Resources

Guide

5th Annual IBM AIX Community Survey Findings

The AIX Community Survey, now in its fifth consecutive year, goes in-depth with IT teams to gain a unique perspective into how this platform is being used today and how teams envision using it in the future. Over the years, the respondents of the survey have expanded to include a variety of industries, geographies, and titles within IT. More than 100 IT professionals in North America, EMEA, and APAC participated in this year’s survey, and this input enables all of us to understand the role of AIX with new clarity.
Article

Comparing Different Methods for Calculating Health and Risk

How do you calculate IT health and risk ? There are different methods you can use, depending on your needs. The most common methods for determining IT infrastructure health are: Threshold comparison Enhanced threshold comparison Event detection Variation from normal Allocation comparison Queuing theory for health On the other hand, the most common methods for calculating IT infrastructure risk are...
Blog

Performance Management

What is Performance Management? IT performance management is responsible for everyday aspects of capacity management , like monitoring performance and resources, planning changes to make efficient use of resources, analyzing performance, and reporting back to the business. Now more than ever, your company’s bottom line rests on your ability to provide 24/7 service online. Even short outages can...
Blog

IT Maturity

What are your optimization goals? An optimization initiative is typically triggered by one of the drivers listed below and the focus is dictated by your overall business objectives. But singlehandedly focusing on one objective may negatively impact your capabilities in the other areas. This can reduce the overall service quality and offer limited to no real value. In order to achieve concurrent...
Blog

How to Go from Simple to Strategic Capacity Management

Capacity Management Strategies If IT was like a restaurant…then capacity management should be like the restaurant manager (aka Maître D’). Unfortunately, too many organizations are using capacity management as the clean-up department. When something goes wrong, capacity management fixes it. And while that used to work, that’s not the best practice to follow today. A Brief History of Capacity...
Blog

Capacity Planning

Have you ever experienced an online service outage? It’s like losing half your physical locations without any warning. Downtime is a huge problem. It stops your revenue stream. It compromises customer loyalty. It damages your brand’s reputation. And it wastes hours and IT resources to fix the problem—when it shouldn’t have been a problem to begin with. Isn’t it about time you prevented downtime...
Blog

IT Risk Mitigation

It's a brave new world for IT. And it often seems impossible to predict future demand and guard against performance risks. You have mountains of data, scalable cloud infrastructures, and a complex web of IT environments. It's complicated, to say the least. And it's matched by skyrocketing consumer demand for and reliance on online services. Bottom line: outages are more dangerous to a company’s...
Case Study

For Centralized Data Processing, KeHE Relies on Fortra

As the nation’s leading distributor of natural, organic, specialty, ethnic, and gourmet food products, KeHE Distributors has helped thousands of retailers—from the smallest independent stores to the largest supermarket chains—meet the constantly growing demand for products that help people to live well. John Kinnaird is the National Operating Center Manager responsible for supporting both hardware...
Case Study

Lamps Plus Reduces Overtime Using Automation Solutions from Fortra

Established in 1976, Lamps Plus has brought excellence to the retail lighting industry for more than 35 years. Today, they are the nation’s largest specialty lighting company with more than 40 superstores throughout the western United States. They serve over five million customers a year with functional and decorative lighting products, in-home lighting consultations, in-store lighting seminars...
Case Study

Bank of Stockton Turns to Fortra for Reliable, Error-Free Operations

Founded in 1867, Bank of Stockton has always been at the forefront of banking technology innovation. With 17 branches in five counties across central California, Bank of Stockton is known as a community bank with a reputation for continually investing in new technology-based products and services to better serve its customers. Whether working to attract and retain customers, protect privacy, or...
Case Study

Fortra Helps Tara Materials Focus on Canvas, Not Paper

Canvas is the foundation of many great works of art. For many years, Tara Materials has been a major supplier of canvas. Its leading product line, Fredrix, was first manufactured in 1868. Today, Tara has two factories in Tijuana, California and Lawrenceville, Georgia that assemble more than three million pieces of stretched canvas and make about half a million yards of coated canvas each year.
Case Study

Cashman Equipment Looks to Fortra Professional Services with High Hopes

Cashman Equipment Company is not only one of the highest-rated Caterpillar equipment dealers in North America, but it is also one of the largest privately-owned companies in Nevada. Headquartered in Henderson, they employ over 600 dedicated team members of various professional and technical backgrounds. Nationally recognized by Caterpillar for outstanding sales performance, Cashman Equipment is a...
Case Study

AAA Life Leverages Fortra Solutions for IT Efficiency

Part of the American Automobile Association (AAA) family, AAA Life Insurance Company offers a variety of competitive life insurance, annuity, and travel accident products. With over one million policies, many people rely on AAA Life to help provide protection for their loved ones. As Senior Systems Engineer at AAA Life, Randy Wittner is in charge of their IBM i environment, overseeing two S824...
Blog

Service Level Management

While IT managers agree that service level management (SLM) is critical to their organizations, many also find it intimidating. It need not be. An SLM program is what you make it - it can be formal or informal, all-encompassing or focused on key services. The point is to document required service levels for services provided to the business by the IT organization. Service-level requirements are...