Blending mainframe technology with Apple, Blackberry, and Android – makes you think!

I don’t know whether you’re going to be at the SHARE conference in Anaheim (California) from 27 February to 4 March, but one of the interesting things to see is the William Data Systems stand (booth 211).

They are showing how their ZEN z/OS network management suite of product integrates with popular smart phone technology – Apple, Blackberry, and Android. What you’ll see is ZEN monitoring z/OS networks and then reporting the results to a mobile device. The user can then evaluate what’s happening on the mainframe and take appropriate action immediately. As a consequence, z/OS support staff can get on with their lives and be out and about, but still be able to monitor their mainframes and react to alerts.

The company say that this mobile technology extends ZEN’s whistle-blower ability to monitor SyslogD, filter the results by many criteria, launch automation commands or REXX procedures, and transmit the important alerts to mobile devices, all in real-time. I think this sounds pretty impressive and I was lucky enough to have a demonstration of the technology a few ago.

Originally the technology was restricted to iPhone and iPad users, but now it’s extended to the other ‘smart’ technologies that organizations use.

Their press release mentions SyslogD. In fact, this is probably the most useful resource that many IT departments ignore or only refer to long after they should. Having this kind of information on your phone seems almost futuristic.

Anyway, if you are at Anaheim, take a look.

On a completely different topic… I was pleased to receive the following e-mail during the week:

“On behalf of IBM, it is with great pleasure to recognize you as a 2011 IBM Information Champion. We would like to thank you for your leadership and contributions to the Data Management community. You continue to be among a very small group to be chosen for this recognition. Congratulations.”

This makes three years in a row.

If you’re interested, you can find out more about the Information Champion programme here (www-01.ibm.com/software/data/champion/)

2010 Guide Share Europe Conference success

This year’s Guide Share Europe Conference was again held at Whittlebury Hall in the beautiful countryside in the very south of Northamptonshire, near the Silverstone circuit and Towcester racecourse, and not too far away from Milton Keynes. It was held this week on Tuesday and Wednesday (2 and 3 November). And it was a great success.

To help stay connected, the conference centre offered free Wi-Fi in public areas, and the conference provided 14 streams of seminars with five sessions per day – a staggering 140 presentations over the two days. In addition to the CICS, IMS, DB2, Enterprise security, large systems working group, network management working group, and software asset management streams, there were four streams for Tivoli users, DB2 LUW, zLinux, and new technologies. So there was definitely something for everyone. Most of the presentations were available on the free memory stick given to delegates, and the rest will be downloadable from GSE’s Web site.

I sat in on a few of the IMS presentations and the birds-of-a-feather expert panel session. It was a real pleasure to witness the conversations after a presentation when younger members of the audience would be chatting to older members, who were all keen and able to answer the newcomers’ questions. There was a lot of sharing of information and learning going on in a completely supportive atmosphere.

It was also a pleasure to catch up with old friends. And, among the 400 people registered, there were plenty of old friends I did catch up with and plenty of new friends made. 321 people attended on the Tuesday and 315 people were there on the Wednesday. The conference dinner on the Tuesday evening was attended by 230 people.

In addition to the high-standard presentations, there were 29 vendors in the exhibition hall where coffees and lunch were served. The vendors were also a source of technical information, and included IBM, Verhoef, Rocket Software, ezLegacy, CA Technologies, BMC, Compute (Bridgend), Blenheim Software & Inspired Solutions, and many others. Their presence helps keep down the cost of attending.

The GSE is the European association of companies and individuals using IBM hardware, software, and solutions. GSE is a non-profit association run by its members for its members. You can find out more details from their Web site at www.gse.org.uk.

Towards the end of the Wednesday there were the prize draws as different vendors gave away prizes. Many happy conference-goers gratefully left with new Kindles or iPlayers or some other technotoy in their bags.

The conference was well organised by Mark Wilson – the Chairman Large Systems Working Group & UK Conference Manager – and his team, and well worth attending by delegates and vendors. All-in-all, there was something for everyone to benefit from.

Well done to everyone on the organizing team and the presenters. And, if you didn’t make it this year, you missed something very good. See you there next year, perhaps.

On a different note: there’s still time to vote for Mainframe Update as your favourite blog in the category, Individual IT Professional Male. The IT Blog Awards 2010 are being organized by Computer Weekly. Click here to vote.

And, there’s still time to complete the Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2011 mainframe user survey. You can find this at www.arcati.com/usersurvey11. If you’re a vendor, then you can ensure your entry in the Yearbook is up-to-date by going to www.arcati.com/vendorentry.