IBM Informix Dynamic Server, Version 10.00.xC1 contains new features in the following areas:
IBM Informix Dynamic Server 10.0 provides significant advances in database server security, encryption, authentication, and availability.
You can use the new SQL statement, SET ENCRYPTION PASSWORD, to implement column-level encryption to improve the confidentiality of the data. New built-in functions provide methods for encrypting and decrypting data. The system catalog does not identify which columns contain encrypted data, and the same column can include both encrypted and unencrypted values. This security enhancement feature supports data confidentiality and data integrity.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Syntax.
This feature was first available with version 9.40.xC3. Server utilities on UNIX now check if the environment is secure by testing for the following conditions before starting:
If the tests for any of these conditions fail, the utilities exit with an error message.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide.
The DBSA (Database Server Administrator) can use a new built-in role, called EXTEND, to specify which users can register UDRs that include the EXTERNAL NAME clause. User-defined routines use shared-object files that are external to the database server and that could potentially contain harmful code. The DBSA can use the GRANT statement to confer the EXTEND role on a user (typically the DBA of a local database), or can use REVOKE to withdraw that role from a user. The DBSA can disable this feature by setting to "off" a new IFX_EXTEND_ROLE configuration parameter. This feature is intended to improve security and to control accessibility.
This feature is primarily documented in IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Syntax, IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide, and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
Dynamic Server provides multiple listener threads available to handle connections and imposes limits on the availability of the listener VP for incomplete connections. This feature reduces the risk of a hostile denial-of-service attack by making it more difficult to overwhelm the listener VP that handles connections. The default incomplete connection timeout period is reduced from 60 to 10 seconds. The default maximum number of incomplete connections is 1024.
You can customize this feature with the following two new configuration parameters:
You can change the value of these configuration parameters with the onmode utility while the database server is running.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
The server usability enhancements include features for ease of administration, scalability, and high availability.
This feature adds support for specifying the page size for a standard or temporary dbspace when you create the dbspace. You might want to specify a non-default page size if you want a longer key length than is available for the default page size. The root dbspace is the default page size. If you want to specify a page size, the size must be an integral multiple of the default page size, not greater than 16 kilobytes.
You can also use the new BUFFERPOOL configuration parameter to create a buffer pool that corresponds to the page size of the dbspace.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can use the new BUFFERPOOL configuration parameter or the onparams utility to define a buffer pool for pages that correspond to each unique page size in use by your dbspaces. When you use the BUFFERPOOL configuration parameter or the onparams utility to define a buffer pool, you specify information about the buffer pool including its size, the number of LRUS in the buffer pool, the number of buffers in the buffer pool, and lru_min_dirty and lru_max_dirty values.
The BUFFERS, LRUS, LRU_MAX_DIRTY, and LRU_MIN_DIRTY configuration parameters are no longer used. Information that was specified with the BUFFERS, LRUS, LRU_MAX_DIRTY, and LRU_MIN_DIRTY configuration parameters prior to Version 10.0 is now specified using the BUFFERPOOL configuration parameter or the onparams utility. Information you enter using the BUFFERPOOL configuration parameter or onparams utility supersedes any information previously specified with the deprecated parameters.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You have enhanced flexibility in managing the tblspace tblspace. The tblspace tblspace is a set of pages that describe the location and structure of all tblspaces in a given dbspace. Use the onspaces utility to move or drop the chunk containing the tblspace tblspace.
You can also specify the size of the first extent and of subsequent extents when dbspaces are created:
This feature allows you to reduce the number of tblspace tblspace extents and reduce the frequency of cases where those extents are placed in non-primary chunks.
These features are primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
As a Database Administrator, you can use a new single-user mode that is an intermediary mode between quiescent mode and online mode. While the server is in single-user mode, new connections are accepted only for user informix. Use this mode to perform any maintenance task, including tasks requiring the execution of SQL and DDL statements, when no other users are connected to the database server. Administrators can also perform all other functions available in online mode. You can set this mode using the oninit or onmode utilities, or the IBM Informix Server Administrator (ISA).
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can create a default role and assign that role to individual users or to PUBLIC on a per-database level. Each user who is assigned to a default role receives the privileges of that role as well as whatever other privileges are granted to the user individually. The syntax of the GRANT, REVOKE, and SET ROLE statements support this feature. This feature allows client applications to reset permissions (to the default role) of the user running the application, instead of requiring the DBA to reset permissions manually.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Syntax.
If you are user informix or have DBA privileges and the database server is in quiescent mode, you can rename a previously defined standard dbspace. You might want to rename standard dbspaces if you are reorganizing data in an existing dbspace and see a need to change the dbspace name. The rename dbspace operation only changes the dbspace name; it does not reorganize data. The database server automatically updates the system catalog so that database objects residing in a renamed dbspace are registered with the new name, but subsequent DDL statements referencing that dbspace must specify the new name, rather than the old name.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can use the new alarm configuration parameter, ALRM_ALL_EVENTS, to specify whether the event alarm program operates for all events that are logged in the MSGPATH or only specified noteworthy events.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can now specify that segments for shared memory be created as large as your operating system platform or the SHMMAX parameter allows.
NOTE: ON-Monitor does not support Shared Memory Size greater than 4GB. Therefore, the size specified for SHMVIRSIZE, SHMADD and SHMTOTAL in the "Shared-Memory screen" cannot be greater than 4GB.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can set up High-Availability Data Replication using standard ON–Bar or ontape commands for external backup and restore. Doing so can significantly reduce initial setup time.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Backup and Restore Guide.
You can replicate an index to a secondary server in an HDR pair that contains a corrupted index. Replicating an index does not require a lock on the table. You can manually replicate an index when you detect a corrupt index with the onmode -d index command. Alternatively, you can configure automatic index replication with the onmode -d idxauto command or the DR_IDXAUTO configuration parameter. This feature increases the availability of the HDR primary server because replicating an index is quicker than dropping and then rebuilding the index on the primary server.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can automate switching servers for High-Availability Data Replication if the primary server fails by using the DRAUTO configuration parameter. If DRAUTO is set to either RETAIN_TYPE or REVERSE_TYPE, the secondary database server switches to type standard automatically when an HDR failure is detected. If DRAUTO is set to RETAIN_TYPE, the original secondary database server switches back to type secondary when the HDR connection is restored. If DRAUTO is set to REVERSE_TYPE, the original secondary database server switches to type primary when the HDR connection is restored, and the original primary switches to type secondary.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can now use the new -version option with all server utilities to provide detailed information on the build operating system, build number, and build date. The -version option provides more information than the existing -V option. This feature enables DBAs and IBM Technical Support personnel to track version- and build-machine information, access documents before installing a product, be sure they are ready to install a product, and diagnose problems.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
IBM Informix Server Administrator (ISA) supports the following new features:
You can use the IPv6 format for IP addresses with Dynamic Server. The IBM Informix JDBC Driver, Version 3.0, supporting the JDK 1.4, is IPv6 aware. That is, the code that parses the connection URL can handle the longer (128-bit mode) IPv6 addresses (as well as IPv4 format). This IP address can be an IPv6 literal.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide.
The performance enhancements include improved query performance and recovery time. In addition to the topics discussed below, enhancements have been made to improve performance in the following areas:
This feature was first available in 9.40.xC4. You can specify how much memory is allocated to non-PDQ queries. The default of 128K can be insufficient for queries that specify ORDER BY, GROUP BY, hash joins, or other memory-intensive options. Use the new configuration parameter, DS_QUERY_MEM, to specify more memory than the 128K that is allocated to non-PDQ queries by default.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Performance Guide.
You can create, save, and reuse external optimizer directives. In previous releases of Dynamic Server, external optimizer directives existed as text strings within DML statements, but were not stored as separate entities. External optimizer directives are useful when it is not feasible to rewrite a query for a short-term solution to a problem, for example, when a query starts to perform poorly. In this release, the DBA (as user informix) can create external optimizer directives and apply them to subsequent queries, without changing existing application code. This feature is implemented as a new SQL statement, SAVE EXTERNAL DIRECTIVES, to create and register external optimizer directives in a new sysdirectives table of the system catalog. Use the new IFX_EXTDIRECTIVES environment variable and the EXT_DIRECTIVES configuration parameter to enable this feature.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Performance Guide, IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference, and IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Reference.
You can store multiple fragments of the same table or index in a single dbspace, reducing the total number of dbspaces needed for a fragmented table. Each fragment is stored in a separate, named partition in the dbspace. Storing multiple table or index fragments in a single dbspace improves query performance over storing each fragmented expression in a different dbspace. This feature improves performance and simplifies management of dbspaces.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Performance Guide, IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Guide, and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference.
You can set two new configuration parameters (FAST_RESTART_PHYSLOG and FAST_RESTART_CKPT_FUZZYLOG) to reduce the time required for database server recovery. This supports high availability by improving recovery performance when using fuzzy checkpoints.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Administrator's Reference and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Performance Guide.
This feature was first available with Version 9.40.UC3. You can use the new SET ENVIRONMENT OPTCOMPIND statement to set the value of the OPTCOMPIND environment variable dynamically for the current session. For example, you might wish to change the value for different kinds of queries. For a DSS query, you should set the value of OPTCOMPIND to 2 or 1, and you should be sure the isolation level is not set to REPEATABLE READ. For an OLTP query, you can set the value to 0 or 1 with the isolation level not set to REPEATABLE READ. The value that you enter using this statement takes precedence over the current setting specified in the ONCONFIG file. The default setting of the OPTCOMPIND environment variable is restored when your current session terminates. No other user sessions are affected by SET ENVIRONMENT OPTCOMPIND statements that you execute.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Syntax and IBM Informix Dynamic Server Performance Guide.
The SQL enhancement improves database availability.
The SQL syntax of CREATE INDEX and DROP INDEX now supports the new ONLINE keyword. When you use the ONLINE keyword, DDL operations execute without applying an exclusive lock to the table on which the specified index is defined. If you use this syntax to create an index on a table that other users are accessing, the index is not available until no user is updating the table. After you issue the new syntax to drop an index, no one can reference the index, but concurrent DML operations can use the index until they terminate. Dropping the index is deferred until no user is using the index. This feature maintains the availability of the table within a production environment after an existing index has ceased to be efficient.
This feature is primarily documented in the IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Syntax.
The Enterprise Replication enhancements ease administration, improve data integrity, and allow additional SQL operations. These enhancements are documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Enterprise Replication Guide.
A master replicate is a replicate that uses a specified participant as a master against which all other participants are tested for consistency.
Creating a replicate as a master replicate provides several advantages:
Enterprise Replication has a replicate template option that greatly simplifies setting up the replication system. Replication templates contain schema information about a database, a group of tables, column attributes, and the primary keys that identify rows. You first define the template by specifying schema information and then apply the template on the database servers within the replication domain. If the tables and primary keys do not exist on the server during the realization of the template, then the tables and primary keys are created according to the template definitions. Table attributes are verified during the realization of the template to ensure that proper replication can be performed on that database. Replicates created as part of the realization of a replicate template are created as mastered replicates and grouped as a replicate set.
You can create, realize, view, and delete templates using the Enterprise Replication command line syntax or IBM Informix Server Administrator (ISA).
Enterprise Replication can perform an initial synchronization on data to be replicated as well as repair a system in which data may have failed to be applied for any reason. Initial synchronization is performed at the startup of a new replicate or when a new participant is added to an existing replicate. Repair jobs reconciles the differences when the normal replication process has failed. Repair processes can be optimized to only compare rows found in ATS or RIS files: if the row still exists in the source, it is re-replicated; if it does not, then it is deleted on the target.
Beginning with version 10.00 you can alter a replicated table in any of these ways:
Before attaching fragments place the table in alter mode. Alter mode is a new state of a replicated table. In this mode only DDL and select operations are allowed. No insert, update, or delete operations are allowed in alter mode. After attaching the fragments, unset alter mode.
When performing any sort of alter other than attaching fragments, the database server automatically sets alter mode before altering the table and unsets it after the table is altered.
To set/unset the alter mode on a table, use the CDR CLI interface.
ALTER TABLE and ALTER FRAGMENT statements are allowed only on master replicates.
An existing replicate can be redefined by "remastering the replicate". Remastering allows you to change what columns are in a replicate definition without interrupting the replication. Also an existing non-master replicate can be converted to a master replicate using remastering.
Enterprise Replication event alarms are now detected uniquely by the event alarm program. You can specify what actions are triggered by specific Enterprise Replication event alarms.
You can selectively suppress any DataSync warning or error message that the ATS or RIS files contain with the CDR_SUPPRESS_ATSRISWARN configuration parameter.
The backup and restore enhancements improve performance and debugging. These enhancements are documented in the IBM Informix Backup and Restore Guide.
You can recover specific tables from an archive using the archecker utility. Tables can be restored up to a specific point in time. This allows you to restore specific pieces of data without having to perform a lengthy restore of the entire archive. Data can be restored without restoring the full database server on another instance. To perform a table level restore, archecker supports a command file which uses an SQL-like syntax to specify the source and destination table schemas.
You can now view the logical-logs backed up by ON-Bar, similar to using the onlog utility to view the logical-logs backed up by the ontape utility. If you need to perform a restore, you can view the old logical-log files that were backed up by ON-Bar to find out the exact problem.
You can now change the ON-Bar debugging level while ON-Bar is running. You can save a large amount of time and disk space by setting high debugging levels only when you need them. You set the debugging level with the BAR_DEBUG configuration parameter. The value of BAR_DEBUG ranges from 0-9, with 0 being no debugging information and 9 being the most detailed debugging information. You can change the value of BAR_DEBUG as frequently as you want. Similar to the onstat -m command, you can use ON-Bar to print the recent ON-Bar activity from the onbar activity log file.
You can now specify that ontape uses standard I/O instead of a tape device or disk file. During a backup, ontape writes the data to stdout (standard output). During a restore, ontape reads data from stdin (standard input). Specifying stdout or stdin allows ontape to use pipes (an OS provided buffer mechanism to connect separate programs to a data stream) for archives and restores. Using pipes, the data can be processed by other programs without requiring that the data be saved in files or tape devices. For example, you can use compression to save media space, use cloning to duplicate the archive for safety reasons, or restore the data onto another server instance. This feature is especially efficient for setting up High-Data Availability Replication by restoring the data to the secondary server while skipping the intermediary step of saving the data to a file or disk.
You can use the ontape utility to perform external backup and restore procedures.
The storage enhancements improve ease of use.
The High-Performance Loader utilities onpload and onpladm include support for long object names up to 128 characters, but the ipload GUI does not. If you use long database, table or column names and create jobs using onpladm, you cannot run these jobs using ipload. For ipload, database, table and column names cannot exceed 18 characters.
This feature is documented in the documentation notes for the IBM Informix High-Performance Loader User's Guide.
The Informix Interface for Tivoli Storage Manager (formerly known as Tivoli Data Protection for Informix) is bundled with the Dynamic Server installation. This feature eases installation. You can use Informix Interface for TSM with ON-Bar to store data. Informix Interface for TSM stores Dynamic Server databases and logical logs on the Tivoli Storage Manager.
The extensibility enhancements improve distributed transactions, obtaining information from trigger executions, and Java support.
You can use built-in opaque data types in remote queries involving databases residing on the same database server. The built-in opaque data types supported by this feature are BOOLEAN, BLOB, CLOB, and LVARCHAR. User-defined types that can be cast explicitly to a built-in data type are also supported. You can use these data types in DML operations and as parameters and returned data types of UDRs between all databases of the same Dynamic Server instance. The target data type of the explicit cast must be a built-in opaque type or other built-in SQL data type, and all the casts and all the UDTs must be defined in all of the databases participating in the query. The following types of operations are supported:
You can create user-defined routines that are invoked in trigger action statements to obtain information about the triggers, triggering tables, views, statements, and the values of rows involved in the trigger actions. Using the new DataBlade API routines, you can write a general purpose user-defined routine that can you can use to audit any table and any trigger event.
This feature is documented in the IBM Informix DataBlade API User's Guide.
J/Foundation supports JRE Version 1.4 and the JDBC 3.0 specification.
The installation enhancements improve usability. These enhancements are documented in the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Installation Guide for UNIX and Linux.
Dynamic Server, CSDK, JDBC, and ISA installation programs now include the display and required acceptance of a License Agreement. The License Agreement and License Information files are installed with the product and available for customer review at any time.
The following files are now available in a /doc directory that is available before installing Dynamic Server:
You can install Dynamic Server on UNIX or Linux using the new installation application in console, GUI, or silent mode. For detailed instructions, see the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Installation Guide for UNIX and Linux.
The interoperability enhancements improve communication between Informix and DB2 products.
You can run Informix ESQL/C applications with DB2 servers and databases. The Informix ESQL/C product provides new libraries that are called when you use the esql command to preprocess your files to work with DB2. Informix ESQL/C runs with DB2 Version 8.2, or later, running on Linux, UNIX, and Windows operating systems.
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