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IBM Archive

ISV’s Test Drive IBM eServer Linux

Frank writes "IBM has a new eServer Linux Test Drive program. It enables ISV's the ability to test drive Linux on all IBM eServer platforms. It's no-charge access(14 to 30 days) to the eServer iSeries, pSeries, xSeries, or its mainframe zSeries. ISV's can choose Turbolinux, SuSE, or Red Hat to develop, port, and or test drive their solutions on IBM's eServers running IBM's middleware, and the e-business developers' toolkit based on Linux."

CeBit: PPC 970’s up to 1.8GHz

"MacGuardians (German) report from CeBit that IBM's PowerPC 970 will debut at up to 1.8GHz as originally expected. (IBM's Microprocessor Forum presentation in October 2002 indicated initial speeds for the PowerPC 970 ranging from 1.4GHz - 1.8GHz). The 2.5GHz models described in an IBM press release more recently are reportedly for the subsequent generation of 970's, but will apparently utilize the 0.13 Micron Process, contrary to ZDNet's report." The article is at MacRumors.

IBM PowerPC 970 Blade Reaches 2.5 GHz in Lab

The new IBM PowerPC 970 is the heart of the PowerPC Blade. It is based on the 64-Bit Power 4 architecture which is also used in the processors of the IBM eServer pSeries. The 64-bit microprosessor offers full symmetrical multi-processing, has a high reliability (with parity L1, ECC L2 and parity checked system bus) and is manufactured in the latest 0,13 micrometer Copper/SOI CMOS technology. The CPU runs at frequences ranging from 1.8 GHz - 2.5 Ghz, therefore the IBMPowerPC 970 is the fastest PowerPC so far. It also features onchip 512 KB L2 Cache, Altivec Vector/SIMD unit, 6,4 GB/s I/O system bus throughput. Rumors want that chip to be the next CPU used by Apple when it's out.

IBM’s New Rational Software Resource Center

Rational's open, industry-standard tools for developers can improve the speed, quality, and predictability of application development on J2EE, .NET, Linux, and other platforms. Rational Software is a founding member of Eclipse and has taken a leadership role in the growth of Eclipse as the Open Source standard. Take a look at the new resource center for Rational software, and what they are creating for the Open Source community.

IBM Plots Road Ahead with Power5

"IBM has plans to make the midrange and low end of its Unix line stronger in a move that could liven up competition within the company between competing chip architectures. In 2004, IBM will roll out its Power5 processor, which will in some ways complete an overhaul of the company's entire Unix server line. With chips tuned for each class of Unix server it sells, IBM is looking to keep the heat on Sun Microsystems and stop users from defecting to Intel's Itanium processor." Read the article at InfoWorld.

IBM Mulls Linux For Its PCs

dabooty writes "International Business Machines (IBM) may soon start packing its PCs with the open-source Linux operating system (OS). IBM’s Linux initiative has so far been limited to its servers and workstations. Read it at Financial Express." Yes, we all know Linux isn't an OS - but a better comment would be 'Is this Yet Another Linux Distribution or the sound of the the first stone of the Microsoft empire crumbling?'

IBM Releases IP Security Validator for Linux

Frank wrote in to tell us "IBM has released IP Security Validator, which enables independent evaluation of VPN configurations and quick/autonomous reaction to problems. An offline mode even allows the offline evaluation of traffic that was captured into a file with other tools such as tcpdump or pcapture. This way, traffic collected from non-Linux network nodes can be evaluated on a Linux machine." The site goes on to say that among the features, it "reports the results on the standard output in words." Finally, not only can I compete with my friends who use all Windows 2000 networks, I can read the results without a man page!

IBM Acquires Rational

"In a surprise move, IBM agreed to acquire Rational Software Corp. Friday in a deal worth $2.1 billion. IBM officials said the acquisition of the major development toolmaker would be the biggest for IBM since the computer giant acquired Lotus Development Corp." Read the report at eWeek. Our Take: This could be a serious blow to traditional Unices, like HP-UX and Solaris, depending on how IBM will handle these platforms.

IBM’s Linux Enterprise Strategy Probably Unsustainable

The Aberdeen Group has issued a report on Big Blue and its Linux products and strategy today for the enterprise today. The report -- An Assessment of IBM's Enterprise Linux Strategy -- says that the firm has so far spent billions in an attempt to lead the industry on Linux related technology. But it questions whether IBM will be able to sustain this strategy over a long period of time. Read the news report.

IBM Releases WebSphere 5.0

"IBM WebSphere 5.0 features SOAP parsing, UDDI repository, Java and a number of open source technologies that IBM claims speeds performance of Web services and lowers integration costs. The application server also simplifies management through features IBM claimed are part of its nascent autonomic computing strategy for self-healing of systems. These features include ability to detect and correct faults and automated server clustering." Read the report at TheRegister.

IBM Server Chip Seen Slimmed Down for Apple Macs

IBM announced on Monday a microchip for personal computers that will crunch data in chunks twice as big as the current standard and is expected (but not confirmed yet) by industry watchers to be used by Apple. Apple was not available to comment, and IBM declined to comment on which computer makers would use the chip, but its plans would mark a change for the industry, which has emphasized the importance of the speed of a chip rather than its ability to handle heavy workloads. Read the report. Update: Read another report at ZDNews.

alphaWorks releases PortingManager tool for Linux

PortingManager is a free tool that provides assistance when porting C and C++ Solaris applications to zSeries Linux. PortingManager scans a source code tree, looks for Solaris APIs, flags them, and provides documentation that is useful when porting the API from a Solaris-specific function call to an equivalent Linux function call.