Best practice: Copying databases

Traditionally we have always done this using dbexport/dbimport but with all the new flash tools in the later versions of IBM Informix I was wondering if there are better ways of doing this these days. What do other people use? I suppose the question comes down to: Do IBM Informix have any best practice guidelines? Thanks -- Regards Scott Newton | R&D Solution Specialist | Integral Technology Group Ltd 95 Ascot Ave, Greenlane | PO Box 302313, North Harbour, North Shore City 0751 DDI 09 302 3788 | Fax 09 477 0478 | www.integralgroup.co.nz

"Scott Newton" <scott.newton@integralgroup.co.nz> wrote in message news:mailman.705.1243280291.1831.informix-list@iiug.org... > Traditionally we have always done this using dbexport/dbimport but with > all > the new flash tools in the later versions of IBM Informix I was wondering > if > there are better ways of doing this these days. What do other people use? > I > suppose the question comes down to: Do IBM Informix have any best practice > guidelines? > > Thanks > > -- > Regards > > Scott Newton | R&D Solution Specialist | Integral Technology Group Ltd > 95 Ascot Ave, Greenlane | PO Box 302313, North Harbour, North Shore City > 0751 > DDI 09 302 3788 | Fax 09 477 0478 | www.integralgroup.co.nz Not sure that IBM will venture an opinion, but for years use of SAN copy to make "instant", full-size copies of database servers has been a easy option, which we use a lot. It isn't so great if the target server is not SAN attached, of course, or if you don;t want the entire database server but just a subset of databases/data ...

Scott Newton wrote: > Traditionally we have always done this using dbexport/dbimport but with all > the new flash tools in the later versions of IBM Informix I was wondering if > there are better ways of doing this these days. What do other people use? I > suppose the question comes down to: Do IBM Informix have any best practice > guidelines? > > Thanks > There are a lot of options. But none is a straight and direct replacement for dbexport/dbimport. It really depends on what you're doing, your knowledge of the databases and the final result you want... Let's see... You can: 1- dbexport/dbimport 2- Use Art's myexport 3- INSERT INTO ... SELECT FROM 4- Use SAN copy has Neil mentioned 5- Create an HDR secondary 6- Use enterprise replication 7- Variations of 1), 2) and 3) using High Performance Loader for the bigger tables 8- Use a tool like Optim 9- ...? A few considerations: - 4) and 5) will only work within the same platform and version - 1) is the easiest, but slowest - 1), 2), 3) and 7) will cause unavailability - 6) can be hard to implement and requires primary keys on each table you want to copy - 7) requires more labour (unless myexport takes care of everything which I think it does). And it can give you a big boost - 8) is expensive but is a good solution to move partial datasets with the ability to maintain integrity and allow for data masking - 3) can raise issues with: new datatypes, order of actions If you have a specific situation it would help. There is no tool to directly replace dbexport/dbimport. What we can talk about are methodologies. I'd love to see a multi-threaded/multi process dbexport in some future version. If you have time constraints (most of the times we do unless the databases are really small) dbexport/dbimport is really limited although it's very easy to use (despite the bad image it may have due to occasional bugs) Regards. -- Fernando Nunes Portugal http://informix-technology.blogspot.com My email works... but I don't check it frequently...

"Fernando Nunes" <domusonline@gmail.com> wrote in message news:gvhm8o$mqu$1@news.eternal-september.org... > Scott Newton wrote: >> Traditionally we have always done this using dbexport/dbimport but with >> all the new flash tools in the later versions of IBM Informix I was >> wondering if there are better ways of doing this these days. What do >> other people use? I suppose the question comes down to: Do IBM Informix >> have any best practice guidelines? >> >> Thanks >> > > There are a lot of options. But none is a straight and direct replacement > for dbexport/dbimport. It really depends on what you're doing, your > knowledge of the databases and the final result you want... Let's see... > You can: > > 1- dbexport/dbimport > 2- Use Art's myexport > 3- INSERT INTO ... SELECT FROM > 4- Use SAN copy has Neil mentioned > 5- Create an HDR secondary > 6- Use enterprise replication > 7- Variations of 1), 2) and 3) using High Performance Loader for the > bigger tables > 8- Use a tool like Optim > 9- ...? Any reason that you didn't mention onunload/onload?

Neil Truby wrote: > > "Fernando Nunes" <domusonline@gmail.com> wrote in message > news:gvhm8o$mqu$1@news.eternal-september.org... >> Scott Newton wrote: >>> Traditionally we have always done this using dbexport/dbimport but >>> with all the new flash tools in the later versions of IBM Informix I >>> was wondering if there are better ways of doing this these days. What >>> do other people use? I suppose the question comes down to: Do IBM >>> Informix have any best practice guidelines? >>> >>> Thanks >>> >> >> There are a lot of options. But none is a straight and direct >> replacement for dbexport/dbimport. It really depends on what you're >> doing, your knowledge of the databases and the final result you >> want... Let's see... You can: >> >> 1- dbexport/dbimport >> 2- Use Art's myexport >> 3- INSERT INTO ... SELECT FROM >> 4- Use SAN copy has Neil mentioned >> 5- Create an HDR secondary >> 6- Use enterprise replication >> 7- Variations of 1), 2) and 3) using High Performance Loader for the >> bigger tables >> 8- Use a tool like Optim >> 9- ...? > > Any reason that you didn't mention onunload/onload? I miss that one. To be honest I don't like it. But for completeness it should be mentioned. It can only deal with same platform *and* same IDS version. It has limitations with new datatypes and the error messages are awful... Of course it has advantages... speed. I have a customer who uses it regularly... When everything goes ok it's nice... Sometimes they try do use it cross versions, or use corrupted onunload files and than it's a real pain. I would love to see improvements in this area... But my wish list is much longer than the feature request list ;) Regards. -- Fernando Nunes Portugal http://informix-technology.blogspot.com My email works... but I don't check it frequently...