Three questions

[mark_glassberg at valley.net (Mark Glassberg)]

A friend uses an IBM AS400 in his business, which he is not satisfied with.
While listening to his complaints recently, I suggested he look into linux.
He explained that there are a number of impediments to such a move.  First,
he says the AS400 would have to be sold because it can only run under IBM's
proprietary operating system.  So, my first question is, is this correct?

Then he explains that the reason he uses this machine is in order to run a
proprietary IBM relational data base management system called DB2, and final-
ly he says that he uses software written in RPG which utilizes DB2.  So my
next two questions are:  a) Is there a linux or unix package which could re-
place DB2, and b) Is it possible to run software written in RPG on a linux
system?

Any assistance will be greatly appreciated.