Paul Bentley, Dexter Sean Charles, Paul Chapman and Laurent Mermet brought together their expertise for these two sessions.
The webinar and demo replay are available below.
.NET on IBM Power with NTi
Since November 2023, IBM officially supports .NET 8 on Power, making it possible to develop and run .NET applications directly on POWER infrastructure.
.NET Core being natively cross-platform, applications run on Windows, Linux, macOS, ARM and Power without any code changes.
The covered use cases are wide-ranging: web applications and APIs, desktop and mobile applications (Android, iOS, macOS, Linux), as well as AI and machine learning integration.
For deployment, a Linux partition can be added to an existing IBM Power server. .NET applications then run in Docker or OpenShift containers, an approach that leverages the existing Power infrastructure while delivering the flexibility and deployment speed that containers provide.
Benchmarks and performance
The results measured during the demo speak for themselves:
- DB2 for i query executed in approximately 3 milliseconds
- Network performance three times faster than an x86 configuration with an external network
- Internal network connections 15 to 20% faster than external connections
- 10,000 database entries created in approximately 7 seconds
These gains are explained by the use of the PowerVM hypervisor's internal network, which reduces latency and improves security by keeping IBM i off the public internet.
Demo details
Environment
The demo runs on an IBM Power9 server with two VIOS (Virtual I/O Servers). An internal network is established between the VIOS and the partitions through the PowerVM hypervisor. The architecture includes two main partitions - a Linux partition and an IBM i partition - as well as a small Linux partition hosted directly by the IBM i partition.
Application architecture
Two containers are deployed on each Linux partition: one for a concert booking website, the other for a QR code scanner. The IBM i partition hosts the database without being exposed to the internet. All communication between the containers and IBM i flows through the internal network.
Scenario
The scenario features a concert booking website: users reserve tickets and receive QR codes. A smartphone simulates concert entry by scanning the codes, triggering real-time validation against DB2 for i. Already scanned tickets are automatically rejected.
Security
Containers communicate over HTTPS with certificates. NTi manages database access with restricted user rights. IBM i is never directly accessible from the internet.
NTi on Power : key highlights
- Compatible with IBM i 7.1 to 7.5, with no version dependency
- Minimal footprint: a single library with a product key file on the IBM i side
- Lightweight containers, low CPU and memory requirements
- Simplified x86 to Power migration through the lift and shift model
For more details, the webinar and demo replay are available on our YouTube channel.
