Moribund. That's the apparent state of the AS/400 cum iSeries cum i5 market, if you read the trade journals. Recent article topics have included the dismal financial performance of IBM's midrange group, reports of colleges that participate in IBM's Partners In Education (PIE) program canceling iSeries classes for lack of students, and the outsourcing of IT and programming jobs. Add to that the relative dearth of i5 advertising compared to the other platforms (even within IBM's product line) and you have a compelling argument that the i5's days are numbered. It's enough to make us old-time data processing guys (now called the IT department) cringe. Unless your retirement is coming up soon, you should make some career plans or you, too, may become a dinosaur.
A Little Online Research
Curious whether the i5 job market is truly as bad as the press would lead you to believe, I decided to do a little research on Monster.com, the online job bank. Once I navigated to the Web site, I employed (pun intended) their search engine, using only the most general terms possible, just to get a feel for the potential result set. The results were quite startling.
Using the search "iSeries or AS/400 or AS400 or i5" I got a result set of over 1,000 job listings. (Monster.com doesn't give an exact count over 1,000 like Google.com does.) Likewise, a search using the term "Linux" and another one using the term "Windows" each returned over 1,000 job listings. Thus, my initial reaction was that perhaps things weren't as bad as I expected. That reaction lasted only until I started reviewing the types of jobs being listed.
Interspersed within the system administration and programming job listings were listings for jobs such as HR specialists, accountants, and accounts payable/receivable clerks. All of these superfluous job postings noted AS/400 skills as desirable or as a requirement, which really skewed the query results. To eliminate them, I went back to the initial search page and this time specified that I was interested only in computer/software-related jobs. That really changed things! When I asked for AS/400 computer software jobs I was presented a list containing only 107 jobs. Replacing "AS/400" with "iSeries" returned an even more spartan list--only 49 jobs. In both queries, the job listings included entries for help desk staff, so the actual number of programming and system administration jobs is even fewer than the miniscule numbers I just reported. Wondering how narrowing the criteria would affect the query results on the Linux and Windows fronts, I reran the queries, specifying jobs from just the computer/software category. The result? There were still over 1,000 jobs for each operating system.
A Little Analysis
Although I don't consider Monster.com to be the final authority on the state of the i5 job market, I do believe that given its ubiquity (i.e., accessibility from virtually anywhere), it can be used as a fairly good representation. The queries I issued did not specify job location or industry, only that the jobs included be in Monster's computer/software category and that they be i5-, Linux-, or Windows-related.
What can you surmise from this five minutes of research? First, there are few jobs listed for i5 professionals, yet the job market for people with skills in the Linux/Windows realm seems to be quite robust. Thus, it seems clear to me that if you want to be marketable now and in the foreseeable future, you will need to have skills in excess of being just a pure i5 programmer/manager.
"You haven't done much job-market analysis to make such a claim!" I hear you exclaim. "You can't draw such pessimistic conclusions about the i5 based on such simple research." Well, I'm certainly not an MBA, and I have no desire to become one. Yet I am a good observer, and I keep fairly well-read about the computing industry. What I fail to hear is any buzz surrounding the i5. In some ways that's a good thing (who wants to see bad press about the i5 and virus or Trojan infestations?), and in other ways that's a bad thing (Hollywood stars will tell you that any press, even bad press, is good). But the lack of publicity has definitely affected i5 sales to the point that for many project managers it's not even on their radar, which is a shame considering that in many cases it would be the best choice. You don't need me to tell you this; just look around you.
(Editor's Note: This article was written before IBM's recent announcement of its high-visibility advertising push for the i5.)
How many local i5 user's groups do you know of? When I started using the IBM midrange line in 1982, the rural area in which I live had a very active group: South Central Users Group (SCUG). It died a few years back, and the closest user's group I now know of is at least two hours away from me. At least I think it's still in existence. I haven't heard from it for a while.
How many new i5 installations are you aware of? I know of just a few i5 users (using i5 to cover all instances of OS/400, even those on boxes labeled iSeries or AS/400) in my area, and although there are some i5 sales among this group, most boxes are purchased to replace existing hardware. Just for kicks (and to satisfy my curiosity) I think that the next time I talk to my IBM BP I'm going to ask him if he can point to a single new i5 installation. I just hope that the question doesn't get me strangled.
I think the point here is clear. Even stalwart IBM midrange users have to admit that things don't look nearly as rosy for our beloved machine as they once did. Before you attempt to string me up for uttering this heresy, let me say that I don't think all is as gloomy as I have so far painted it to be, though.
A Little Planning
Assuming that you buy into the notion that you need to increase your skill set to include something other than i5, your next step is to decide what skills to learn.
Reviewing the job titles listed in the aforementioned Monster.com queries, you will note numerous listings for system administrators and programmers in various languages, including, but not limited to, Java, PHP, and PERL (languages typically used in Web-based applications). There were even a number of listings for WebSphere professionals. So it would seem that good (and perhaps obvious) skills to learn include Windows, Linux, and Web application development. If you gained experience doing these, you would be in good shape to apply for many of these jobs should you have the need or desire to do so. On top of that, in an interview, you would bring to the table a vast experience with business programming that many new IT graduates lack.
So where can you get these skills? In the case of the latter two, they are as close as your nearest i5! With the features that IBM has imbued in its i5, you have at your disposal everything that you would need to obtain ample experience to qualify for a large number of the jobs currently being offered.
Think about it: Java is a well-respected Web development language that has been available on the i5 midrange line for years. Recent versions of OS/400 promoted Java to be on a par with the other languages familiar to us from the days of the System/38. IBM has been pushing Java on the iSeries for years, so you should have at least a passing familiarity with it by now. If not, perhaps you should start.
And what of the other Web development languages? While OS/400 can be configured with the proper interpreters to run some serious Web applications written in PERL and PHP, the real value of the i5 is realized when you partition your system into one or more Linux partitions. Then, you have at your fingertips all of the resources of the open-source community, while running Linux under the management of what has to be one of the world's most stable operating systems: OS/400. Even if you don't decide to partition your i5, you can still learn quite a bit by recycling an old PC that is too small to run software from Redmond. Virtually all of the software that you'll need is available free.
Additionally, the administrative skills that you learn on your test box or i5 will easily transfer to any Linux machine, from the smallest PDA to the largest zSeries. The scripting skills that you gain are directly applicable to Qshell or PASE on your current i5. And the Web development skills that you'll gain will be applicable to any OS on any machine.
In short, you have no excuse for allowing your marketability to dwindle to that of an 8-track (music) tape and every reason to think about your future.
A Little Forecasting
Only the most optimistic individual believes that the i5 will ever regain the market (and mind) share that it once held. IBM has already braced for that by standardizing on hardware that can be shared across its various product lines. It has made the i5 a chameleon among machines, capable of running new or legacy applications on a number of popular operating systems. For those among the i5 faithful, this is a good thing, as it keeps the OS/400 line alive. Personally, I will continue to use the i5 wherever possible. The machine that was once on the path to legacy status is now a machine with a bright future, thanks to IBM's tweaking. The i5 I'm getting ready to order (to replace an iSeries 820) will serve my company for many years to come. If it's not directly running OS/400 line-of-business applications, then it will be hosting Linux instances on which those applications will be running.
While the state of the i5 is good for my company, I reap benefits as well. My skills stay sharp, and I remain marketable. I'm not wasting time learning things that have limited usability or marketability while I maintain or write software for my i5. What a great win-win situation!
The question you need to ask yourself is this: Do you want to stay as flexible with your capabilities as the i5 is with its capabilities? If so, it's time to start spending some time researching your future. I think it's a good bet that both Linux and i5 will be there when you're ready to start.
Barry L. Kline is a consultant and has been developing software on various DEC and IBM midrange platforms overfor 21 years. Barry discovered Linux back in the days when it was necessary to download diskette images and source code from the Internet. Since then, he has installed Linux on hundreds of machines, where it functions as servers and workstations in iSeries and Windows networks. He co-authored the book Understanding Linux Web Hosting with Don Denoncourt. Barry can be reached at
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