing.

8. Filling the Skills Gap: It's Academic

The IBM Academic Initiative for System i is increasing platform awareness in the education arena and filling a real need for System i skills.

9. Product Review: Vision Solutions' iTera Director

iTera Director makes short work of System i optimization by automating tasks and enhancing visibility into system processes and resources.

10. Questionable Quality

Rather than working feverishly to develop a nuclear nasal dilator (or whatever), propeller heads should focus on getting their existing gizmos to work unfailingly.

11. Partner TechTip: Provide Continuous Data Protection for Data and Objects

iTera Vault's continuous data protection allows you to recover data and objects when things go bump in the night-or day.

12. Product Review: ADVANCED BusinessLink's Strategi SOA

Strategi SOA brings RPG and other System i languages into the service-oriented world, lifting the "legacy" label of their shoulders.

13. Case Study: ADVANCED BusinessLink's Strategi webSTYLE

ADVANCED BusinessLink's Strategi webSTYLE helps Getty Petroleum Marketing (Getty) to modernize and derive additional value from its legacy applications.

14. Reports of System i's Death...

For well over a decade, many System i folk have been saying "the platform is dying." If they live long enough, they'll likely be saying the same thing decades from now.

15. Product Review: ADVANCED BusinessLink's Strategi mobileACCESS

Strategi mobileACCESS easily turns most mobile devices into practical 5250 application clients.

16. Partner TechTip: Improve Your Tape-Based Backup and Recovery Processes

Shrink disaster recovery times, eliminate backup downtime, and extend protection to all of your data and objects.

17. Product Review: BOSaNOVA Q3

The BOSaNOVA Q3 storage encryption appliance eliminates the critical security problems typically associated with backup tapes.

18. Product Review: Bytware's StandGuard Network Security 3.1 with GUI

Bytware adds a powerful, full-featured GUI to its StandGuard Network Security object-based security solution for System i.

19. Product Review: Vision's iTera High-Availability Managed Services

Vision Solutions delivers the high-availability expertise, monitoring, and management that allow customers to focus on their core competencies.

20. A Non-Tirade Tirade

After a great many tirades, Klebanoff finally admits to being a fraud.

21. Collateral Technology Value

Who's making money off our modern technologies? You'd be surprised.

22. Server Technology

Robots have finally reached the pinnacle of technological achievement. They're serving cocktails.

23. Product Review: Vision Solution’s iTera HA Edition V5

An early product of the Vision Solutions and iTera merger, iTera HA Edition V5, is about to enter beta testing.

24. Caffeinated Game Controllers

Video game controllers are flying not only off retailers' shelves, but also out of customers' hands. Oh, and has Klebanoff ever mentioned that he likes Starbucks?

25. Virtual Laws and Taxes

Do you play in virtual worlds? If so, play nice and don't be too successful. Otherwise, a real-life police officer or tax assessor may visit you in the future.

26. Driving Emotion

You can now put into your car the same sort of brilliant thinking that went into emoticons. As you can imagine, Klebanoff is not happy. Then again, when is he ever happy?

27. Happy Gimplesfolly Day

Klebanoff encourages his loyal reader(s) to celebrate exuberantly the upcoming Chanukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Gimplesfolly Day holidays.

28. Case Study: DRV Technologies' SpoolFlex

DRV Technologies' SpoolFlex helps Eljer deliver spooled information to users quickly, easily, and in a more practical and convenient format.

29. Ruffled Serenity

Klebanoff has come to realize that some people don't share his understanding of a few simple words. Consider "serene," for example.

30. Product Review: Bytware's StandGuard Network Security 3.0

Bytware’s StandGuard Network Security 3.0 safeguards all relevant i5/OS and OS/400 exit points using an object security model.

31. They Feel Your Pain. No, Really.

Do you ever get the feeling that customer service people are hearing but not listening? Technology is coming to the rescue. Yeah, right.

32. Internet Marketing Sleaze

Despite being a proud marketing communicator, Klebanoff is sometimes embarrassed by a few of the lower life-forms that seem to have taken up his profession.

33. Technology Bugs

Does technology ever bug you? It won't surprise you to learn that it occasionally annoys the heck out of Klebanoff.

34. Losing It

Countries should redirect a few of the, depending on the country, hundreds of millions or billions of dollars spent on censuses toward a little regular internal counting.

35. A Pretext for Deceit

A great relationship is built on trust. It may (hopefully) be a small minority, but a few businesses need to learn that lesson.

36. Case Study: Califon Systems' Security Module for iSeries

Tire Kingdom uses Califon Systems' network security to achieve a high level of iSeries exit point security based on object-level principals, with minimal administrative workload.

37. iPod, Robot

Science fiction author Isaac Asimov provided the Three Laws of Robotics. Klebanoff proposes a fourth: Try to avoid being even more asinine than humans.

38. Surfing Naked

Do you ever get the feeling you're being watched? Your feelings probably aren't deceiving you.

39. Hold the Toothpaste

Tourist destinations better start thinking about making themselves more attractive because airport security is making it harder to justify the bother of going there.

40. Internet Hours

People who spend a lot of time on the Internet are giving up other things, like friends, family, and household hygiene.

41. Artificial Human Intelligence

Computer scientists and engineers are trying to replicate human intelligence in silicon. The question is, should they?

42. So to Speak

Merriam-Webster is going to add nearly 100 words to its Collegiate Dictionary in 2006. Klebanoff suggests it should consider a few more.

43. Product Review: ARTech's GeneXus

GeneXus allows organizations to rapidly develop mission-critical applications, without adding any runtime costs.

44. Chew on This

Some members of the news media can't resist going to great lengths to find local color even when the underlying story is already compelling.

45. Battling Robots

As Maxwell Smart might have said had he been given the chance, "If only they could have used their electrons for good instead of evil."

46. Buzz Off

There's a lot of sounding off about the generation gap going on out there.

47. Product Review: BOSaNOVA Mobile

 BOSaNOVA Mobile leverages the value of mobile devices through easy connections to iSeries data and applications.

48. The Road Not Taken (Nor Given)

Getting there may be half the fun, assuming, of course that you do, in fact, eventually get there.

49. Olympic Video Games

Faster. Higher. Stronger. And check out the muscles on those wrists and thumbs.

50. Product Review: The BOSaNOVA Rabbit Thin Client

BOSaNOVA delivers a smaller, faster, cooler thin client.