Does anybody know? Informix on NT?

Dear lists. Let me ask all of you a simple question, please.. Sorry that I am not so experience with Informix. I have Informix ver.4.x running on AIX (RS/6000). We wrote all the application using Informix 4GL. I feel that RS/6000 getting costly recently and think about to change into more reasonable ones. Should it be Windows NT, is there Informix available for that o/s? How could I migrate from AIX to NT (is it just copy-and-paste or something more complicated?) And the last, how about the database (can I just change into Windows SQL?) Again, thanks in advance for your help and tips. My regards, -- Harsono ------

Hi Jopar, There is certainly an Informix database available for NT, and your database should be able to be ported over to this platfrom. I don't know AIX, so I'm unsure as to how this would be done. Maybe someone here can help?? Best Regards, Kirk Jopar <jopar@softhome.net> wrote in message news:39a41b68.0@news.cbn.net.id... > Dear lists. > > Let me ask all of you a simple question, please.. Sorry that I am not so > experience with Informix. > > I have Informix ver.4.x running on AIX (RS/6000). We wrote all the > application using Informix 4GL. I feel that RS/6000 getting costly recently > and think about to change into more reasonable ones. Should it be Windows > NT, is there Informix available for that o/s? How could I migrate from AIX > to NT (is it just copy-and-paste or something more complicated?) And the > last, how about the database (can I just change into Windows SQL?) > > Again, thanks in advance for your help and tips. > > My regards, > > -- > Harsono > ------ > > >

ho, imho, stay on the rs/6000. I recently installed an eval version of ids for nt to take a look, not too shabby, but here's the cons: 1) you lack the cool tools that unix comes with, though I suppose there are equivalents (mks tools for instance). 2) no onmonitor... sheesh, how do they expect us to work? 3) afaik, no support for raw filesystems, though I stand wide open to correction, but I didnt see an option for it. 4) step back to item 1, its a fat arch / mindset jump, I've never tried 4gl for NT, but I shudder to think trying to port my shell scripts across... Basically, from what I've seen (in my little experiance), a port to nt will be big jump in thinking for your developers. NT doesn't scale well in our experiance as opposed to unix machines, you lack the finer granularity of control aswell under NT. UNIX can be made to run WAY faster. Though, look on the bright side. NT is easier to control, NT kernel panics mean something to the users. The hardware is generally cheaper for the lowend machines. just my 2c (not that it means much in our currency) brett says... > Hi Jopar, > > There is certainly an Informix database available for NT, and your database > should be able to be ported over to this platfrom. I don't know AIX, so I'm > unsure as to how this would be done. > > Maybe someone here can help?? > > Best Regards, > Kirk > > Jopar <jopar@softhome.net> wrote in message > news:39a41b68.0@news.cbn.net.id... > > Dear lists. > > > > Let me ask all of you a simple question, please.. Sorry that I am not so > > experience with Informix. > > > > I have Informix ver.4.x running on AIX (RS/6000). We wrote all the > > application using Informix 4GL. I feel that RS/6000 getting costly > recently > > and think about to change into more reasonable ones. Should it be Windows > > NT, is there Informix available for that o/s? How could I migrate from AIX > > to NT (is it just copy-and-paste or something more complicated?) And the > > last, how about the database (can I just change into Windows SQL?) > > > > Again, thanks in advance for your help and tips. > > > > My regards, > > > > -- > > Harsono > > ------ > > > > > > > > >

If platform cost is the primary driving factor, then I would recommend Linux and not NT for the following reasons: 1. Informix Dynamic Server software itself costs quite a bit less under Linux. 2. You cannot run Informix-4GL on a pure NT platform, you will have to go to Dynamic 4GL and you will incur cost there both with the Dynamic 4GL software itself plus the learning curve of thin client setup not to mention some light "porting" you may need to fix things like hardcoded pathnames, etc. (if you have them). In many cases you can just recompile your 4GL app and go with Dynamic 4GL but there are some areas which require manual intervention. Informix database itself does run on NT. 3. If you are still running 4.x (I assume Online 4.x), you will get lots of benefits from moving forward to 7.x or 9.x, but if you do not have a maintenance agreement you will incur software cost as well (no matter which platform you go to, including staying with AIX). 4. UNIX still seems to be a better platform for database servers in my experience (just my opinion) because of better performance and ease of administration (especially if you have been in the UNIX world for a long time)... Of course, this all depends on many factors as to how large is your database/application, how critical is it, etc. etc. If it is very large and highly mission-critical, you may also want to consider Sun Solaris platform. Hardware-wise it may be cheaper than IBM and Informix certainly runs very well on it... Note however, that, hardware cost is getting less and less significant - usually the labor and software costs are the two primary factors in the total cost in my experience... Hal Maner M Systems International, Inc. www.msystemsintl.com Jopar <jopar@softhome.net> wrote in message news:39a41b68.0@news.cbn.net.id... > Dear lists. > > Let me ask all of you a simple question, please.. Sorry that I am not so > experience with Informix. > > I have Informix ver.4.x running on AIX (RS/6000). We wrote all the > application using Informix 4GL. I feel that RS/6000 getting costly recently > and think about to change into more reasonable ones. Should it be Windows > NT, is there Informix available for that o/s? How could I migrate from AIX > to NT (is it just copy-and-paste or something more complicated?) And the > last, how about the database (can I just change into Windows SQL?) > > Again, thanks in advance for your help and tips. > > My regards, > > -- > Harsono > ------ > > >

Jopar, yes, there is a version of Informix for Windows NT. Since both platforms (NT and AIX) use 4K page size, I don't think you'll have an issue with compatability. I would recommend doing a dbexport of your database(s) as this exports in ASCII format so doing a dbimport should prove to be a routine process which won't matter what OS or version of Informix you're bringing it into. Consult your documentation on the specifics of dbexport/dbimport as you can do them both to disk or to tape. Keep in mind if you do it to tape, you'll have to have a compatible tape drive on your NT box when you try to import it. Hope this helps... Jopar wrote: > Dear lists. > > Let me ask all of you a simple question, please.. Sorry that I am not so > experience with Informix. > > I have Informix ver.4.x running on AIX (RS/6000). We wrote all the > application using Informix 4GL. I feel that RS/6000 getting costly recently > and think about to change into more reasonable ones. Should it be Windows > NT, is there Informix available for that o/s? How could I migrate from AIX > to NT (is it just copy-and-paste or something more complicated?) And the > last, how about the database (can I just change into Windows SQL?) > > Again, thanks in advance for your help and tips. > > My regards, > > -- > Harsono > ------ -- Phillip Tien Database Administrator Whole Foods Market, Inc. "I always wanted to be the last guy on Earth just to see if all those women were lying to me."

Thank all of you for the helps. From several tips the Linux is hard to forget. I'll try that. Jp Jopar <jopar@softhome.net> wrote in message news:39a41b68.0@news.cbn.net.id...