Re: Questions about Informix Functionality

In article q5r@news2.delphi.com, DAGMARA@news.delphi.com (DAGMARA@DELPHI.COM) writes: > Hello. I am an ORACLE DBA, but I have been tasked to evaluate a product > that uses an Informix RDBMS. I know very little about the Informix world, > so forgive me if the answers seem obvious to you. > > 1. Can Informix support distributed processing, if so, what version? > What distributed processing means to me: I have two Informix RDBMSs on > two servers; a single transaction can update both RDBMSs. > Yes. Informix 7.1 (OnLine) uses data replication to update both databases. > 2. Can Informix support mirroring, snapshots, or replicated servers? > Yes. I know that Informix (OnLine) 5.x and greater supports mirroring. We currently use mirroring on critical sections of the database. > 3. Can I write / store database triggers to perform referential or data > integrity? > Triggers and stored procedures are a part of Informix 5.01 (OnLine) and greater. And, yes, these can be used to perform referential or data integrity. > 4. Any "gotchas" with the product; e.g., yes the function will work, but > only if you stand on head and hold your breath (you know, like ORACLE). > There are some bugs (as there are with any product) that we have discovered. Some of them we are able to make work arounds, others we haven't been real successful with. I would rate Informix as average when it comes to fixing all their bugs in a timely fashion and not re-introducing new bugs in later versions. We currently have a problem with our stored procedures. We are running 5.02 OnLine and have been told that we have to upgrade to 6.0 for the bug fix. Moving from 5.02 to 6.0 is a VERY BIG step for the DBA. Therefore saying you have to move to 6.0 when the company isn't prepared to make that big change, in my mind, isn't a very good customer oriented approach. > This RDBMS will probably be several gigabytes; any experiences with this > amount of data would be helpful also. > > 5. Does Informix permit you to stripe tables? > Yes. We presently have a 20GB database that we stipe amongst several disks to help increase performance. With 6.0, 7.1 you have the ability to partition data within tables over multiple disks depending on the criteria you specify. Also, 6.0 has Parallel archives and restores (this will save LOTS of time for large DBs), parallel index builds, parallel sorts, cascading deletes as well as other items. 7.1 will give you parallel data query. All of these items are of great benefit for large database systems. > 6. Can you use raw partitions on UNIX? > It's the ONLY way I would design a large database. You can use cooked files if you wish, but performance will not be up to par. good luck! Debbie Shelton DBA McCaw Cellular Communications, Inc. debbie.shelton@mccaw.com > Thanks so much. > > Dagmar Anne Bogan > > Kopania & Komorovski Data Architecture and > Richardson, TX 75081 Performance Tuning > > dagmara@delphi.com >