The Node.js ecosystem has been disrupted by self-replicating malware called Shai-Hulud.
In September 2025, researchers found that Shai-Hulud had infected more than 500 npm packages, including some from trusted maintainers. The worm did not just publish a few bad versions. It spread automatically, using stolen credentials to infect other packages owned by the same developer.
Seiden Group is pleased to announce that we now provide production support for the open source Mapepire database connector for IBM i. This includes support for Node.js applications and cloud-based or containerized workloads that connect to Db2 for i—whether from IBM i itself or from external systems.
Many developers already rely on Mapepire every day—sometimes without realizing it—because it’s the back-end to the Db2 for i extension for VS Code. We’re excited to help clients adopt this lightweight, high-performance connector.
As we mentioned in our article on installing ODBC via yum, the latest IBM i open source packages require new repositories.
A notable example is Node.js v20. When we hear users say, “I don’t see Node.js v20 listed in available packages, and yum returns ‘No package nodejs20 available‘,” the reason invariably is that the new repositories, ibmi-base and ibmi-release, have not been installed.
This alert was originally published in Seiden Group’s July 2023 Support Bulletin.
Seiden PHP+ fully supports IBM i 7.5 and 7.6.
IBM i 7.5 includes OpenSSL 1.1.1, an upgrade that can disable older PASE applications that were tied to 1.0.2 or earlier.
The Toronto User Group recently invited Alan to speak with them about how to implement secure, flexible APIs to connect IBM i applications to other systems.
Using several real-world code examples written in various free tools and languages—including RPG, PHP, Python, and Node.js—Alan demonstrated how others send and receive data safely using their favorite language paired with IBM i business logic. This video contains the details.
Open source on IBM i is moving fast these days. Alan recently shared his favorite updates to IBM i open source—focusing on improved security, performance, and ease of programming—at a Summit Lunch & Learn hosted by Paul Tuohy.
In this post we’ll take a closer look at how IBM i developers can use the QSHCURL command to easily reach out from CL or RPG and talk to internet-based services and APIs, then consume the resulting data, without a lot of extra effort.
First we’ll provide a short curl intro, and then we’ll look at an example of how to use the PASE-based curl command with an RPG program.
Node.js has joined other popular IBM i open-source technologies, such as PHP and Python, for web application and API development. A server-side runtime for JavaScript, Node.js can run both on IBM i and on other platforms such as Linux.
The Node.js iToolkit lets you leverage your company’s investment in RPG and COBOL business logic while developing front ends and APIs with Node.js. As with Node.js itself, iToolkit can run on your IBM i or can connect to IBM i from your PC or an external web server.
This post explains how to install Node.js and its iToolkit on your IBM i, then use iToolkit to call an RPG service program.
Open source continues to gain traction in IBM i shops, and for good reason. It excels at delivering new interfaces and functionality for RPG and COBOL applications, plus it broadens the talent pool for your development team.
ODBC connections between Linux and IBM i should be encrypted to keep their Db2 data safe in transit.
To encrypt ODBC data, IBM recommends the industry-standard TLS encryption protocol (the successor to SSL).