Informix "Hands Free"?

Can anyone out there give me ideas about how I can make an Informix DB run virtually "hand free". I am looking for things you might have done to automate the maintenance process. We have automated, to some degree, our daily archiving. What other things should we be looking at? Our db will be mostly accessed through a front end we've implemented in ESQL-C. The only support for this system is to be an operator with some UNIX background. I've attended the Online Admin and Managing and Optimizing Class' and the way the instructors talked, this system would need a DBA to support it because there are virtually no automated tools. Can we get away with automating some of the maintenance?