Highlights: Informix Developer and Innovator-C Editions Have Moved
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.
Table of Contents
Editorial
Looking at the RFE site we can see that 7 new requests for enhancements were added this month.
This means that our user community would like to see a new Informix version.
All I can say is that a new version is in the makes. We don’t have a release date, but it will be coming this year. So, stay tuned.
Gary Ben-Israel
IIUG Insider Editor
IIUG Board of Directors
gary@iiug.org
Highlights
Informix Developer and Innovator-C Editions Have Moved
Informix Developer and Innovator-c Editions have moved from DockerHub to IBM Container Registry.
The IBM Informix Developer Edition (non-production) and Innovator-C Edition docker containers are moving out of dockerhub and into the IBM Container Registry (ICR).
The repositories on docker hub will be removed in the very near future.
| If you are pulling the container from here: | Switch to this as soon as possible |
| docker.io/ibmcom/informix-innovator-c | icr.io/informix/informix-innovator-c |
| docker.io/ibmcom/informix-developer-database | icr.io/informix/informix-developer-database |
docker pull icr.io/informix/informix-innovator-c
docker pull icr.io/informix/informix-developer-database
To be able to use the docker pull command you need to have Docker Desktop or something similar like podman (opensource) on your machine first. Here is the IBM doc page listing out the options available:
https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/Registry?topic=Registry-getting-started#gs_registry_images_pulling
Karen Qualley
HCL
Informix Corner
Informix Tech Talks on YouTube
Upcoming Informix Tech Talks
Title: 25 Years of Informix Here, There and Everywhere
Speaker: Mark Scranton
Date/Time: March 9, 2023, 2:00 PM EST
Description: “Road Stories: 25 Years of Informix Here, There and Everywhere” Real life stories from consulting, education and coffee breaks in the IDS world. Technical challenges, mysteries and “really?” scenarios from the world of Informix.
Speaker Bio: Mark started with Informix in 1995 and has been doing only IDS and XPS work ever since. Consulting and education for Informix Corp., IBM, Xtivia and independently. Still enjoying Informix work after all these years.
Register for 25 Years of Informix Here, There and Everywhere
Title: Informix SQL Performance Tuning Tips
Speaker: Jeff Filippi
Date/Time: April 6, 2023, 2:00 PM EDT
Description: Learn how to improve your Informix SQL statements to optimize performance on your Informix Database system.
Speaker Bio: Jeff Filippi(Integrated Data Consulting, LLC) has worked with Informix products for 30+ years and is an IBM Business partner and IBM Champion.
Register for Informix SQL Performance Tuning Tips
Last Informix Tech Talks Replay
Replay of the Last Informix TechTalks February 2, 2023: Informix Sysmaster Database Queries for Monitoring and Performance Tuning – Lester Knutsen
Past Informix Tech Talks Replays
Visit WAIUG’s website for more information.
All Informix Tech Talks replays are available at: https://www.iiug.org/en/category/techtalks/
And on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/c/InformixTechTalksbytheIIUG
Rhonda Hackenburg
Informix Tech Talks YouTube Channel
We now have 356 subscribers to our YouTube channel.
We have 95 videos on YouTube on our Channel.
Our Channel has received over 9,000 views so far!
Informix Tech Talk YouTube Channel Videos
Past Informix Tech Talks Replays
Bruce Simms
In Search of Tech Talks Speakers
We are looking for additional speakers and especially any new speakers to share your Informix knowledge with our user Community via the IIUG Tech Talks. We will assist you in preparing for your Tech Talks presentation by prerecording your session. This will allow you to be available to answer any questions that come up in the chat during you presentation.
If you are interested in producing a 15 – 45-minute presentation, please contact either Bruce Simms or Rhonda Hackenburg for additional information.
Rhonda Hackenburg
IIUG Board
leolo Informix MasterMind Conference 23
The conference is set to take place on June 5-6, 2023, at the Interalpen Hotel Tyrol in Austria. The event is expected to feature a range of topics related to the future of data security, AI, and predictive analytics, among others.
Attendees will have the opportunity to meet and learn from some of the leading international experts and speakers in these fields. The conference is designed to provide valuable insights into the latest trends and developments in data security, AI, and predictive analytics, as well as to showcase innovative solutions and technologies.
Preregistration is currently open, and interested individuals can contact Leolo IT for more information about the conference, including registration details, the full list of speakers, and the conference agenda. With its focus on cutting-edge technologies and emerging trends, the Leolo IT/Informix Mastermind conference promises to be a must-attend event for anyone interested in the future of data security, AI, and predictive analytics.
Call for speakers is open. Please submit your 40-minute Informix topic. Selected speakers will receive one complementary night at Tyrol Interalpen Hotel!
Rooms are limited, preregister to reserve your room.
You can preregister, submit your presentation request, or learn more at leolo Informix Mastermind Conference 23.
CTO – Senior Consultant – Data Scientist
leolo IT & Media Consulting GmbH
Post your IBM Informix review on Gartner Peer Insights (GPI)
- Reviews are completely anonymous – neither you nor your company will be identified in the published review.
- Simply use this custom, Gartner-generated URL, which takes you directly to the Cloud Database Management Systems Market on the Gartner Peer Insights platform.
- Register with your business email or LinkedIn profile – Gartner validates the authenticity of the reviewer (Gartner will reject Gmail or other freemium email).
- If your review is accepted and publishes using the custom URL above, you are eligible to receive a $25 USD gift card, remitted by Gartner. Or you can donate the proceeds to a charity found on the Gartner platform.
Client Advocacy, IBM Software
Informix Videos by Carlton Doe, IBM
Carlton Doe is an Informix Database Specialist at IBM He has prepared several videos for your review.
| What is Informix? | An introduction to what is the Informix database software is. |
| What is Informix? Short Introduction | A shorter introduction to what Informix is. |
| Informix edge to the corporate server | Carlton demonstrates the full progression of real-time data from capture to analytics using features in Informix v.14.10. |
| Introduction to Informix TimeSeries | An introduction to Informix TimeSeries. Carlton discusses and illustrates the TimeSeries features in Informix v.14.10. |
| Using the Informix 14 Edition Installer | How to use the Informix 14 Edition Installer. Carlton discusses the changes in installing Informix v.14.10 and later. He briefly illustrates the one or two-step installation process. |
View Carlton’s videos
Rhonda Hackenburg
IIUG Board
IIUG Board Member Profile
Here it is again — time for a new board and new profiles… Let’s discover together board member Tom Beebe.
Q: How do you use Informix in your “real” job (DBA, Consultant, Developer, etc.)?
A: I am an Informix consultant. My day job has me supporting a wide variety of clients on a wide range of Informix versions. Currently I am supporting everything from SE to the latest 14 releases. So, it is an interesting mix of Informix environments, both for small and large clients. Every day is different.
Q: How long have you been using Informix products?
A: I started using Informix working with Lester Knutsen about 20 years ago.
Q: What is your role on the IIUG Board?
A: Besides annoying Stuart, the role I see for myself on the board is bringing a wide variety of Informix backgrounds in when looking at the product and the user group and what is offered. I am also hoping to help support the user groups IT infrastructure.
Q: Why did you volunteer to be on the board?
A: I wanted to step up and help, I have previously been on the board and stepped down due to lack of time to be able to dedicate to it.
Q: What do you want to accomplish this year on the Board?
A: I want to help do more IT infrastructure progress to make the website more usable for members.
Q: Where are you from?
A: Washington DC area (USA)
Q: Best Informix story?
A: I got brought in to a customer because their Informix instance stopped working. Did some digging, it had 900 days of uptime as 9.4 on Windows. After troubleshooting I found it was simply due to a windows account issue from when they upgraded their domain controller, it didn’t have anything to do with Informix at all. They also had not had an admin in the office for over 6 years at that point. The Informix system has been almost entirely hands off since then many, many years later.
Q: Worst Informix nightmare.
A: Two of them. First one is seeing an admin accidentally oninit -i on a production system (v10), and then finding there were no good backups. The other was seeing someone (I am that someone) accidentally knock the IIUG server with his knee as he went out to lunch, and not notice he had just powered it off…
Q: Can you tell us about your family and hobbies outside of IIUG?
A: I am recently married to my longtime partner. We share our house with two geriatric kitties and a way too energetic teenager who is somehow now in her 20s. In my free time I do hobbyist photography and am slowly getting into both climbing and blacksmithing. My hands and forearms do not like me some days.
Informix Training
Free Informix Tutorials Videos – a step by step approach to using Informix Database Servers are available at https://advancedatatools.com/tech-info/informix-tutorials/
Lester Knutsen
RFE Corner
IBM has an RFE – Request For Enhancements website.
https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io/?project=INFX
Please visit this site to vote for your favorite enhancements and place new requests. It is friendly and has a nice look and feel.
Recent
ifxclone to not change BUFFERPOOLS
Provide the DBA with detailed connection information
Add onmode -F <type> to free only certain memory e.g. vpcache.
Add onstat -g vpcache detail to show breakdown of usage e.g. smx buffers
Implement nested loop join of external and indexed tables
Automátic column-level encryption at rest
Popular (Over 50 votes)
Obtain the query plan of a running query
Many times a DBA is called to check upon a slow process. Most of the times those processes are running a slow query.
Sometimes it’s hard to know if the query is using the best query plan or not. A DBA can reproduce the query, but it it was prepared without values or if the statistics were changed after it started there is no guarantee that the query plan seen by the DBA is the same as the running query.
We have “onstat -g pqs” which sometimes can give us a clue, but it’s mostly cryptic and undocumented. If a user has X-Windows he can try xtree, but it’s a bit strange for todays standards.
We also have SQLTRACE, but if it was not set when the query was launched it will not capture the info (and besides, due to the circular nature of the buffer it may not be there at the time we need it).
A simple pseudo-table in sysmaster could probably implement this with ease.
It could also be extended to support the “last” query plan making it easy to get the query plan in any tool
Votes: 104 (+0)
Created: December 24, 2018
Status: Future consideration
Informix should be able to change owner on tables and any other objects
If user=informix creates all database and all tables, then programmer creates table but user=informix cannot change it. Only drop it.
Votes: 98 (+0)
Created: December 24, 2018
Status: Future consideration
Backup Individual database, not entire instance
Need a mechanism, similar to ontape, to backup a live database (as opposed to entire instance), without locking it.
Votes: 88 (+0)
Created: December 24, 2018
Status: Future consideration
Gary Ben-Israel
IBM Informix Forum Corner
Join and visit the IBM Informix community forum at http://www.iiug.org/community
Recent Posts
Index shrinks an entire b-tree level when removed/rebuilt….
1 —
Last night I had a production system run out of space when the engine decided to consume 50,000+ pages in a dbspace for an index out of the blue. During the review of what was going on, I noticed this table had an index with a 5 level b-tree, which immediately caught my eye, especially when this index itself was larger than the table data (1.3gb vs 1.1gb) which made no sense with an index with only about 1/8 of the rows in the table in int.
On a test system, dropping this index and re-creating it changed it to a 4 level b-tree and obviously removed tremendous space from this index. We fixed our problem by doing this same thing on our prod system and restarting the job.
My follow-up today is running into a lot of barriers though.
1 – Why didn’t the btree scanner handle this? Shouldn’t it have realized at some point over multiple months this index was far too big vs what it was?
2 – Our theory is the db ran out of space because it wanted to go down to a 6th level for this index…..any ideas what can make Informix do this
3 – I need to find all the indexes in the system that might meet the same criteria. At this point the only way I know is to run oncheck -pe and parse the entire database output. Is there a better way?
I just read another question that is very similar to mine on here, however, that one Art references the index having a serial key in it. Mine doesn’t have the serial in the index in question, but it seems to be exhibiting the same behavior.
Jared Heath
2 —
Per database on your system: select * from database_name:sysindexes where levels >= 4; will give you all of indexes per database that have 4 or higher levels.
You can repack the index as well via SQLADMIN API: https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/informix-servers/14.10?topic=saaf-index-compress-repack-shrink-arguments-optimize-storage-b-tree-indexes-sql-administration-api please read up on it.
Scott Pickett
3 —
- I am not sure it will always merge all pages, it is more focused on removing deleted entries from pages e.g. it will only look at pages with deleted rows. There is an option to repack indexes.
- If in a part of the index a page becomes full and a new row needed to be inserted the page will be split and another level created. The level does not have to be the same in all branches of an index.
David Williams
4 —
Correct David. The btree cleaner threads only merge adjacent nodes that are both less than 50% full. It will not merge a 60% node with a 10% node.
Art Kagel
Address sanitizer error in ESQL/C client library when invalid login/pswd
Informix IDS 10 – Windows 32 bits – ontape – recomendation
DRDA connection to Informix 10.00.UC5W5
onstat -g ses returns “Changing data structure forced command termination”
ALTER TABLE removes it from audit trail
Incompatible blade version to migrate a database from informix 12.10 FC15 to informix 14.10 FC9.
Gary Ben-Israel
Informix Resources
Not a member, become an IIUG member and keep updated on all things Informix. It’s free.
Not a member, join The IBM Informix community and connect with other Informix data experts.
Informix Requests for Enhancements.
Technical Articles
https://www.oninitgroup.com/technical-articles/
https://www.oninitgroup.com/faq-items/cloud-backups-with-informix-14-10/
Over 10 Years of Informix Webcast Replays
Over 30 Years of Informix Blog Posts
Social Media
| YouTube |
Forums, Groups, Videos, and Magazines
- The IIUG old forums at http://www.iiug.org/forums/technical.php *** NO LONGER ACTIVE ***
- Informix Marketing channel on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/user/informixmarketing?feature=results_main
Closing and Credits
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 exceeds 25,000 entries and enjoys the support and commitment of IBM’s Information 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.
Editors: Gary Ben-Israel, Rhonda Hackenburg
For comments, please send an email to gary@iiug.org or rhonda@iiug.org