Day 2 IDUG EMEA – DB2 10 Migrations & Certifications
Day two of the main IDUG programme and I’m really enjoying the novelty of being a real attendee for a change – this is the first European IDUG I’ve been to in 13 years where I haven’t had any official IDUG duties!
My conference kicked off a day early on Sunday, helping Mike Bracey of IBM UK to present a DB2 10 for z/OS migration planning workshop for around 30 people. We had to pack an enormous amount of material into a single day, but we had some great feedback and hopefully helped a few more customers in their DB2 10 journey.
There has been an amazing amount of discussion about DB2 10 here, with plenty of IBM presentations, user experiences and those irreplaceable “corridor conversations” that are one of the most valuable parts of being at an IDUG conference. Almost everyone I speak to is actively planning their DB2 10 for z/OS upgrade, and I learned in a presentation this morning that around 25% of the upgrades conducted so far have been customers using the skip-release feature and going directly from DB2 V8 to DB2 10. A few of the migration presentations I attended have got me thinking about how much vital migration preparation can be done way in advance of actually ordering the DB2 10 code, and I’ll be putting together an article or blog on that soon.
In the meantime the certification guys have been kept busy with lots of people taking the DB2 10 certification exams, and the mainframe Triton DB2 Geeks have all added both DBA and Systems Administration certifications to our totals. Now if only the midrange Geek could find the time to do likewise….
Still lots more good stuff to look forward to, including the IBM customer event this evening and the DB2 Experts Panel to finish the main part of the conference on Thursday. Even then our work is not done, as we’re attending a Customer Advisory Council meeting on Thursday afternoon to discuss the requirements and possible features in the next major release of DB2 for z/OS. Seems that whether you’re a DB2 developer or a DB2 Geek, your work is never done….