Virtual POWERUp 2020

An overview of TD/OMS and Gravity applications, going through the development lifecycle

Modernization doesn’t have to mean massive overhauls, business process interruptions, long implementation delays or investing large sums of money on new hardware and software. All Modernization projects should be well planned with specific goals and objectives listed out. Would updating the user experience suffice in the short term while you work on improving processes and rewriting the back-end code? Presenter Tony Graham, long-time IBM i user and Product Marketing Manager at LANSA, discusses several paths for IBM i modernization allowing you to make sure you are on the path that makes the most sense for your specific issues.

IBM i shops continue to struggle to produce high-quality forms at a reasonable price. Using IPDS and AFP is cumbersome, at best, and some forms solutions are difficult to work with and often cost a lot of money. TLAForms is the most feature-rich, cost-effective solution to turn your existing IBM i spool files into full-color, professional forms. Whether you have a forms solution in place or are just now looking into creating better looking forms, TLAForms offers the best combination of functionality, cost and outstanding technical support.

The just-released Valence 6.0, available for free download, includes a browser-based low-code development utility called Nitro App Builder (NAB), through which anyone with a solid understanding of their IBM i database can create slick-looking web or mobile apps, including dashboards and data grids with download-to-Excel functionality, all in a matter of minutes! Running entirely on IBM i, the NAB tool can also be used to create intricate file maintenance apps through which users can adjust content in one or more physical files — you control which fields they can see or edit.

All of this can be achieved with no coding, though IBM i developers can easily extend the app's functionality with RPG or SQL code to handle business logic as needed. Advanced programmers comfortable with HTML5 and JavaScript code can take things even further, creating super elaborate data-entry apps that work hand-in-hand with server-side RPG logic through the Valence Portal.

The bottom line: With Valence, whether you're a developer or a super user, you can crank out highly functional web and mobile apps on IBM i in no time — no prior experience in web or mobile development required. Come to this quick demo session to see the latest release of the Valence framework, and how easy it is to build and deploy such an app on your system.

You’ll learn how to:
 

• Comply with Data protection laws (e.g. GDPR, Sox, HIPAA)
• Prepare and Manage Test Data
  • Create smaller sets of test data that is referentially intact
  • Anonymize production data to safely use in testing 
• Improve and automate your testing
  • Automatically prepare test environments, execute your existing code and report on any differences detected from the previous version
  • Identify what specific data is needed for testing your application
  • Identify what parts of your application are not being tested

 

Progressive web apps combine the best of native mobile apps with the best of the web technologies. The end result is an app that functions much like a native app but delivered through the web. Intrigued? During this Lunch and Learn with Tony Graham, LANSA Product Marketing Manager and Edgar Wharton, LANSA Product Manager, we will discuss the basics of PWAs, benefits, as well as any disadvantages to using them. If you’re looking for a reliable, consistent user experience across all devices, PWAs just might be your answer. Come join the discussion and find out if PWAs are more than hype.

The simplicity of REST is its most significant advantage. Its implementation, however, spans a vast array of technologies, protocols, and development paradigms. For RPG programmers unfamiliar with the world outside of IBM i, what to learn first and how to approach REST can be a daunting task. This focused session combines keys areas of critical theory with practical examples, useful for anyone involved in REST development on IBM i.

Growing data requirements mean you need to connect your IBM i investments quickly and efficiently to next-generation targets such as Kafka, Snowflake, Databricks, and Cloudera. You also must maintain system efficiency and keep budgets in check. Bringing all these pieces together to build the modern environments your organization needs can seem like a big mountain to climb. Join us for this Lunch and Learn discussion, were Precisely will cover how to best modernize your IT infrastructure by creating data integration strategies that help you connect your IBM i to the latest downstream technologies.

Googles Material Design combines the principles of modern ‘user experience design’ with technical innovation.
Material Design is a great option for standardizing the UXP across your organization AND providing a framework to compose enriched workflows to meet the demands of your business.

We’ll cover real world examples and best practices of how your organization can implement this modern UXP framework for your IBM I application portfolio.

It’s been over a decade since the birth of the DevOps principles, which spread quite successfully through the distributed systems development space. The agile approach to developing, testing, releasing and operating applications is making strong headway into more traditional infrastructure, like the IBM i.  Companies are finding their developers are more comfortable in this working model, and it facilitates greater collaboration across the teams.

In this panel discussion, we’ll bring together vendors and practitioners to discuss the motivations for moving to DevOps, how the approach integrates across their IT departments, and what pitfalls they’ve seen – and survived – as they rolled this out.

Git, GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Jenkins, open source tools… it this the direction your department is considering on IBM i?  Live and face-to-face over the Web, our experts, Andrew Clark, Jeff Tickner, Ray Bernardi and Scott Heinlein will address common questions and concerns around Git and open source.  In this 60-minute panel discussion, they will show you live how easily this can be done with Arcad as well as discuss their experiences.  

Areas to be discussed will include: 

• How to manage concurrent versions on IBM i with Git 
• How to automate "builds" (recompiles) on IBM i with Git 
• How to use Git to manage ALL source code in your organization including IBM i 

 
While we can’t ensure that all questions will be addressed during the live panel, we will ensure that one of our staff members will answer all questions received.

Monolithic code, retiring developers, managing decades of patches and quick fixes. These common roadblocks can pose significant risks to the future of your business, and trying to fix those problems can be equally risky. After working with clients on transformation and modernization initiatives for several decades, IBM Champion Mike Pavlak and Michael Killian, VP of Strategic Accounts at Profound Logic, will share with you the ways in which risks associated with IBM i code transformation can be reduced, and sometimes even eliminated.