0:12

Hello and welcome to IBM biweekly, a podcast

0:14

focused on the technical aspects of the Ibmi

0:17

operating system and the community revolving around

0:19

it. My name is Josh and with me as Cohos

0:21

Liam today is the 11th

0:24

of March, 2019 and we have episode to Ibmi.

0:26

What is it in store for you today? Uh,

0:29

with the episode and agenda for today

0:31

is to just discuss, well what the

0:34

IBM I is for all of those

0:36

that do not know. I had some feedback

0:39

from friends wanting to actually

0:41

understand what I work on. So I thought this would

0:43

be a great time to do that. We

0:46

have a very relevant guests guest

0:48

on the show today. Steve will,

0:50

the architect of IBM. I

0:53

will be joining us for an interview

0:56

that will be later on in the episode after the new

0:58

segment. Uh, and

1:01

we have some exciting

1:03

news that I guess you'll find out before

1:05

the new section because that's when we'll

1:07

be doing the first sponsorship spotlight.

1:10

So without further ado, which is right

1:12

now, we go, here we go. Ladies and gentlemen,

1:15

we'd like to thank our sponsor for this

1:17

episode. Uh, the only

1:19

use group in Chicago, uh, Omni

1:22

Omni, O m n I use R.

1:25

Dot Org, um, only meets every

1:27

third Thursday in the Chicago area. And

1:29

you can check the website for upcoming speakers

1:31

and the dinner meetings and their

1:34

plans. So thank you to them. I

1:36

appreciate, we appreciate it very much.

1:39

Yeah. So that is

1:41

the sponsorship, which leads us to

1:43

the new section, which we'll

1:45

be covering, the fact

1:48

that we have sponsors. Uh, so

1:51

the first section of news, I guess as Ibm

1:54

Biweekly News, we have some exciting things to talk about.

1:57

We are now accepted, enlisted on

1:59

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2:02

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can see are pretty mugs on there. It's

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Uh, there's actual video included

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and we have plans to release

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on the youtube channel. So

2:29

look forward to extras,

2:31

uh, uh, passively

2:34

tutorials and things like that. We haven't

2:36

quite decided yet. Uh,

2:38

but there will be extra content there. Um,

2:41

just wanted to announce that we're trying to

2:44

reach a hundred subscribers as

2:46

soon as possible on youtube. So please

2:48

subscribe if you haven't yet. Youtube

2:50

requires that a before you

2:52

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2:55

a name the channel in a way that

2:57

you have a custom URL. So we

2:59

really need that step count please. Uh,

3:02

we also had a patriot

3:04

on now, so, uh, you can find

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to further the podcast

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and in the other content will have, um,

3:22

uh, the first tiers very affordable at

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$1 a month. Um, and

3:26

we will be sending

3:29

a sticker package to

3:31

all of our patrons once we

3:34

have enough funding to do so, which, uh, it looks

3:36

like we'll be reaching the funding to do so actually

3:38

before April, surprisingly. So, uh,

3:41

you know, look forward to stickers quite

3:43

soon if you become a patron. Yeah,

3:47

and speaking of patrons, we have official

3:49

sponsors or a, an official

3:52

sponsor. Now we

3:54

will add the Omni user group did

3:56

reach out to us after our first

3:58

episode. We were very excited and

4:00

offered to sponsor some episodes.

4:03

Uh, so with that, if you would

4:05

like to become a sponsor,

4:08

well before I mentioned that I

4:10

did t's before the episode that we wouldn't

4:12

be able to highlight any other

4:15

user groups or conferences

4:17

and things of the like, and this is why

4:20

we have a sponsor now and it just seems a bit

4:22

unfair to highlight

4:25

any other, um,

4:29

user groups or conferences or things

4:31

that could gain from being highlighted

4:33

while there's people that are sponsoring Jew

4:35

to do that. So now

4:38

if it's newsworthy, if it's a

4:40

new user group or if it's

4:42

a conference coming up like we're about to cover

4:45

here in a moment, then yes,

4:47

we'll highlight it during the new section.

4:49

But other than that, you don't expect

4:51

any highlights throughout

4:53

the podcast and unless it's a sponsor.

4:56

So if you would like to sponsor us,

4:59

please get in contact. We have

5:02

three slots in the episode

5:04

that we will do sponsorships. We only have one

5:06

sponsor, so we're doing one slot today. Other

5:09

than that, sorry to bore everyone. We won't

5:11

be talking about this

5:13

sponsorship any anymore. You just had

5:16

to cover that in the news. Now

5:18

we'll move on to the fact that

5:20

Wmc Pa, uh,

5:22

the conference in Wisconsin, the one I'll be attending

5:26

and speaking that, um, how

5:28

many times the, uh,

5:31

well it was going to be three, but,

5:35

um, Mike pavalack reached

5:37

out to me and I

5:40

tend to tentatively maybe taking

5:42

on his sessions as well because

5:44

he may not be able to make it. Oh,

5:47

that spoiler, the spoiler alert.

5:49

I'm not sure if I specify announced that, sorry Mike.

5:51

But, um, regardless,

5:54

like I said, it's tentative. He even knows

5:56

what, yeah, the

5:59

exciting news. I may be speaking

6:01

even more breaking. Um,

6:05

so I'll be in Wisconsin, uh,

6:08

the week that this episode goes up, uh,

6:10

if you're there, um,

6:13

I may or may not be

6:15

covering things with the

6:17

podcast. We still haven't decided on that

6:19

format yet and if we will or will not

6:21

be doing that. So Josh

6:23

May or may not have stickers. Yeah,

6:26

yeah. I may or may not. I'm definitely not going to

6:28

have any of the community support

6:32

or ones because those are for the patrons. Uh,

6:35

but I will have

6:39

a few of the normal IBM biweekly

6:41

stickers. They're about as rare as diamonds.

6:43

I mean I haven't got one yet. I'm doesn't

6:46

have one. I don't have one. So if you

6:48

get one, I think, uh, let me see

6:50

here. I have

6:52

a few to tease on the episode

6:54

here. So yeah, noise. Here's,

6:56

here's the Nice border one

6:59

here and then we

7:01

have gorgeous, the larger

7:04

just flat out IBM biweekly logo.

7:07

And then for you patrons out there, you'll

7:09

be getting this fantastic special

7:12

community supporter, addition, IBM

7:14

biweekly sticker. Oh, sorry about

7:18

the week. Focus here on the camera then beautiful

7:22

stickers or they came out fantastic

7:25

quality when they're as good as you can get. I

7:27

feel like we need to say he would raped them. Michelle

7:31

will shout out sticker meal. I mean, okay

7:33

that wasn't who I was to go out but that

7:36

was one, who are we shouting at? The guy that actually came

7:38

up with the logo design where the design of

7:40

these and he's like, well, you should've been more specific

7:42

then. Um, the guy

7:44

that came up with the logo. Yeah. Obviously is Liam's

7:47

friends outlet. Liam introduce who came up with a logo

7:50

corner, holiday designer. Fantastic

7:52

guy all around. Thank you for doing our logo.

7:55

It's on a sticker. It's on the

7:57

website. It's, it's the brand now,

7:59

so we appreciate it big time. At least

8:01

I do very much. And I hope you enjoyed the Nando's

8:03

that we got, so

8:07

I must definitely appreciate it. That's for sure.

8:09

He's done a fantastic job on the logo on

8:11

and um, he's even working

8:13

on another top secret design

8:16

for yet another sticker that

8:19

will be going out to certain patrons. So

8:22

again, a little tease, they're not

8:24

going to say what it is, but it

8:27

is a super special edition sticker and we love

8:29

our listeners just therefore it, right? Yes. Oh,

8:31

most definitely. We do. Uh, so

8:34

with that, I think there's just one little

8:36

bit of other news there. I mean, it's

8:38

a small piece. Um, uh,

8:41

previously things like Eczema service,

8:44

DBT, utility and Truett we're on, uh,

8:46

on bitbucket hosted under

8:49

Litmos. Um, and they were on there but

8:51

they were actually over on get hub

8:53

under the IBM organization now. So

8:56

you can find, so for example, you can find

8:59

Eczema service, get hub.com forward

9:01

slash IBM Ford Slash

9:03

Xml Service and um, I think there was

9:06

even a, people are opening issues

9:08

and closing issues and has been some pull requests

9:10

and it's, that's exciting.

9:13

That's right. The a community's really

9:15

starting to adopt get hub. It's going

9:18

for that and growing.

9:20

And the same goes for DB two and Truett there

9:22

they're on get hub. Yeah, hub.com for such

9:24

IBM Ford Slash [inaudible]

9:27

Ford slash troop. So, um, you

9:29

can find them there. And that's, that's exciting because the,

9:31

I mean, IBM have been using get

9:33

hub, I mean IBM as a whole, we've been using gap for a while

9:36

and it's great that these tools, these

9:38

IBM eyes specific tools are now, um,

9:42

on that bottle of that.

9:44

Yeah, I mean definitely excited about

9:46

it. And thank you. I am, you know, I

9:49

don't mean to sound like a good hub fan

9:51

boy or anything or a bitbucket Haider

9:53

don't really know because I'm neither of those.

9:56

I, I am for

9:58

whichever. But as far as

10:00

community adoption goes, I feel like

10:03

it's just a bit easier on

10:05

the platform. They just migrated to. Yeah.

10:07

I mean I'm glad they've made them move to

10:09

get her the and um, have

10:12

embraced.

10:13

Yeah, it's, it's a, it's fantastic. It's a good

10:15

move. Um, I'm very happy

10:17

about it and that sounds, I think that's all the news we have

10:19

this week actually. So, um,

10:22

right. Yeah. Well

10:24

that is, that is the only

10:26

news we have for this week. But I

10:28

would like to just quickly mention since we have

10:30

a little bit of time left on a Friday you section

10:33

to say one more thing as well, just afterwards. Okay.

10:36

Well, uh, well I'll let you

10:38

mention years fairs cause it might be the same thing. So go

10:40

ahead.

10:41

Well, I mean, since we have talking

10:43

about where we do our speaking arrangements,

10:46

um, I actually am doing a remote

10:48

session on

10:51

the 19th m m s a

10:53

m in the u s um, and I'll be doing

10:56

a migrating to get four

10:59

RBG iot applications brand new session.

11:02

It's going to be great. It's remotely great

11:04

taught. So, um, I'm excited to give it and

11:06

I think what I think what I'm going to do actually,

11:09

cause this is, I really like the session.

11:11

I might actually record it and hook up my

11:13

own like a portable mic and

11:15

get it on youtube somehow. Like the whole session.

11:18

I've never done that, but I liked the session that much. I

11:20

might do it. Yeah. I mean

11:22

definitely do that and hey,

11:25

maybe that can be extra content. Oh

11:27

yeah. Actually I it

11:29

great. Um, yeah.

11:32

So yeah, it wasn't

11:34

the same thing, but along the same lines, my

11:36

bit of extra news was going to be the

11:38

fact that because I don't

11:40

think we'll have an episode

11:43

out in time to announce it otherwise,

11:47

when's the summit? March

11:50

summit is on the 25th

11:54

to the, so yeah, I guess

11:57

we know that'll be, we'll

11:59

be releasing an

12:01

episode pretty much that day. So 26th

12:05

to the 28th, sorry. Uh,

12:07

so we could have announced it will announce it tries, whatever.

12:10

There's also, there's also the summit

12:12

coming up in March. So, uh, the

12:16

RPG DB two summit will be happening and alongside

12:18

that will be the CIO summit

12:21

that the side and group throws every year or

12:23

sorry, alongside the

12:25

RPG PB two summit. Uh, that's

12:28

about it. We'll be saying for them. We just wanted

12:30

to let everyone know that that will be going on

12:33

for new. I

12:36

think that covers it. What's the news you, so

12:38

without further ado,

12:41

I think we can go ahead and skip on to

12:43

the Steve. We'll segment now.

12:46

Right now the format that

12:48

we're following is that the interviews or

12:50

conversations will be held separately

12:54

a day or whenever

12:56

prior to the full episode recording.

12:59

Just not to waste, they guessed time,

13:02

uh, with the rest of the episode. So,

13:04

uh, this was recorded on

13:07

Thursday, March 7th. Just to let

13:09

everyone know, and this is a conversation

13:12

between Liam, myself and

13:14

Steve will, the IBM I

13:16

architect at IBM. So

13:20

we jump

13:23

into it. Welcome Steve.

13:26

Uh, it's great to have you on the podcast as

13:28

our first guest for the IBM.

13:31

What is it episode. We

13:33

have some questions in store,

13:35

but this is going to be more of a conversational

13:38

format and the questions are just for

13:40

steering the conversation. Uh,

13:42

so Steve, would you like to just

13:45

quickly introduce yourself please? Sure.

13:48

I'm Steve Will. My job

13:50

at IBM is that I'm the chief

13:52

architect,

13:54

IBM my operating system. Um,

13:57

what that means for me in particular

13:59

is that I am in the development

14:01

organization, which is homed

14:04

in Rochester, Minnesota for

14:06

this operating system that we'll be talking

14:08

about today. Um, I work

14:10

therefore with a team of programmers

14:13

and engineers on the operating

14:16

system and all of the new things that are

14:19

going to be put into it over the course of the

14:22

next several years. My specific role is

14:24

to set the strategy and

14:27

the plans, so make decisions about

14:29

which things we're going to invest

14:32

in, which things were going to do and when,

14:34

and I do that based on

14:37

the strategy that we have for

14:39

developing the platform. Also

14:42

in my version of the job, I've been doing this

14:44

now for a little over a year, 11 years.

14:46

Uh, my version of the job, I also spend a lot of time

14:49

interacting with, whether

14:51

it's at conferences or user group

14:53

meetings or one on one with

14:56

customer executives. So that's also a part

14:58

of my job.

15:01

Okay. So you have a strong

15:03

role in the future of the platform

15:05

as well as a, uh,

15:09

a tight grip on

15:11

the community and really grip, but

15:14

you're in it.

15:14

I'm definitely am directly involved

15:17

with the community in a lot of different ways.

15:20

Um, and that technology is something that

15:22

my team and I own.

15:25

Okay. So with that being said, and

15:28

how many, well, knowing your position

15:32

based on the operating system, how would

15:34

you describe the outbreak system?

15:37

Rbi to someone that has, you know, has

15:40

never heard of it before, has no idea what

15:42

it is. How would you, how would you go about that?

15:45

Well, for people who don't know anything

15:47

about it, like if I run into somebody at a

15:49

generic computer conference and they have

15:51

no idea what Ibmi is, I

15:54

would start by telling them that we're

15:57

the operating system that's used

15:59

by tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds

16:02

of thousands of businesses to run

16:04

extremely secure, extremely reliable

16:07

application platforms. We

16:09

have customers who are, uh, running

16:12

Ibmi and the solutions on top

16:14

of them running banks,

16:16

retail retailers,

16:19

manufacturers, distributors, insurance

16:21

companies, basically any kind

16:23

of company, uh, could be running

16:25

on top of IBM. Um,

16:28

so it's an

16:31

operating system like other operating

16:33

systems that are used to run businesses. But

16:36

this particular operating system was

16:38

designed from the very beginning to

16:40

be great at being a business solution

16:43

platform. And many of

16:45

the operating systems of people learn

16:47

about use. Today we're

16:49

more designed to be a

16:52

single user operating systems that have grown,

16:54

for example. So we are a core

16:57

operating system being used by businesses.

16:59

That's the key thing that I tell people.

17:02

Okay. And to clarify, I'll

17:04

be my runs on power

17:07

hardware right alongside

17:10

of our operating systems like aix and

17:12

Linux on power, right.

17:14

We are one of those three operating

17:16

systems that converged over the course

17:18

of a couple of decades to be

17:20

able to run on that same power hardware

17:23

platform. That's right.

17:24

Okay.

17:26

Would you say that the Ibmi

17:28

has a very, it's a very

17:31

practical operating system and when

17:33

I asked that it's more like a, um,

17:36

like when feature requests

17:38

from the community come in and stuff there,

17:41

they're curated in a way that's very,

17:44

you only accept requests

17:46

that are practical to the operating system.

17:48

There's not any superfluous

17:50

bells and whistles to the Ibmi. Would

17:52

you say that? Yeah, absolutely.

17:54

When we're making our decisions on what we're

17:56

going to put in the operating system, we're looking

17:58

at the total population

18:01

of businesses that are going to take

18:03

advantage of things. And so we

18:05

may do a new

18:07

technology as one of the first operating

18:10

systems that addresses a new technology. If,

18:12

if our customers and our art solution

18:15

vendors are going to get immediate value

18:17

from it. On the other hand, if it's something that

18:19

is just a flash

18:22

in the PAN, we're talking about it today

18:24

will have forgotten about it six months from now. Well

18:26

we probably won't invest in that.

18:29

Right? So practicality and value

18:31

are very much at the forefront of the operating

18:33

system, which I think

18:35

is unique to the IBM. Something

18:38

I noticed when I first joined from

18:40

my Linux background and that

18:42

sort of brings me to my next question, which

18:44

is, um, what would you say distinguishes

18:47

the Ibmi from other operating

18:49

systems?

18:51

Okay, so Ibmi is

18:53

an integrated platform that

18:56

takes the hardest parts of

18:59

managing servers and storage

19:02

and data and

19:05

basically automates it. The

19:07

idea behind this architecture from the very

19:09

beginning was we want

19:11

to let our customers run their businesses

19:13

using their business applications without

19:16

having to become experts in

19:18

the computing technology that's

19:20

underneath it. We are,

19:22

the IBMI operating system is not a,

19:25

what I call a kernel based operating

19:27

system. There's sort of two philosophies

19:29

on how to create an

19:31

operating system. And the one that is in primary

19:34

use since, because you mentioned Linux is

19:36

so, uh, so widely

19:38

known is a kernel operating system.

19:41

What I mean by that is make the

19:43

operating system as thin as it possibly

19:45

can be so that there's not much

19:47

there between the software

19:50

and the hardware that the operating system

19:52

is virtualizing. And that's one way to

19:54

do things, but it doesn't have nearly as

19:56

much power. It doesn't

19:58

have nearly as much integrated into

20:01

it as Ibmi does.

20:03

Ibmi was created, um, with

20:05

these architectural elements, with

20:08

the intent that we, the operating system,

20:11

we're going to manage things for people and so therefore

20:13

it has significantly more heft to

20:15

it. We have, uh, these

20:18

five pillars of our architecture

20:20

that are all about doing things

20:22

for the user that they don't

20:24

have to do. And so

20:27

we are not the same as those

20:29

other operating systems. And as I mentioned

20:31

before, uh, just sort of hinted

20:33

at it, we were designed from the very beginning

20:36

to assume you are going to have multiple users

20:38

running on it, maybe even multiple

20:40

businesses, certainly multiple applications.

20:43

And so the architecture was created so

20:45

that things could be shared across users,

20:48

across applications and so on.

20:50

And all of that architectural infrastructure was there.

20:52

We didn't have to create it

20:55

as our operating system grew

20:57

from a single user to

21:00

a single user next to another single

21:02

user with a virtual machine underneath us. We

21:04

were designed from the beginning to be that.

21:07

So we are in many ways different. Okay,

21:09

so kind

21:12

of more of a Linux perspective.

21:15

You're almost saying that there was more integrated

21:18

into the kernel space and there is in

21:20

the user space by default. Yeah.

21:23

Yup. If you were going to talk in their, in

21:25

their language, that would be the case. Yeah. So

21:28

could you just describe some things

21:30

that are in that, the operating system

21:32

space that w and people might

21:34

not expect usually? Sure.

21:37

So the first thing is that

21:39

we are a relational database

21:41

operating system. We don't

21:44

have an operating system and

21:46

then you install a database on top of

21:48

it. We are a DB

21:50

two fully relational database

21:53

and operating system put together.

21:55

So every piece of data that we store

21:58

on the system is stored so that it

22:00

can be part of a relational database. Every

22:02

operation we do on the file system

22:04

is that as well. And therefore,

22:07

as our database team

22:10

gets more and more advanced with how

22:12

they implement algorithms

22:14

and so on, we can know that all

22:16

of the data on the platform is going to

22:18

benefit from increased searches,

22:21

increased sorts, and all of those

22:23

performance and functionality

22:25

things that all the databases in

22:27

the world are getting better and better at.

22:30

But nobody has to rewrite anything because

22:32

it's all buried in integrated

22:34

in the operating system. So that's one of those

22:36

key values. And as part of the integration

22:39

that makes us different. That's,

22:42

that's good. And um, so it runs

22:45

a database in the, in the operating

22:47

system you make, you make it as if

22:49

the, the operating system is practically

22:52

a database, which is great. Um,

22:54

and I think we know, I mean it runs db

22:56

two db two for, yes.

22:59

So I'm just to clean

23:02

that up. DBT Four. I, is it different

23:04

from DB two Luw

23:07

and DB two phys ed or are they different or

23:09

are they the same? Do they follow the same standard?

23:12

If all of the same standards, that's the most important

23:15

thing. So that, so that SQL

23:17

that'll run on any one of those platforms

23:20

will run on I okay. That's the same,

23:22

but they're implemented. They're, they're

23:24

coded completely differently.

23:27

We are in our

23:29

operating system. L you double

23:31

you assumes there is going to be an operating

23:34

system below it that has a certain kind of

23:36

file system. So it implemented

23:39

differently. Okay.

23:45

That question that

23:45

I have, last question I had on that, on that, on that topic

23:48

there. Sorry. So

23:51

with a DVT being, so how do they

23:53

integrate it with the operating system that

23:56

you brought up? The efficiencies

23:58

that that helps with, but also it gives us access

24:02

to, um, interact

24:05

with the operating system through

24:07

SQL. Uh, in a way

24:09

with DBT, it's DB two services,

24:12

is that right? Maybe two services are

24:13

created. They're relatively new to the

24:15

platform just in the way that

24:18

we want to give things.

24:20

Um, give users the ability to

24:22

interact with things. Um, but

24:24

yeah, they exist today so that

24:26

people can use SQL from either

24:29

inside the operating system or on a separate

24:31

box and treat,

24:34

interacting with our machine

24:36

as if they're interacting with database

24:38

resources. And so that's been

24:40

a very powerful new way

24:42

of dealing with IBM.

24:44

I that makes it easier for

24:46

people who aren't familiar

24:48

with the IBM architecture to be able to do

24:50

things via SQL.

24:53

Exactly. So, so one can,

24:56

uh, build interfaces

24:59

in any language that can interact with SQL,

25:01

which is pretty much anything. Yup. Uh,

25:04

and, and build interfaces for

25:06

their IBM. I've, I've done such

25:08

with Ph, PHP, web applications.

25:11

Um, you just want to deviate to services the same. Yeah.

25:14

Yeah. It's a beautiful thing. Um, and

25:17

another thing, just touching on the uniqueness

25:19

of the IBMI compared to other operating systems,

25:21

and we'll probably move on after this

25:23

one, but, uh, one

25:26

thing that I noticed when I joined in the platform

25:28

that at first it irked me a little

25:30

bit, but you can definitely

25:32

see the massive value that it gives

25:34

the backward compatibility on the platform.

25:37

I think is something to touch on.

25:39

Okay. Yeah. Let's talk about that for a minute because

25:41

some people, when I described this next bit,

25:44

we'll say, well that, that's exactly what Java does.

25:46

And I understand, well, listen

25:48

to me talk for a few minutes. So

25:51

when you compile a piece of code on

25:53

this operating system, it gets compiled

25:56

to what we call the

25:58

machine independent,

26:01

uh, machine interface technology, independent machinery

26:04

phase. They am, I, it can gets

26:06

compiled to this instead of these virtual

26:08

instructions. And so your

26:10

code is not compiled down to

26:13

power chip instruction

26:15

sets. It's compiled down to this intermediate

26:18

code layer that

26:20

has made it possible for

26:22

this operating system to have code

26:25

user code that was compiled back

26:27

in 1988 still run

26:29

today on a power nine processor

26:31

without ever having been recompiled

26:34

because we take the translation

26:36

from that intermediate layer

26:39

down to whatever the hardware is.

26:41

So the power nine architecture

26:43

today, for example, and do that implementation.

26:47

Um, as I said, that's mental,

26:49

uh, level of compatibility that's been

26:52

able to, to bridge decades, not

26:54

just from one release to another, but decades

26:57

now. People will often say, well, isn't that exactly what Java

26:59

does? Well it's Sorta what job does

27:02

Java brings you

27:04

to a, uh, interpreted

27:06

set of instructions that

27:09

then need to be implemented on

27:11

whatever platform it runs on.

27:13

That certainly true hours has

27:15

been there for decades and

27:18

that architecture allows people

27:20

to be certain absolutely

27:23

certain that code that used to run

27:25

yesterday is going to be able to run tomorrow

27:27

however far apart yesterday and tomorrow

27:30

are. So that's one of those architectural

27:32

elements of our platform designed

27:34

from the very beginning to be there. Um,

27:37

very different from typical

27:39

other operating systems.

27:41

So would you compare that

27:44

ability to have code that can

27:46

stay continuously running, which you pay that

27:48

well with an, you know,

27:50

an operating system that has minimal downtime?

27:52

Do they, I feel like they go hand in hand

27:55

because you can almost have something running

27:57

indefinitely.

27:58

Yes. Yes. I mean it's one of the ways.

28:01

Absolutely. It's one of the ways when our customers

28:03

think about us as being the most

28:06

reliable system that

28:08

they own, one of the things

28:10

they're thinking about is that they don't have

28:12

to refactor things

28:14

nearly as often cause that causes

28:17

slowdowns, downtime, et cetera. So part

28:19

of it.

28:20

All right. So I want to, um, switch

28:23

it up, switch the topic a little bit here and,

28:26

uh, I just want to know because

28:28

you're, you're in, you're involved at such a high

28:30

level of have a magnitude of things that

28:32

happen on the operating system. Is

28:34

that a, a favorite part

28:37

or a favorite area of the operating system

28:39

that you enjoy or enjoying

28:41

working with the most? Um,

28:45

do you have a favorite? Okay.

28:47

All right. So, uh, favorite

28:49

favorites. Always an interesting thing because

28:52

you may or may not know, I

28:54

have four children. You asked me which one is

28:56

my favorite. I don't know if we're going to answer the question

28:59

right. So, um, but, but

29:01

I have a history on this platform. Um,

29:04

before I became chief architect, I

29:06

worked at lots of different layers

29:09

in this operating system. I worked

29:11

at the lowest possible layer interacting

29:13

with the service processor. Um,

29:16

I worked eventually on

29:18

some of the reporting work that brought a patchy

29:21

to the platform, but probably

29:23

my most technical pieces

29:25

of work we're done in the security

29:28

architecture of the platform. And so

29:30

there is a part of me

29:33

that says my favorite part

29:35

of the operating system is that

29:38

security architecture that's so different

29:40

from what are other architectures, what

29:42

other operating system architectures are. I mean we,

29:45

we have an object based platforms

29:47

so that you can only do two

29:49

objects, what the methods or

29:53

something like methods would be to

29:55

a given object. Um, being able then

29:57

to secure things

29:59

based on users and roles in ways

30:01

that are only possible

30:04

in our operating system is pretty cool. So

30:06

that's one way to look at favorites is the,

30:08

where I came from. Another way to look at favorites

30:11

is what am I spending most of my time

30:13

on talking to customers these days. And, and

30:15

that would have to be the advances

30:18

we've made in open source interacting

30:20

with DB two. Our machine is a database

30:23

machine. But this ability to bring

30:25

open source to bear on our platform

30:27

to do business solutions and have

30:29

that interact with the database has been one of the most

30:32

exciting parts of

30:34

my job over the course of the last five years.

30:36

So in that way, one might be

30:38

able to look at it and say, that's my favorite

30:40

cause that's where I spend more time than in anything

30:42

else. So I guess those are a couple of answers.

30:45

Yeah, I mean I, I

30:48

might actually concur with the security part. It's

30:50

something that I forget about. Oh, we're actually just

30:52

the integrity in general. Um,

30:55

it really is a

30:58

really, is magnificent. Just an object

31:00

can only be one thing and that's it.

31:03

Um, and that's not

31:05

really, is quite something because of course in,

31:08

you know, in windows you can, you

31:11

know, a file can be anything you want it to be. Right.

31:13

But it's, the integrity is, let's

31:17

not throw any shade, no shade.

31:19

All right. Well without any shade. One of the,

31:21

one of the issues

31:24

that other operating systems have had,

31:26

and this is partially because they were created,

31:29

as I said, is very thin operating

31:31

systems, is that people

31:34

have been able to find ways, for example,

31:36

to get into operating

31:38

system memory space and

31:40

do bad things, right? Viruses and so

31:42

on. Well, you simply cannot

31:45

do that in IBM. I, it's not

31:47

that it's hard to do and if you could just figure

31:49

it out, you could do, but we actually have hardware

31:51

storage protection between the power

31:54

processor and the Ibmi architecture.

31:57

We can store everything that belongs

31:59

to the operating system in space that

32:01

no program can even

32:03

accidentally let alone on purpose

32:06

get into. And so when you were talking

32:08

about integrity, I mean that's something that is

32:10

unique to us and has provided tremendous

32:12

value to our clients who don't

32:14

even have to worry about many of the

32:16

viruses and Trojan horses and so on

32:18

that are part of everyday life on

32:20

other platforms without throwing shade.

32:23

I'm just saying that one of is one

32:25

of these things that we created as part of the architecture

32:28

prevented something that maybe nobody would have even

32:30

anticipated would if existed back

32:33

when these are architectures are getting

32:35

creative, but because of that, um,

32:37

there are just things that our customers have

32:39

to worry about that way. And that

32:41

has been, again, another thing Jim was

32:43

mentioning, being able to continuously be

32:45

up and running. Well, if you don't have

32:47

to worry about going after, um,

32:50

fixes for these things, you can just

32:52

do your business

32:54

right. And it's touching on secure

32:56

ability though. Are there, the security

32:58

we were talking about, that was something

33:01

also you need to, the platform I noticed is

33:03

that, um, wow,

33:06

other operating systems rely

33:09

heavily on third

33:11

party software for security,

33:14

you know, like antivirus software, et cetera.

33:16

The Ibmi uh, well,

33:18

IBM provides everything

33:20

you need for the Ibmi out of the box.

33:23

So, uh, just to

33:25

clarify that, I, the reason I

33:27

bring that up is I used to

33:29

hear all the time the Ibmi is the most secure

33:31

platform and I just recently

33:34

got that cleared up to me. Uh,

33:36

the meaning behind that is that out

33:38

of the box when you boot up your IBM,

33:41

I, you have everything you need to secure

33:43

it.

33:44

Yes. Right. It can all be locked down because

33:46

of the history of how we ship

33:49

this thing. It doesn't come totally

33:51

locked down out of the box because there

33:53

are many software

33:56

providers who assumed that they're going to have

33:58

some control. It's sorta like assuming

34:00

that you're going to have root access, for example, on

34:02

the Unix tick box, right? Right. So they assume

34:04

there's going to be something there, but then it's relatively

34:07

easily to lock everything down

34:10

with exactly what has come with the operating

34:12

system. You don't have to go and add

34:15

a security package. You don't have to

34:17

go add a security vendors

34:19

solution and it's all within the

34:21

operating system.

34:22

Uh, so on another subject,

34:25

now that we've covered your

34:27

favorite area quite there, the um,

34:30

uh, which is great, but what's the,

34:33

what would you say would be the most progressive

34:35

release in your opinion of the operating

34:37

system?

34:39

All right. Um Hm. So

34:41

of course we make progress with every release, but you're,

34:43

you're talking about big jumps. So

34:46

I'm, I'm going to say that there are,

34:48

there were three big jumps

34:51

in the progression of our architecture.

34:55

The first one is maybe

34:57

older than you guys are anyway,

34:59

was V3 or six. Um, oh

35:02

wow. Yeah. There was in

35:05

the early days of this operating system

35:07

back when it was part of, it was the Asmr

35:09

400, um, Stevie

35:13

that's operating this operating

35:15

system, this operating system

35:17

and the, and all of the

35:19

hardware that was associated with it. So storage

35:22

processors, I owe everything was

35:24

created specifically for that platform.

35:27

But Ibm said we

35:30

are going to eventually want to converge

35:33

into a set of hardware

35:36

that can be used by multiple. And so

35:38

back in this release B three are six. We had

35:40

to converge from the original

35:43

hardware processing architecture

35:46

to the new power PC architecture.

35:48

It was new at the time and that's what

35:50

eventually became the power systems that

35:52

we are today. So we had to

35:54

do a whole

35:57

rewrite, essentially have half the operating system

35:59

and yet preserve that

36:02

backwards compatibility that we talked about. So

36:05

code that was created on their very first

36:07

release would still run even

36:09

though it was on an entirely different set

36:11

of computer instructions. So

36:14

that was very progressive. At that point

36:16

we said, okay, not only have we

36:18

kept our promise to our customers about

36:20

compiling down to the semi and making

36:22

it backward compatible, but we'll be able to

36:25

do that no matter what happens, right?

36:27

We've, we've solved all the problems and now

36:30

when we went from that power PC to the very

36:32

first power foreign power five and

36:34

then went to symmetric multiprocessing

36:37

with thousands of threads, we

36:39

have proven to ourselves already that would be able to do that.

36:41

So that was number one. The next

36:43

release I think that would be similar in terms

36:45

of its um, impact in

36:47

progression was the seven one release.

36:50

Um, I realize again that

36:52

this may be a little different for folks

36:54

who haven't worked with this

36:56

platform, but back

36:59

in the day, all operating systems

37:01

with force you to go to a new major

37:03

release in order to get new major function.

37:06

And in seven one we created a part

37:08

of the architecture that would allow us to

37:10

add things to a major release

37:13

that were very significant but

37:15

wouldn't force you to go to the next major

37:17

release. And that we did in seven

37:19

one. And that has allowed

37:22

us to be far more agile in

37:24

how we deliver things. We can get

37:26

things out there for open source

37:28

that's, you know, progressing at an

37:30

amazing pace as well as our

37:34

software development as well as our

37:36

db two and so on. So, um,

37:39

that was a big change. And the

37:41

next release that we do is going

37:43

to have a similarly big deal

37:45

associated with it. Uh, I can't

37:47

talk about that now guys. You got me

37:49

a couple of months too early for that. But, but,

37:52

um, there are progressions

37:54

that happen every release, but there are

37:56

big progressions every generation

37:58

or so. Right, right.

38:01

So the next release is going to be, I

38:04

mean, it was a big one. There's a big change happening.

38:06

Yep. Okay. Well that's cool. We

38:10

won't make people retranslate or

38:12

anything. No. Okay. That's

38:14

cool.

38:15

So we did just, um, I

38:18

think we just kind of covered that. The platform

38:20

does have, I'm on it

38:22

now. It does. You know, um,

38:24

so for all of the Linux listeners

38:26

out there, there is package management

38:29

with Rpms on the IBM platform.

38:31

No. Yup. That's

38:34

been exceptionally received

38:36

in there in our development community

38:38

that people, yeah.

38:39

Oh, most definitely. I can vouch for that. One

38:42

of that is that cheered for it. Yeah. Um, so

38:46

with that, I think we can

38:48

move on from the progression. Okay.

38:50

So with that being

38:52

said, and uh, you know, you

38:55

don't, maybe this is maybe a less technical question,

38:58

but where do you, what do you see for the future

39:00

of the operating system?

39:03

I mean as it, you know, as an operating

39:05

system, as you know, how old

39:07

do you think people, the perception will change?

39:10

You know, what are you, what do you think is the

39:12

future for it's at this industry,

39:15

all that, you know, the operating system in general.

39:17

Okay. All right. Well first of all,

39:19

the whole industry is

39:22

beginning to assume that

39:24

you, you as a user

39:27

of computer resources should be able to use

39:29

it anywhere you are, anytime

39:32

you want to. And

39:34

over the course of the

39:36

last decade, um, that has meant different

39:39

things to different populations.

39:41

But one of them was that you gotta be able

39:43

to use a mobile device to connect to our platform.

39:46

And for people who

39:48

are not familiar with IBM,

39:51

I, I can just tell you that you can connect

39:53

multiple devices. Ibm Bmi, just like

39:55

you can't anything else for people

39:57

who've been on this platform for a long time,

39:59

they may not even be aware of that because

40:02

there were these stable methods for doing

40:04

user interfaces on our platform and

40:06

many of them didn't move those

40:09

interfaces to mobile devices. But that's

40:11

been a huge change over the course

40:13

of the last decade or so. As more and more clients

40:16

respond to their customers

40:19

and their executives who want to have

40:21

mobile interfaces. So that's one of the parts

40:23

of the anywhere. Another part of the anywhere

40:26

is can you run this thing

40:28

not in your own data center, can you run

40:31

it in a managed environment or a cloud environment?

40:34

And so you asked about the future of the platform. Part

40:36

of the future of the platform is making sure

40:39

that anybody who wants to get access

40:41

to it, we'll be able to find a provider.

40:43

They can certainly buy a system. We'd love

40:46

for them to buy a system. And and many

40:48

of our clients, most of our clients will continue

40:50

to do that, but some clients will interact

40:52

with this operating system through

40:55

solutions that run their businesses.

40:57

Banks, for example, or insurance

41:00

companies. And they won't even know

41:02

where the platform is

41:04

that is running this business solution for

41:07

them because it will be on somebody's cloud,

41:09

whether it will be a public cloud or private

41:12

cloud. So that's part of the future of

41:14

the platform is making sure that

41:16

we can do everything that needs to be done

41:18

and that our solution vendors can

41:20

provide solutions in that cloud

41:23

or managed service environment. Right. And

41:25

then you have, go ahead.

41:27

So you, I mean you're, I mean

41:29

you're probably aware, I would be very

41:32

confused. You weren't, but uh, you

41:34

know, Ibmi is now in IBM cloud.

41:37

Right. Um, and do you, do you see

41:39

that as a draw, a new drive

41:42

for people that

41:44

want to move to the cloud is because it's got, you know,

41:46

the IBM name on it. Do

41:48

you think that more people will be interested in moving

41:50

their environment to the cloud or

41:52

you know, to that, to IBM cloud?

41:55

Do you think that's okay?

41:56

Well, I think it was an important step for

41:59

IBM and IBM I to take

42:01

together because it

42:03

seems like every CIO

42:06

in the world is currently

42:09

off looking at, does

42:11

the cloud get me what

42:13

I want for my it organization?

42:16

Does it get me the kind of stability that

42:18

I want to kind of expense

42:20

a posture that I want? And

42:22

so if we want

42:25

to have them look at Ibmi with

42:27

that same set of criteria,

42:29

we want to make sure that they have an option there. Many

42:32

of our clients are going to look at

42:35

that and then some of our clients

42:37

are going to take advantage of it because

42:39

honestly, cloud is a great

42:41

technology, but some businesses

42:43

want to have control over

42:45

their physical assets, right? So

42:48

we don't think that this is going to make everybody

42:51

jumped to the cloud, but we do think

42:53

it'll make people say, oh, you

42:55

can do that with Ibmi good. I can evaluate

42:57

that just like I do with my other platforms.

43:00

And that's what we need to be able to

43:02

enable.

43:03

Right? It's all about having options. So

43:05

that's great. Uh, so we're going

43:07

to have a few quick closing

43:10

questions to hopefully spark

43:12

interest with people. Um, so

43:16

if, why is the Ibmi

43:18

important to me and why would

43:20

I want to learn about it if I'm listening

43:23

and I'm new to hearing about that?

43:24

Okay. Well, first of all, if

43:26

you're listening and you want to

43:28

make a living programming, there

43:32

are hundreds

43:34

of thousands of installations of IBM I

43:36

all around the world and

43:38

they are not all

43:41

always looking, but there's always

43:43

a certain subset of them who are looking

43:45

for programmers. And so one

43:47

way to understand

43:50

why it might be valuable is that you

43:52

can make a good living doing programming

43:55

on this platform. Now you may not

43:57

have heard of it before, but it's running,

44:00

you know your bank, it's running the

44:03

retail outlet that you go to. It's

44:06

running the distribution company

44:08

that delivered your package to you that

44:11

has to keep going. Those businesses have

44:13

to find programmers and because

44:15

you can use today's technology,

44:17

the open source technology that you learned when

44:19

you were at school or that you've been spending

44:21

time on your own learning

44:23

how to do, you can apply

44:25

that same technology to running

44:27

businesses and it's a more stable

44:30

way of making an income. Then

44:32

I'm hoping that you're going to be part of the next

44:35

big game that somebody creates

44:37

and puts on a phone somewhere. I

44:39

mean that's, that's one thing that I would say,

44:41

you know, it's, it can be important to you because

44:43

it's a good way to make a living

44:46

in the, in

44:48

the software development and design industry

44:51

and businesses tend to be

44:54

a little bit more consistent

44:57

and

44:57

more profitable.

45:00

So I mean you're telling

45:02

truth. You're

45:04

right. Yup. Okay.

45:08

Uh, we'll have to,

45:10

we'll end it with a, we're closing

45:12

question. I think non,

45:15

it doesn't even have to be related to Ibmi

45:18

but do you have a current hobby

45:21

or passion that you're into outside of work?

45:24

What are you, what are you into in the moment?

45:27

Oh sure.

45:29

So I am a game player.

45:31

I love lots of different kinds of games.

45:33

Um, many times strategy games,

45:36

but I also like a

45:39

console games to some extent.

45:41

I happened to be playing through or finishing

45:43

playing through my second play through

45:45

of a game called Skyrim

45:48

I've heard of. I had no idea

45:50

that the Lsu game ever. Tell us your

45:52

level, Steve.

45:54

I'm currently at low 59.

45:56

I've been basically completed

45:58

the wow. Steve will, I

46:01

am so impressed in the show. So

46:07

that's one of the things that I do when I'm,

46:09

when I'm relaxing. Wow.

46:11

That's amazing. I don't even have time to game.

46:13

How do you do that at? Well, I

46:17

fortunate to be married to someone

46:20

who really enjoys watching that sort

46:22

of thing. So when

46:25

that is so sweet, it's nice that, you know,

46:27

we can spend an hour or two doing that and then we can

46:29

do the rest of world life to those that are watching on

46:31

youtube. Thank you. Steve was Paul map?

46:35

That was goals right there, Steve.

46:39

Alright. I think we'll wrap

46:41

it up at that. Thanks everyone for listening

46:44

and thank you Steve Wolff for joining us.

46:46

Uh, it was fantastic having you on

46:49

my pleasure. Appreciate it. Thank you. All

46:52

right, well that was an exciting interview

46:54

with Steve Will. Uh, I,

46:57

I think it went great for our first guest.

47:00

You know, Liam, I, I don't

47:02

think we could have taken anyone more relevant to

47:04

introduce the Ibmi to everyone. As

47:06

soon as that interview was over. It

47:09

was not only was it a

47:11

great from a business perspective,

47:14

but seeing as we're a technical podcast, it

47:16

was right on spot. I feel

47:19

like your mom didn't

47:21

go to technical. Uh,

47:23

I didn't go to business. He, it was just right

47:25

in the perfect middle, I think. And

47:28

who knew that Steve will

47:30

is a Gamer. You I, I

47:34

am not, I'm not sure. I shouldn't be shocked,

47:36

but it's,

47:37

I don't know why I'm just, I just, I'm

47:39

a little shocked. I don't know why. I

47:41

just, I think that that's fantastic. I need to get his Gamer

47:43

tag cause I feel like we

47:45

could, uh, we could hang out sometime.

47:48

I mean you said it was his second time, ms second play

47:50

for it as well. That

47:52

was, that was something that was impressive

47:55

to me because I don't think I have the attention span

47:57

for Skyrim to play through.

47:59

I mean it's been a while. It's, I'm playing it in a

48:02

few years. Oh my God. Anyway,

48:05

I, it's fantastic.

48:07

Yeah. So I hope everyone

48:09

enjoyed it for sure. Uh,

48:11

and I hope we did the Ibmi justice

48:13

and please

48:15

give us feedback on

48:17

the format and you

48:19

can, you can tweet at us

48:22

the IBM biweekly Twitter

48:24

or our personal ones. You, uh,

48:27

feel free to email us or contact

48:29

us through any of the other platforms.

48:32

We would love youtube comments.

48:35

Uh, and we will be answering

48:37

those in, interacting with the community in every

48:39

way that we possibly can. We

48:42

love constructive

48:44

feedback, especially since we're just starting

48:46

out in this was the first interview. Um,

48:50

do you have any closing remarks

48:53

other than that? I mean, before I shout

48:55

out our social okay.

48:56

And all that. Um, good question.

48:59

I feel that this has been an excellent second episode.

49:02

I'm very happy and I think wig, it's

49:05

again, like I think we're going to make a lot of people happy. This is a really

49:07

nice episode. I felt like, um,

49:10

I will, can we say anything about

49:12

our next guest?

49:16

Well, we do want to tease

49:18

at the end, so that's, I'm glad that you mentioned

49:20

that. Uh, I don't think that we've

49:22

decided on which our next

49:24

guest will be, but I can Siri to

49:27

tease coming to say one

49:30

at least the one that confirmed. So

49:32

we have two episodes kind of allergy,

49:35

shout out the gas, but I'll just quickly go over and

49:37

we were kind of doing a track here, a series

49:40

since we introduced the Ibmi and

49:43

um, we're going to be going

49:45

over, uh, what

49:48

the Ibmi as this episode then

49:51

Dvt or Rpg. We haven't

49:53

decided which we're going to go with next. Um,

49:56

but I think I know which guests

49:59

Leah Monster Shout out.

50:01

It's the myth. The

50:03

person, the legend scarf Osteen.

50:06

Yeah. He has a DVT. He has

50:08

agreed it's gonna be

50:11

fantastic and I'm one of

50:13

what it's going to be great. I don't know how to describe

50:16

it. My, my uh, my

50:18

vocabulary is not good enough to describe it. That's

50:20

the law.

50:22

It is very exciting. For those that don't

50:24

know Scott for Sti, like

50:27

Steve will is the most relevant to introduce the

50:29

Abma Scout. Foresty will be the most relevant person to

50:31

introduce Devi to. Uh, he

50:34

is the one that steers the future

50:36

of DB two. Yup. Known

50:39

so cannot wait to pick his

50:41

brain. Oh, it's, oh,

50:45

it's, it's going to be fabulous. I don't, yeah.

50:48

All right. And

50:50

glad you tease to that. That was a great

50:53

tease. I mean one more. Well

50:56

I have you asked her? No, not

50:58

that person. The, the one are

51:01

that we confronted with on slack. His

51:04

name starts with a k down by, just gives

51:07

it away. Who else starts withK in this industry

51:12

and it hadn't guessed. We will be having Kevin

51:15

Adler on at 11, at a later date and

51:17

that's going to be, and that's going to

51:19

be great. He's a very technical

51:21

person at IBM, handles

51:23

a lot of the open source, uh,

51:26

uh, development there. And so

51:28

that'll be a fun, fun when you go over. But

51:30

I think, I think that's enough teasing of the,

51:33

I'm sorry I'm getting, I

51:35

know it's exciting but we don't want

51:37

to give them a hallway. Uh, so

51:40

without that, it is, that's done

51:42

with the end of the episode,

51:44

I think people, but I

51:46

would just go ahead and quickly shout

51:48

out our youtube

51:51

and other social platforms. Again, I know I said

51:53

it in the news, but we're really trying to grow.

51:56

It's not that we're begging for views,

51:59

it's just that we really, we

52:01

want the feedback from the community

52:04

and in order to get that feedback, we need

52:06

the audience. So, so

52:09

please follow us and,

52:11

uh, and uh, comment

52:14

on our videos

52:16

in the podcast audio. So, all

52:19

right. Thanks everyone. And,

52:21

uh, looking forward to seeing you in episode

52:23

three.