Vicom Infinity Blog

Dear educators and mainframe friends,

I enjoyed the vacation of a lifetime this summer as chaperone for my daughter’s school trip to Germany. I was able to spend two weeks living with a German family, really getting to know the people, the culture and their town. But now I’m unpacking the suitcases and my thoughts are already thinking about what’s next. What are the most important things I need to finish up before the end of the year? What do I have scheduled for the fall semester? How quickly vacations fade to memories and photographs.

I know many of you have been thinking about your plans for the fall semester all summer long because you’ve been sending us emails with questions. I hope you’ve had some time to relax or you’ve at least been enjoying a beautiful view somewhere while planning for your next class.

We have lots of great things coming up that we think you and your students will be excited about. I’d love to hear from you. Let me know if you’re as excited as I am!

z Skills Tech Talk: 2017 Top Ten Mainframe Trends

Join us for our first z Skills Tech Talk on Tuesday August 29th!! Long-time conference speaker Glenn Anderson will give us a quick survey of trends in IT digital disruption and the mainframe, such as the API economy, DevOps, Internet of Things, blockchain, analytics and cognitive, and more. It promises to be a much more productive way to spend an hour than reading countless articles on each of these topics!

Feel free to invite other educators and students as this worldwide webinar is relevant to everyone in IT.

New Developer’s Contest: Unchain the Frame

Why should the students have all the fun? Unchain the Frame is a new contest for everyone, hosted by AngelHack and sponsored by IBM. Master blockchain, machine learning, industry APIs and open source technology while competing in a four-month virtual hackathon with more than $50,000 USD in prizes! Unlike Master the Mainframe, you don’t have to complete Phase 1 in order to compete in Phase 2. Submit your hackathon idea before Sept 4th to compete for Phase 1 prizes. Or submit your technical solution using one tools from the three technical categories before Oct 9th to compete for Phase 2 prizes. In Phase 3, your solution must use two tools and be submitted by Nov 8th. Compete in one phase or all three!

Is it just me or does this contest sound like a great way students to submit school projects for a chance to win prize money? 🙂

Go to unchaintheframe.com to register.

New Faces of IBM z

Do your students wonder what a mainframer actually does? We now have a series of videos where we ask young professionals exactly that question (plus some really fun questions). New Faces of IBM Z is a growing collection of students and early career mainframe professionals who share their thoughts on IBM Z in 3 minutes or less. Watch each video and share them with your students.

z/OS Introduction and Workshop
New to z/OS or just want to brush up on your skills? Our own Paul Newton teaches a week long workshop called z/OS Introduction and Workshop that is so popular we can’t offer it often enough! This no-charge class is an introduction to the z/OS environment, providing you familiarity with z/OS and the z/OS application development environment. At the end of the 4.5 days, you’ll have solid z/OS skills and an open badge to prove it!The workshop is held October 9th to 13th in Coppell, Texas. You may attend in person or via the web.Go to http://www.ibm.biz/zOSclass for more information and to enroll. Please direct any questions to Bruce Lin at [email protected].

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LfXWmADVf8&authuser=1

z systems Academic Initiative
[email protected]

Thanks,
Misty
__________________________
Misty V. Decker, PMP
Program Manager, z Systems Academic Initiative
Poughkeepsie, NY
(845) 435-3082

learn more: ibm.biz/zskills
join us: ibm.biz/zadvocate
compete: ibm.biz/masterthemainframe

http://unchaintheframe.com/

https://developer.ibm.com/linuxone/

Regards, Len

Leonard J. Santalucia

CTO | Business Development Manager | Certified Specialist

Vicom Infinity, Inc.

IBM Premier Business Partner

One Penn Plaza – Suite 2010