Re: What's new in Informix 7.3?

Also sprach "Jay D. Sullivan" <jnelaine@erols.com> : :We had two problems with 7.2 which I'm hoping (but not expecting) were :resolved in 7.3. The first is Informix's lack of case-independent :indexes. There was no way to do a case-insensitive search and still be :able to use an index. Databases such as Sybase/Microsoft SQL Server allow :this. I don't believe this has been addressed in 7.30. They did add 3 functions, UPPER(), LOWER(), and INITCAP() in SQL, but case is still handled the same way in searches with regards to indexes (i.e. you COULD query with a WHERE clause including "AND UPPER(col1) = "SEARCHSTRING", but it can't use an index on col1 to execute the search). However, UDO with one of the text datablades should be able to handle such a search ok. :The second problem was that Informix's biggest variable-length text field :only allowed you to store 256 characters. If you wanted to store more than :that, you couldn't do things like "LIKE" searches. SQL Server has a TEXT :type which will store up to 32K of data and you can still do LIKE searches. Ah, what you mean is you'd have to use a blob column to store longer text, and that, indeed, does not allow search conditions. Again, not addressed in 7.3. And again, easily doable with UDO and the appropriate blade. Also, IUS supports lvarchar, which is a varchar up to 32K in size. Sounds to me like you should be looking into UDO (Universal Data Option, formerly known as IUS, Informix Universal Server). Dave (posting from home, speaking as a representative of nobody but himself) ********** "Everybody plays the fool, sometimes."