Highlights: The Informix Early Validation Program for the next release is on its way
Welcome to the International Informix Users Group (IIUG) Insider! Designed for IIUG members and Informix user group leaders, this publication contains timely and relevant information for the IBM Informix community.
Contents:
- Editorial
- Highlights
- Conference corner
- Developer corner
- Informix news
- Support corner
- Informix corner
- Sponsor corner
- Informix resources
- Calendar of events
- Useful links
- Closing and credits
Editorial | Back to top |
Last week was the IIUG Board of Directors meeting in Las Vegas. On Sunday some of us attended the Conference Advisory Council (CAC). The CAC is a group of customers commenting about various aspects of the Informix product, requesting new features and suggesting direction. Being under a Non-Disclosure Agreement, the CAC can hear about the new features of the upcoming version before they are made public. For the same reason I cannot tell you about them. All I can say is that the next version will have a bunch of very cool features.
The IOD conference started on Monday. For the first two days we attended sessions and met colleagues and IBMers. Monday night we had the traditional Informix party which was great as usual. On Wednesday and Thursday we had a board meeting. Two days of brainstorming, discussions and meetings with IBM executives. We hope the outcome will be beneficial for Informix and the IIUG.
I am trying a new format for this edition of the Insider. A short email version with links only and a full downloadable version on our website. Please email me and let me know what you think about it.
Gary Ben-Israel
IIUG Insider Editor
Highlights | Back to top |
The Informix Early Validation Program for the next release is on its way
The vNext release has been under development for more than a year, and is a major update that includes many client-requested features, performance enhancements and innovations.
Our goal in presenting this opportunity is twofold: give selected clients the opportunity to validate their applications and get an early start with the new features, and to validate the readiness of this version for GA in the near future.
We very much appreciate feedback from our EVP partners. It is a crucial aspect of the overall program readiness, without which we cannot achieve our goals. There are many Informix customers who are interested in the lessons learned in EVP so we encourage you to both provide us detailed feedback, and to consider providing the community with the highlights of your evaluation, by providing us with permission to include your feedback in our launch materials.
We are confident that we have improved the product and that vNext represents the best Informix server ever, and we’re excited to give your organization an opportunity to get your hand on it first, and to help us with the final and critical client validation of this product.
Anita McKeithen, PMP
Business Operations Program Manager
IBM Certified Executive Project Manager
Information Management Division
Conference corner | Back to top |
IIUG Informix Conference 2013 – Call for speakers
Submit a proposal to present at the 2013 International Informix Users Group (IIUG) Conference.
The IIUG Conference Planning Committee is ready to accept presentation proposals for the 2013 IIUG Conference which is to be held April 21 – 25, 2013 at the San Diego (CA) Marriott Mission Valley, USA.
Do you have experience with Informix or Informix related products? Do you have real-case studies related to Informix solutions? Have you discovered any Informix hints or tips? Are you interested in sharing your Informix knowledge and skills with the Informix User community? If the answer is yes to any of these questions the IIUG Conference Committee invites you to submit a proposal to speak at the 2013 Conference.
The 2013 Conference will be comprised of more than 80 technical/user sessions, a series of hands-on-labs and 1 day of comprehensive tutorials intended to reinforce the power of Informix. Presentation proposals should be brief, but more than 250 words, highlighting the Informix technical solutions, real world experiences or trade tips you will include in your presentation. Multiple presentations are encouraged.
If sharing your knowledge is not enough, conference speakers (non IBM employees) are provided with a complimentary pass providing access to conference sessions, meals and conference related networking events. Use http://www.iiug2013.org/speakers to register your proposal. The deadline for submitting 2013 IIUG Conference proposals is November 1, 2012. For your convenience, speaker logins have been retained for those who submitted a 2012 IIUG Conference proposal. Don’t delay – submit your proposal and biography today for consideration.
See you in San Diego!
The 2013 IIUG Informix Conference Team
http://www.iiug2013.org
conference@iiug.org
Developer corner | Back to top |
http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/sg248021.html?Open
Save this link to find about Informix on DeveloperWorks: /url/devworks.html
Informix news | Back to top |
IBM Data Management
IIUG Will Return to San Diego for 2013: Get ready for sun, sand, and Informix April 21-25, 2013!
http://ibmdatamag.com/2012/10/iiug-will-return-to-san-diego-for-2013
The Preeminence of IBM Informix TimeSeries: Part 1. Handling the large volumes of time-stamped data generated from stock transactions, smart metering, and more
http://ibmdatamag.com/2012/10/the-preeminence-of-ibm-informix-timeseries-part-1
OEM website News
IM OEM web site live on IBM.COM: Join the IBM Information Management OEM solution program and win in the market place with greater flexibility to build robust solutions at a lower cost. Learn more on how you can embed Information Management Software
http://www-01.ibm.com/software/data/info/oem/
Support corner | Back to top |
Which version of CSDK should be used on Windows 7 platform?
Both CSDK version 3.50 and CSDK 3.70 are supported on Windows 7 operating system, which makes difficult to decide which one to use. A useful way to decide which CSDK to use is: consider what version of Informix Server you are using. By design, the CSDK version will be the “latest 3.x for 11.x”. Here “x” is the same minor version number “.50″ or .”70” as the database engine, e.g., Informix 11.50 and CSDK 3.50; or Informix 11.70 and CSDK 3.70.
In regard to the bit level, 64-bit windows will support either 32-bit (‘.TC’) or 64 bit (.’FC’) CSDK. Although the bit level is not significant for determining which one to use, it is important to note that the ODBC manager on Windows 7 is 64-bit. If you want use a 64-bit CSDK, you will have no issues. However, a 32-bit CSDK will require an older ODBC manager.
-David Jay
Informix corner | Back to top |
Informix Performance Tuning Technical Training Day
The Washington Area Informix User Group will be hosting a one day Informix Performance Tuning Technical Training Day.
Date and Time: Thursday, November 8th, 2012, 9:00am to 4:00pm
Location: Advanced DataTools Corporation, 4216 Evergreen Lane, Suite 136 Annandale, VA 22003
Directions: http://www.advancedatatools.com/OurCompany/DirectionsMapsHotels.pdf
Morning Session – Special Guest – Scott Lashley, Kernel/Performance Architect, IBM Informix IDS Portland, Oregon
Scott is the IBM Informix Dynamic Server (IDS) Kernel/Performance architect. Starting with Informix Turbo and the implementation of blobs, Scott has been actively developing Informix database engine technology since 1987. Scott was the kernel architect for Informix XPS, Informix’s shared nothing architecture database product. Scott spent a few years helping IBM DB2 LUW by leading the HADR project before returning to Informix IDS for the IDS Cheetah release. Scott’s passion is on developing technology to help reduce the human cost of maintaining the IDS database engine with emphasis on self-tuning and self-maintaining algorithms along with continuing to improve transaction and query performance. Scott’s current focus is on accelerating query performance using main memory techniques. Scott has a BA in Computer Science and Religion from Mt. Vernon Nazarene University, Mt. Vernon Ohio. Plus, Scott referee’s 350+ adult recreational basketball games a year.
Some of the topics Scott will cover are:
- Query Processing
- Indexing
- Diagnostics
- Storage Enhancements
- Networking
And More …
Afternoon Session – Informix Performance Tuning by Art Kagel and Lester Knutsen, Advanced DataTools Corporation
We will cover some of the tips and tricks from our Fastest Informix DBA Contest held at the last IIUG conference. The goal of the contest was to see who could optimize an Informix database server running 1,000 OLTP users in under one hour and generate the most transactions per minute.
The Grand Prize Winner of the new Apple iPad and the Fastest Overall Informix DBA was Andrew Ford. Andrew’s results were almost three times faster than the next closest contestant’s results. Andrew generated over 57,000 transactions per minute.
The meeting is open to all but we have limited space. Please register so we can keep a count of attendees: For more information and to register visit http://www.waiug.org/.
Informix Performance Tuning Bootcamp
Date: Nov 5 – 7, 2012
Location: Seoul, Korea
Registration: /url/bootcamp_5nov2012.html
Date: Dec 12 – 14, 2012
Location: Shenzhen, China
Registration: /url/bootcamp_12dec2012.html
Sponsor corner | Back to top |
Advanced Informix Performance Tuning Course
December 3-6 2012 by Lester Knutsen and Art Kagel (attend online or in our classroom)
This course is confirmed and only has 3 spaces left.
Do you want to learn how to be the FASTEST Informix DBA? This is the course our Fastest Informix DBA contest was developed from, and it will increase your database performance tuning skills.
This 4-day course focuses on techniques for optimizing an Informix Database. Labs will demonstrate more than 100% performance improvement. Each student will have a 4-core Linux server with Informix 11 and a large dataset for benchmark exercises and labs. Attend the class in person or online via our Web Training Center. Both Art Kagel and Lester Knutsen will be teaching the Advanced Classes together.
The Advanced Informix Performance Tuning This course is for database administrators and application developers who will be responsible for managing, optimizing, and tuning an Informix database server. The focus is on skills, procedures, and scripts to improve the performance of your database server. The course will provide a toolkit of scripts and utilities to start monitoring and optimizing your Informix database server.
The course may be taken online on the web from your desk or at our training center in Virginia. All you need is a web browser and a SSH client (like Putty) to connect to the lab machines in our office.
The follow is a link to the courses on our web site.
http://www.advancedatatools.com/Training/InformixTraining.html
Registration Information: http://www.advancedatatools.com/Training/CourseRegistration.html
or call 703-256-0267 x101 for more information and to Register.
Informix resources | Back to top |
New blogs added
John Miller – Informix Fun Facts http://www.jfmiii.com/informix Much more than fun
Informix Support https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/ifmxtechsupport by Pradeep Kutty
Roger Powell https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/netcoolery
- The IIUG forums at /forums/technical.php **** these are very good****
- Blogs, Videos, News and more at http://planetids.com *** Up to date feeds from many blogs ***
- Jerry Keesee http://jerrykeeseetalksinformix.wordpress.com/
- John Miller – Informix Fun Facts http://www.jfmiii.com/informix Much more than fun
- Informix Support https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/ifmxtechsupport
- Roger Powell https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/netcoolery
- Informix documentation team https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/idsdoc
- IDS Experts blog https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/idsteam
- A Latin blog maintained by support http://the-information-x.blogspot.com.br
- Eric Vercelletto’s English Website http://en.vercelletto.com
- Gary Proctor http://garyproctorsblog.com
- Martin Fuerderer a blog on Informix Warehouse Accelerator http://tinyurl.com/the-iwa-blog
- ognjen.orel http://ifmx.wordpress.com/li>
- Keshava Murthy https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/Keshav
- Louis T.Cherian http://louistcherian.wordpress.com
- Art Kagel’s blog http://informix-myview.blogspot.com
- Andrew Ford’s blog http://www.informix-dba.blogspot.com
- Mark Jamison at http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/gbowerman
- Jacques Roy at http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/jacquesroy
- Kate Dawson at http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/katedawson
- Fernando Nunes at http://informix-technology.blogspot.com
- Eric Vercelletto at http://www.levillageinformix.blogspot.com (in French)
- Mark Scranton at http://markscranton.wordpress.com/2011/07/23/informix-and-marketing/
- IBM DATABASE MAGAZINE at http://www.ibmdatabasemag.com
- The Informix Zone at http://www.informix-zone.com
- There is an Informix group on LinkedIn. The group is called “Informix Supporter”, so anyone loving Informix can join, from current IBM employees, former Informix employees, to users. It will also be a good occasion to get in touch with others or long-time-no-seen friends. If you fancy showing the Informix logo on your profile, join. To join, simply go to:
http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/25049/5E4B2048E558
Calendar of events | Back to top |
November – 2012 | |||
Date | Event | Location | Contact |
5-6 | Informix Technical Road Show | Auckland, New Zealand | |
5-6 | Informix Performance Tuning Bootcamp | Seoul, Korea | |
8-9 | Informix Technical Road Show | Wellington, New Zealand | |
8 | Washington Area Informix User Group – Informix Performance Tuning Technical Training Day | Annandale, Virginia | Lester Knutsen |
12-13 | Informix Technical Road Show | Santa Cruz, Bolivia | |
15-16 | Informix Technical Road Show | La Paz, Bolivia | |
December – 2012 | |||
Date | Event | Location | Contact |
12-14 | Informix Performance Tuning Bootcamp | Shenzhen, China |
Useful links | Back to top |
Closing and credits | Back to top |
The International Informix Users Group (IIUG) is an organization designed to enhance communications between its worldwide user community and IBM. The IIUG’s membership database now exceeds 25,000 entries and enjoys the support and commitment of IBM’s Data Management division. Key programs include local user groups and special interest groups, which we promote and assist from launch through growth.
Sources: | IIUG Board of Directors IBM Corp. |
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Editors: | Gary Ben-Israel Rhonda Hackenburg |
For comments, please send an email to gary@iiug.org.