Talsco Weekly: The Future of IBM i

Welcome to another edition of Talsco Weekly

IBM i Brief: 🏙️ NAViGATE 2025 spotlights IBM i modernization in Pittsburgh. 🖥️ IBM teases revolutionary Power11 chiplets. 📢 IBM i 7.4 End of Support announced for 2026.
Career: 👩‍💻 From 4th career to IBM i: Megan’s inspiring journey shows the value of diverse backgrounds and mentorship in the IBM i ecosystem.
Development: 👥 Standing room only at VSCode for i lab demonstrates growing interest in modern tools. 🛠️ AI tools for IBM i development gaining traction.
EDI: 🔄 Modernizing EDI infrastructure transforms cost centers into competitive advantages for forward-thinking organizations.
Modernization: 🖥️ IBM i platform evolution from monolithic to modern showcased at NAViGATE 2025, emphasizing the need to embrace current technologies.
Training: 🎓 IBM Power Skills Academy addressing talent shortage with 17 course tracks and numerous badges. 🏢 inPOWER 2025 conference offers 150+ sessions on IBM i modernization.

IBM i Brief

In case you missed it, here is a recap of just some of the things that happened at COMMON NAViGATE 25 in Pittsburgh this week. It was a wonderful experience.

The NAViGATE 2025 conference in Pittsburgh highlighted significant advances in IBM i modernization, featuring packed VS Code sessions, EDI transformation strategies, and emerging AI applications, all driven by a vibrant community collaboration.

Here is a quick summary of the essence of the conference by my neighbor, Mitch Hoffman. 👋

🏙️ IBM i community met in Pittsburgh

NAViGATE 2025 connected nearly 200 tech professionals for learning and collaboration. The conference highlighted how IBM i systems are integrating with modern IT through APIs, Git version control, and AI solutions.

Attendees shared success stories about geolocation tracking, bi-directional texting with AI, and streamlined EDI partner onboarding. The event reinforced that IBM i’s proven reliability doesn’t need replacing—but rather we as a community, need to build awareness of where the IBM i platform comes from, where it is today, and where it is going in the future.

Other News

🖥️ IBM teases revolutionary Power chiplets

Bill Starke revealed IBM’s Power 11 architecture at HotChips, showcasing their systems-first approach with three key components:

The OMI memory architecture delivers 9X bandwidth per socket compared to traditional DDR. Looking ahead, IBM’s “Power Future” (not yet officially P12) will introduce their first chiplet design, promising increased fab yield, substantial latency reduction, and high-bandwidth interfaces when paired with OMI memory.

📢 IBM i 7.4 EoS announced for 2026

IBM has confirmed that standard support for IBM i 7.4 will end on September 30, 2026, with Service Extension available afterward at typically double the cost.

Power9, Power10, and Power11 users can upgrade to supported releases 7.5 and 7.6, while Power8 users must upgrade their hardware to Power11 to access newer OS versions, as 7.4 is the final compatible release for Power8 servers.

Career

👩‍💻 Beyond Legacy: A Thriving IBM i Career

If you have not noticed, the IBM i community is pushing hard to attract new talent to the platform. Every session that I attended at COMMON NAViGATE 2025 touched this theme as part of their presentation.

This should tell you a couple of things. There continues to be huge demand and a need to attract talent that is embracing modern technology. It also confirms, that future is bright for the IBM i, otherwise, why would they bother?

Megan’s Story

Megan Olson, Software Engineer & Product Manager, Fortra, in her session shared her inspiring journey in the IBM i ecosystem. She began her education at Muskegon Community College, where she was part of one of Char Parker’s last classes.

What makes her story particularly interesting is that programming was actually her fourth career, following previous roles in healthcare, graphic design, and the restaurant industry (where she worked as both a cook and manager).

Magen Olson's Career Journey - Fortra

This diverse background has proven invaluable in her development career. Her experience working with people in previous roles translated well to software development, especially when handling support calls and understanding customer needs, which helped her learn the business side more thoroughly.

Megan discussed the common resistance to the IBM i platform, sharing an anecdote about a Java developer who was told the platform was outdated. She emphasized her transition “From Learning to Doing” - moving from academic studies to developing real-world applications that had meaningful impact.

Her learning approach centered on asking questions and having a genuine desire to learn. When asked about AI in her current role, she mentioned that while they use it, they exercise caution about incorporating AI-generated code into shipped products. She finds AI particularly helpful for specific technical questions, though acknowledges it’s still in early stages.

Megan highlighted that the IBM i community is not a “sink or swim” environment but rather one that values mentorship. She emphasized how peers with decades of experience provide a unique advantage for beginners, and how curiosity drives these mentorship relationships. She specifically mentioned N2i as a valuable mentorship program for newcomers to get involved.

For supporting new talent, Megan advocates for inclusion and letting newcomers lead early, which creates an uplifting experience. She believes that giving people “a seat at the table” accelerates their growth. She encourages a growth mindset that normalizes questions and mistakes.

Her keys to success include: finding your people and building a network; building resources and confidence; engaging with the community through organizations like COMMON, N2i, and local user groups; and not waiting to participate but getting involved early.

Development

👥 Standing Room Only at the VSCode for i Lab in Pittsburgh

There was standing room only at the VSCode for i Lab, lead by legendary IBM i instructor and trainer, Jim Buck, imPower Technologies.

This demonstrates the tremendous interest in modern development tools among IBM i professionals.

EDI

🔄 Modernize your EDI: Untapped Potential in Your Business Infrastructure (Vendor)

EDI has been crucial for business transactions in manufacturing, transportation, distribution, and healthcare for decades. However, many organizations still use outdated implementations that create bottlenecks.

While the digital landscape has evolved dramatically, many EDI systems remain stuck in the past. Forward-thinking companies are now leveraging modernized EDI approaches to transform this infrastructure from a cost center into a competitive advantage.

Here is a three-part program, that reveals how forward-thinking organizations are reducing costs, speeding up partner onboarding, and turning EDI into a competitive advantage.

The 🎥 series addresses common pain points like vendor delays, rising transaction fees, and outdated monitoring systems.

Modernization

🖥️ Code Assistants and Modern Development on the IBM i

At NAViGATE 2025, Tim Rowe, IBM gave a quick history of the platform and then jumped right into the current and future state of the platform.

History ⇒ Future State

The IBM i platform has evolved from its 1988 origins (monolithic era) as the AS/400 through multiple iterations (System i, iSeries) to today’s modern IBM i that supports modern technologies like Git, SQL, PHP, Python, and Node.js, all while maintaining backward compatibility, thus all previous applications continue to run unchanged.

This is Good and Bad.

The good, you can run the old on the latest releases of the IBM i.
The bad, you can run the old on the latest releases of the IBM i.

The bad is, for way too long IBM i shops have failed to modernize and move forward just because they could. But, the time to modernize is now. Period.

IBM i Stay Secure. Stay Innovative

🔄 Modern IBM i development offers clear advantages

Organizations are modernizing to keep business processes aligned with new technology while attracting talent expecting modern tools. The Value that the IBM i platform brings is lower costs (fewer cores, licenses, staff), superior security, exceptional reliability, and reduced “technology taxes.”

Code for i with VSCode is the path forward for embracing coding assistants that explain and generate RPG code, allowing teams to refactor legacy applications into modern, maintainable systems.

Attracting New Talent

Modern development on IBM i looks like “SQL, Modern RPG, Source Control (Git), Developer IDE (RDi or VSCode), Pipeline automation (DevOps), Web & Mobile interfaces” - because this is exactly what new talent expects.

Training

🗣️The IBM i Community Has Spoken, and IBM Is Delivering

At NAViGATE 2025, in a session led by Linda Alkire and Brandon Pederson, they highlighted how the most recent Fortra Survey found that developing IBM i talent is a critical point in the enterprise, with 60% of survey respondents ranking skills as their second biggest concern after security.

🎓 IBM i skills shortage requires innovative solutions

This is where the IBM Power Skills Academy comes in. The goal of the Academy is to drive awareness about the IBM i platform as well as to be there with professionals throughout their professional journey, from entry level to seasoned IBM i professionals.

The Power Skills Academy offers 17 IBM i and 6 COMMON community course tracks along with countless badges. There are also countless other ways that IBM is addressing the needed skills within the IBM i ecosystem.

Everything from the Partners In Education Program (PiE) that helps connect companies with academic institutions at no cost, as well as several opportunities for up-skilling including free self-paced courses, technical roadmaps, certifications, and a Skills Match Portal that is launching Q1 2026. All this and more can be found via the Training Guide.

🏢 inPOWER 2025 connects IBM i community

While NAViGATE 2025 is now in the past, it is still not too late to make the inPOWER 2025 Conference in Wisconsin.

The four-day conference in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, will feature 150+ sessions from Infor, IBM, and partners for customers running ERP XA, LX, and System 21. Top IBM i executives will discuss IDF, Infor OS, and ION alongside industry experts like Tim Rowe, Scott Forstie, and Jim Buck.

The event includes workshops, technical sessions, and networking for 450+ attendees seeking to modernize their systems and move beyond green screen environments. Click to here to register for inPOWER 2025.

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