[pickle-wizard]

Back when I was at IBM one of the hats I wore was AS/400 administrator and programmer.

I miss working with it and would like to buy one for my home lab, but the licensing is a killer. I find used ones on the market, but they usually don't include the license keys or media, and without a support contract can't get them.

I really wish IBM had a hobbyist program. I wouldn't expect it be free, but I wouldn't mind paying a small yearly fee.

[msla]

The irony is that IBM had one of the first Open Source communities: SHARE, dating back to 1955, shared software up to and including a whole OS, SOS (SHARE Operating System), well before Unix or home computers even existed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHARE_(computing)