IBM i brief: Red Hat acquires AI startup Jounce; IBM phases out Power10; AS/400 legacy relevance. Career: quick GitHub tutorial. Development: agentic coding needs DevOps foundations; deeper program understanding. Database: AI-driven legacy modernization and data importance. Hiring: challenges finding IBM i talent and role clarification. Leadership: perception‑based challenges. Learning: IBM i modernization with VS Code and CL docs. Modernization: hybrid mainframe‑cloud architectures, migration lessons. Training: AI hands‑on day event. Security: AI pentesting limits for IBM i and broader threats. Vendor: Shield enhances Nagios monitoring with AI.
Welcome to another edition of Talsco Weekly
- IBM i Brief: 🚀 Red Hat acquires Israeli AI startup Jounce. ⚙️ IBM phases out Power10 systems. 🏆 AS/400 remains the world's most underrated computer.
- Career: 📚 GitHub in Under an Hour (No Command Line Required)
- Development: ⚙️ Agentic coding needs DevOps foundations first. 🤔 True program understanding goes beyond syntax.
- Database: 🔧 Legacy systems are modernizing through AI.
- Hiring: 🔍Struggling to Find IBM i Talent? You're Not Alone.
- Leadership: ◼️ See Differently And Everything Changes.
- Learning: 🔓 IBM i modernization starts with developers. 💻 VS Code gets CL command documentation.
- Modernization: 🖥️ Mainframes aren't dead, they're evolving. ☁️ Enterprise cloud migrations reveal key lessons.
- Training: 🚀 See AI in Action, Then Build With It—All in One Day.
- Security: 🛡️ Shannon brings pentesting to every deploy, but the solution for the IBM i is different. 🚨 Your IBM i isn't immune.
- Vendor: ⚡ Shield supercharges Nagios for IBM i.
IBM i Brief
The real future of enterprise computing is not picking between legacy and modern, but in building hybrid architectures. Why? Because organizations have been talking about getting off of legacy systems forever, and it has not happened. The cost for re-implementations is simply too big. 🚀 Red Hat acquires Israeli AI startup Jounce IBM's Red Hat bought stealth Israeli startup Jounce for $20 million, just one year after its founding by elite Unit 8200 alumni. Jounce developed a modular AI deployment platform offering 10,000+ deployment options with dynamic workload adaptation. The acquisition will integrate Jounce's technology into Red Hat's open-source ecosystem, extending its reach across defense, finance, healthcare, and enterprise sectors globally. ⚙️ IBM phases out Power10 systems Big Blue announced Power10 machines will stop selling July 31, 2026, globally (except China and South Korea, which get until July 2027). The move clears inventory for Power11 systems, now shipping across the lineup. Power10 peripherals and upgrades remain available temporarily. IBM advises customers needing additions to order by July. Second-hand Power8 and Power9 systems will flood the market as enterprises transition to newer generations. 🏆 AS/400 remains the world's most underrated computer Here is a 26-year-old newspaper clipping celebrating the AS/400 as "the most widely used non-pc computer in history," noting that nearly 20% of businesses ran on it.
If IBM's AS/400 division were separate, it would be larger than any computer company except IBM itself.
This makes one think—what role will the IBM i play going forward?
Career
📚 GitHub in Under an Hour (No Command Line Required) New to version control? GitHub's Hello World tutorial gets you comfortable with repositories, branches, and pull requests in 15 minutes—no coding experience needed. Ready for hands-on practice? GitHub's Introduction to GitHub interactive course builds real skills in under an hour with instant feedback. Both free. Both beginner-friendly. Both are designed to make GitHub less intimidating for developers making the leap to modern workflows.
Development
⚙️ Agentic coding needs DevOps foundations first IBM i shops exploring AI-driven autonomous coding must establish Git source control, CI/CD pipelines, and automated testing frameworks before agents can deliver productivity gains. Most organizations ask which AI model to use; when they should ask if their toolchain supports autonomous agents.
Without these prerequisites, agents can't compile, test, and validate code independently—eliminating the core benefit. The good news: Git, CI/CD, and automated testing improve traditional development immediately while enabling future agentic capabilities. 🤔 True program understanding goes beyond syntax Comprehending code requires grasping business tensions, identifying load-bearing components, understanding data contracts, and recognizing historical context. Real mastery means knowing what a program doesn't do, predicting failures, and changing code responsibly. On IBM i, where systems accumulate decades of evolution, surface-level familiarity creates risk. Deep understanding separates developers who merely modify code from those who engineer solutions. Questions to ponder: With the advent of AI, how will this stay the same? How will it change?
Database
🔧 Legacy systems are modernizing through AI This 2026 report reveals AI code assistants will reach 90% enterprise adoption by 2028, driving 20-30% productivity gains.
The convergence point is data. Every trend — AI adoption, modernization, hybrid cloud, the talent crisis — eventually converges on data.
IBM i shops that have decades of clean, structured, transactional data in DB2 will win. Deloitte finds that nearly 60% of AI leaders view legacy-system integration as the primary barrier to agentic AI adoption. The companies that figure out how to unlock that data for AI inference, analytics, and real-time decision-making — without blowing up the system of record underneath it — will win.
Hiring
🔍 Struggling to Find IBM i Talent? You're Not Alone Hiring for IBM i feels impossible right now. But is it the talent shortage—or something else? Many hiring managers get stuck because they don't know exactly what they need. Should you hire for deep IBM i knowledge or someone who can bridge old and new? Do you need a specialist or a generalist? Here's the thing: the IBM i market hasn't disappeared. It's evolved. The talent is out there, but outdated job descriptions and unrealistic expectations are creating a wall between you and great candidates. Maybe you're asking for 10+ years of RPG experience when you actually need someone who understands modernization. Or you're filtering out developers who could learn IBM i quickly because they don't check every box. Stop guessing. Start clarifying. Define what success looks like in the role. Understand what skills are truly non-negotiable versus what can be trained. And remember—IBM i professionals are problem-solvers by nature. The right hire is closer than you think. 👉 Read the full guide
Leadership
◼️ See Differently And Everything Changes Leadership is misunderstood. One of the main reasons people look to leave an organization is due to leadership. One of the main reasons projects fail is due to leadership. Why?
“Most leadership challenges aren’t skill problems. They’re perception problems. And most perception problems come from one hidden belief: Something fundamental is missing. When that belief clears, everything changes.” - Bill Fox
Learning
🔓 IBM i modernization starts with developers Modernization isn't just about technology—it's about empowering developers with modern tools like VS Code, Git, and APIs. By meeting developers where they are and providing the right ecosystem, IBM i shops can unlock innovation while preserving decades of battle-tested business logic. The key is bridging the gap between legacy expertise and modern development practices to attract new talent and keep existing systems relevant. 💻 VS Code gets CL command documentation The CL extension v1.2.0 brings command documentation directly into VS Code, eliminating the need to leave the editor. Developers can hover over commands and parameters for instant documentation, open full docs in a webview, and access enhanced content assist with parameter suggestions that include documentation alongside syntax. These features complement the existing CL Syntax Checker, making CL development significantly more streamlined and modern while keeping developers in their flow.
Modernization
🖥️ Mainframes aren't dead, they're evolving While 71% of Fortune 500 companies still run core operations on mainframes—processing $8 trillion annually and 87% of credit card transactions—modernization doesn't mean replacement. Smart organizations build hybrid architectures combining mainframe reliability with cloud flexibility, using APIs to connect legacy COBOL systems to modern interfaces. Success means strategic integration, not elimination, preserving decades of battle-tested business logic. Takeaway: The same holds for the IBM i. ☁️ Enterprise cloud migrations reveal key lessons Large-scale moves from legacy data centers to cloud-native platforms show that success hinges on phased migration strategies, cost optimization through reserved instances and serverless architectures, and maintaining data integrity during transitions. Organizations that treat migration as a transformation opportunity—not just infrastructure relocation—achieve better outcomes, with careful planning around database migrations, network architecture, and application modernization, delivering measurable performance and cost benefits while preserving business continuity. As this relates to the IBM i community, IBM i stakeholders need to shift the conversation from technology to business outcomes. Demonstrate how the platform delivers modern development, API integration, and hybrid cloud strategies without the migration complexity and cost overruns plaguing cloud-native transformations.
Training
🚀 See AI in Action, Then Build With It—All in One Day Tuesday, March 10th at WMCPA iCON just became unmissable. Morning: AI Vendor Showcase featuring real solutions solving actual IBM i business problems. Afternoon: Hands-on VS Code lab where you'll work with IBM Bob to tackle refactoring, modernization, and application understanding—no theory, just practical skills. See the tools. Use the tools. Same day. Learn more here → Don't miss the full conference—Tuesday's just the beginning.
Security
🛡️ Shannon brings pentesting to every deploy, but the solution for the IBM i is different This AI pentester autonomously hunts for vulnerabilities in your web app and executes real exploits—like injection attacks and auth bypass—to prove they're exploitable. Built for teams shipping code daily via tools like Claude Code and Cursor, Shannon closes the 364-day security gap between annual pentests. It acts as your on-demand whitebox pentester, delivering concrete proof of vulnerabilities so you can ship with confidence every time. IBM i Reality Check: Shannon represents where application security is heading—automated, continuous, AI-driven. But it can't touch IBM i's platform layer. As you expose more web services and APIs from IBM i, ask yourself: are you testing your applications with the same rigor you test your platform? Or are you securing the vault while leaving the API endpoints unguarded? 🚨 Your IBM i isn't immune Today's threats—AI-driven attacks, insider fraud, ransomware—don't care about your platform's legacy. They exploit it. IBM i security isn't just a technical checkbox. It's a business imperative. Legacy configurations create blind spots. Lack of visibility invites risk. Join Carol Woodbury and Justin Loeber for a candid conversation about what's keeping executives up at night—and what IBM i professionals must know to stay ahead. What's worrying IT executives in 2026?
Vendor
⚡ Shield supercharges Nagios for IBM i Version 3.0 delivers 2X-3X performance improvements for large IBM i monitoring deployments with response times up to 5X faster in some cases. The update adds 180 built-in checks covering everything from DASD availability to HA replication status, plus new audit journal security checks for detecting active attacks.
Shield also introduced an optional ChatGPT integration that generates AI-driven analysis of monitoring data directly from the Nagios interface, helping admins identify anomalies and surface potential problems without manual interpretation.
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