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Countdown to SHARE has Mainframe Community Buzzing

SHARE President Janet Sun discusses what's on tap at Orlando conference

With the summer SHARE conference days away, IBM Systems Magazine, Mainframe edition spoke with Janet Sun, president of SHARE and product manager with Rocket Mainstar, to see what’s on tap for the attendees, who are expected to number more than 1,100. Just weeks after IBM’s July zEnterprise announcement, its impact on mainframe customers and IT professionals will clearly be front of mind at the user group conference Aug. 8-10 in Orlando, Fla.

Q: For SHARE attendees, what do you expect the buzz will focus on in Orlando?
A: We actually have a lot of things going. Of course SHARE covers a broad spectrum of topics, but actually there are a lot of hot topics that we’ve got going this time, which is great. We do have considerable coverage of the zEnterprise announcements and we will have over 30 sessions, including user experiences, on the zEnterprise System.

Q: What else will make a splash?
A: There are also some recent IBM announcements that we’re going to have some significant sessions on, including WebSphere Application Server version 8, CICS TS version 4.2, NetView version 6.1, and then about a dozen sessions covering IPv6, which is a hot topic now. We’ve got cloud computing, business intelligence and analytics, and of course, we’re going to continue to deliver our Architecture Summit, which has a lot of the application-related topics.

Those are probably our primary topics, but we’ve got so much more, including sessions on Watson—covering its wider implications. They’ll look to answer how to apply the technology in your environment and how that might affect you in the future. So we have a whole lot of interesting topics at SHARE.

Q: As a user conference, what sets SHARE apart?
A: We draw a large cross-section of people to our event, and they’re representing a number of different areas. So they’re going to be sharing their experiences with all of these topics. That’s because SHARE is a place where people come to talk about their experiences—both good and bad, which is great because we can learn from each others’ successes and mistakes.

At the same time, more IBM developers and technicians attend SHARE than any other event. For the people looking for the details, the right people will be there to answer their questions.

“SHARE is a place where people come to talk about their experiences—both good and bad, which is great because we can learn from each others’ successes and mistakes.” —Janet Sun, SHARE President

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