newbie question about client apps for informix

I've never used informix but the company I work for is going to be developing a tracking system for the products they manufacture (aluminum wheels). I'll actually be developing the system I'm currently doing image processing apps now for pattern recognition. I think I'm leaning towards a sparc 2000 as the server and I'm considering running Linux on the client machines. We like to keep the cost down as much as possible we'll have about 60-70 client machines in the plant obtaining data about the wheels. Each machine will be connected to an ID matrix reader to identify individual wheels. I'm estimating that the server will have to respond to about 15 to 20 querys per second. The client machines will obtain data from the server to control conveyor systems to route the wheels and for other things. Supposedly there is something called CIASM for linux. What is this and how will it help me to develop client applications? Also I believe someone told me informix would accept tcp/ip connections over a specified port to access services, I guess that's pretty obvoious though, how difficult would it be to write my own client app from scratch using the socket interface to access the database. I've played around with some tcp/ip client/server development and know it would be no small feat to accomplish. Thanks for your help. Josh Johnson Computer Systems Engineer Superior Industries Intl. jdjohnso@comp.uark.edu