IBM i Software Glossary

A

API Manager / API Gateway

Software that sits between IBM i data and outside applications to publish, secure, monitor, and control API traffic in one place.

Application Readiness Map

A migration planning artifact that marks each IBM i application dependency as go, fix first, or defer.

AS/400

The older but still widely used name for the IBM midrange platform lineage now commonly referred to as IBM i.

AS400 Operating System

Common search language for IBM i, the modern operating system descended from OS/400 and i5/OS.

AS400 Software

Software associated with AS/400 and IBM i environments, including the operating system, business applications, security, backup, integration, reporting, and modernization tools.

C

COBOL

A business-oriented programming language that, alongside RPG, still runs transactional and financial logic in many IBM i environments.

D

Db2 for i

The integrated database technology used within IBM i environments.

Disaster Recovery

The people, process, site, and technology plan that restores operations after a serious outage or business disruption.

DRaaS (Disaster Recovery as a Service)

A cloud-hosted recovery environment, owned and operated by a provider, that an organization can fail over to during a disaster instead of maintaining its own secondary site.

E

EOSL (End of Service Life)

The point at which a vendor stops releasing updates, patches, or security fixes for a hardware or software product, after which continued use carries growing risk.

G

Green Screen

A shorthand term for traditional text-based IBM i user interfaces that remain common in mature business workflows.

H

HAaaS (High Availability as a Service)

A subscription model where a managed provider operates real-time replication and failover for IBM i on a buyer's behalf, instead of the buyer running HA software in-house.

High Availability

A continuity approach focused on keeping critical systems running or recoverable with minimal interruption.

I

IBM i

IBM's integrated operating system and platform family that evolved from the AS/400 lineage and continues to run many business-critical workloads.

IBM i Cloud Hosting

Running IBM i workloads on Power hardware hosted by IBM or a third-party provider, rather than on servers owned and operated on site.

IBM i Release

A specific IBM i operating system version used to determine hardware support, PTF planning, ISV compatibility, and upgrade timing.

IBM i Security Software

Tools and services that improve access control, MFA, auditing, exit point monitoring, SIEM visibility, and remediation for IBM i environments.

IBM Power Virtual Server (PowerVS)

IBM's cloud service for running IBM i, AIX, and Linux workloads on Power hardware in IBM Cloud, without re-platforming existing applications.

IBM Storage Insights

IBM's cloud-based monitoring and capacity analytics service for FlashSystem and other Storage Virtualize based storage arrays.

IBM Storage Virtualize

The software that runs IBM FlashSystem storage arrays, handling compression, encryption, replication, and automated tiering, licensed separately from the array hardware.

Integrated File System (IFS)

The stream-file, directory-based storage layer built into IBM i that works alongside the traditional library and object structure.

iSeries

IBM's 2000-era brand for the AS/400 family, positioned before the later System i and IBM i naming phases.

L

Legacy IBM i ERP Platforms (System21, BPCS, MAPICS)

A group of long-running ERP products, now owned by Infor, that many IBM i organizations still operate: System21, BPCS (now Infor LX), and MAPICS (now Infor XA).

LPAR (Logical Partition)

A logically separated slice of a Power server that runs its own copy of IBM i (or another OS), letting one physical machine host multiple independent workloads.

M

Modernization

A phased effort to improve IBM i systems, interfaces, integrations, workflows, or development practices without abandoning the business value they already hold.

Multi-Factor Authentication

An authentication approach that requires more than one proof of identity before access is granted.

N

NPIV (N_Port ID Virtualization)

A Fibre Channel standard that lets a single physical adapter present multiple virtual ports, each with its own worldwide port name, used by VIOS to share storage adapters across partitions.

P

Power BI Data Access Pattern

The architecture choice that defines how Power BI reaches AS400 or IBM i data for reporting.

Power BI for AS400

A reporting pattern that connects AS/400 or IBM i data to Microsoft Power BI through governed Db2 for i access, extracts, replication, or APIs.

Processor-Based Licensing (P-Group)

The IBM i licensing model that prices the operating system and much of the third-party software stack against the processor performance tier, or P-group, of the machine it runs on.

Q

QRadar

IBM's security intelligence and SIEM platform, often evaluated as a destination for normalized IBM i security and event data.

QSECURITY (Security Levels)

The IBM i system value that sets how much security enforcement the operating system applies, ranging from level 20 to level 50.

R

Reporting Semantic Layer

A governed layer of shared reporting logic used to keep IBM i reporting consistent.

Restore Test Runbook

A documented IBM i recovery test procedure that proves the business can restore what matters.

RPG

IBM's native programming language for IBM i business applications, still running the core transaction logic behind most AS/400 and IBM i software in production today.

RPO

Recovery Point Objective ... the amount of data loss the business can tolerate between the last good copy and the failure event.

RTO

Recovery Time Objective ... the target amount of time a business can tolerate before a system is restored.

S

SIEM

Security Information and Event Management: centralized platforms that collect, correlate, and alert on security event logs across an organization's systems, including IBM i.

SYSLOG for IBM i

A logging integration pattern that forwards IBM i security and operational events into SIEM or centralized monitoring platforms.

System i

IBM's later hardware-era brand that followed iSeries before IBM standardized on the IBM i platform name.

T

Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)

The full operating cost of a system or software decision, including licensing, infrastructure, labor, support, testing, and risk, not just the quoted purchase price.

U

Upgrade Dependency Inventory

A structured list of IBM i dependencies that must be checked before an upgrade or hardware migration.

V

VIOS (Virtual I/O Server)

IBM PowerVM's virtualization partition that shares physical I/O adapters, including Fibre Channel storage connections, across multiple client partitions on a Power server.

W

watsonx

IBM's AI and data platform, including conversational assistants, foundation models, and governance tooling, that can connect to IBM i data without modifying the underlying applications.

Workload Automation

Software that coordinates jobs, file movement, alerts, dependencies, approvals, and cross-system triggers so recurring business processes run predictably without manual handoffs.