COMMON America’s Advisory Council
The CAAC (COMMON Americas Advisory Council) called snowy, icy Rochester home for three
days in early December. They started off the meeting with a warm welcome from Dave Nelson
and a Power Systems Update from Ian Jarman. This great start to the meeting set the tone
for the remaining days as the CAAC heard from the Power Systems Application Development
team, the Systems and Technology group, and the Marketing group, as well as participated in
a tour of some of IBM’s environmental test labs.
In addition to all of the informative presentations, the CAAC also took action on several
requirements; voting to close some and to open (move forward) others. The newly opened
ones were also categorized and the requirements’ importance was ranked. If you are
unfamiliar with “requirements”, they are basically a way for the COMMON community to send
in their wish list for new and improved features in future releases of IBM i. The CAAC serves
as the liaison between the community member and IBM. This has been a very successful
partnership over the years. In fact, many of the enhancements and changes in V6R1 came
directly from requirements submitted by the CAAC from the COMMON community. At this
most recent December meeting, three requirements were closed due to them being delivered
by IBM, proving again how well this partnership works.
Current CAAC members include (in alphabetical order): Michelle August, David Brault, Tom
Duncan, Vern Hamberg, Scott Hamilton, Pete Massiello, Brian May, Phil McCullough, Tony
Mossbarger, Carl Novit, Justin Porter, and Roxanne Reynolds-Lair.
Participating in the CAAC is a very rewarding experience. Current CAAC members have shared
some of the benefits of serving on the CAAC. Among them were:
• Provides invaluable information for my business from both IBM and other CAAC members
sharing their challenges and solutions.
• Exposure to future trends/enhancements for projecting.
• Meet and collaborate with top IBM i professionals/experts – within IBM as well as outside
of IBM.
• Able to have influence on the future direction of the IBM i/OS.
• Gain critical knowledge to aid in making strategic business technology decisions
• Opportunity to give back to the community
• Develop lasting professional relationships
At this time the CAAC is seeking new members. More information about the CAAC, and the
application for consideration to join the CAAC, can be found at http://www.common.org/
index.php/vol-groups/ caac.html. This is a great way to get more involved with COMMON and
help the IBM i community. If this partnership sounds like something you could contribute to,
please download the application at the above website and email it to CAAC@common.org.
