IIUG Insider (Issue #294) January 2025

Highlights: Harry Carlton Doe III February 26, 1959 – January 16, 2025

 

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.

Editorial

I have known Carlton Doe for more than 20 years. A talented speaker, an Informix evangelist, and above all a great person. Not many know but Carlton was also on of the founders of the IIUG.  

For the 100th issue of the Insider Carlton wrote: 

  It was a dark and stormy night.  While rain gently fell, lightning flashed almost non-stop immediately followed by loud claps of thunder that reverberated through the canyons formed by the downtown office buildings, shaking people to their core.  Huddled around a small table in the upstairs area of a restaurant, a group of five people talked quietly yet purposely.  They reflected on the current state of affairs and decided they needed to try and change the world.  As they walked out into the storm later that evening, they had no idea what that conversation would lead to. 
  No, this isn’t one of Snoopy’s many attempts to write a novel, nor is it the treatment for a movie or TV show dealing with contemporary world events.  Rather it reflects where and how the IIUG you now belong to was born. At the Tampa Worldwide Informix Conference (WWIC), Lester Knutsen, Walt Hultgren, Cathy Kipp, Malcolm Weallans and yours truly had dinner in a raging thunder storm and hatched the idea of creating the organization that came to be known as the IIUG. 
  First is the role of advocacy. We worked hard to become your voice to Informix; to help them know what was important to you from a technical as well as a business perspective.  It took a while but eventually the company came around and the organization, represented by the IIUG Board, became very involved in product direction, strategy and support discussions.  Perhaps the most visible success during my direct involvement was the porting of the database engines and 4GL to Linux.  While it appears as a no brainer today, in the early to mid 1990s Linux was just starting to appear on the enterprise computing horizon and no one really knew whether or not it would ever become an important component of that world.  A number of us in the IIUG pushed Informix very hard for almost two years.  Eventually Informix became the very first major database company to release products on Linux. I was looking through some old IIUG material a couple of weeks ago and found some of the announcement and marketing material for this launch with the famous snapshot of Neil Armstrong’s first moon footprint as the campaign centerpiece. 
  I know that under IBM, the IIUG continues to be a critical voice to the development community in terms of shaping product futures.  Unfortunately, the lumbering bureaucracy that is IBM business management is not nearly as nimble, far sighted, or responsive to customer needs so the organization has not been as successful there as they would probably like but the Board continues to fight on your behalf to make things better. 
  Second is education.  It started with a simple but radical idea for Informix.  We told the Informix conference committee we wanted our own track of sessions at the WWIC because we felt the technical content at the conferences was a little shallow.  We called to the organization to submit proposals for sessions and were very pleasantly surprised at the depth and breadth of the ideas submitted.  At the first conference we were stunned at the turnout.  Every single session was literally filled to overflowing.  One of the most exciting sessions, which still continues to this day, is the Ask the Experts panel of key development and support personnel to answer “how it works” questions.  The IIUG continued to sponsor educational tracks throughout the rest of the WWICs, then after the IBM acquisition, at the IBM Data Management conferences. As the IIUG continued to grow, so did the need for, and the desire to provide, deep technical education. Last year, the IIUG sponsored their first completely independent user conference.  It was a complete success.  Next year’s conference has already been announced and I’m sure will be bigger and better than last year’s. 
  The last thing I’d like to mention is support for local user groups. Back in the dark ages when I was an end-user of the products, I started a local user group, which, I’m happy to note, is still alive and functioning. Back then it was very difficult to do.  There was no one to turn to for ideas on how to create and organize a group, where and how to get external speakers, what worked and didn’t work for activities. One of the first subgroups we created when starting the IIUG was a council for all the local user group officers to participate in.  Called the Informix User Group Leadership Council (IUGLC commonly referred to as the “ugly-c”), it became the main avenue for local groups to share ideas and get speakers as well as provide the IIUG Board with additional insight into what the end-user community needed it to do on their behalf. This support continues today overseen by a IIUG Board member tasked to be the Local User Group (LUG) liaison (aka the “LUG nut”). 
  I am very proud to have been part of the “founding five” that created the IIUG.  It was fun and exciting times.  I got to know a lot of very good, dedicated people who really cared about the Informix community and wanted to make it better.  I am in awe of what that organization has accomplished on your behalf and with the assistance of many of its members.  It is as viable today as ever.  It is needed as much, if not more so today than ever before.  Those on the IIUG Board are as committed to your success and needs as we were.  But they can’t do it alone.  I would strongly encourage you to get involved with IIUG activities whether at a local level on your LUG’s organizing committee or any of the IIUG committees such as the conference planning committee.  You’ll get to meet some great people and have a lot of fun. 
 

Congratulations on this, the 100th edition of the IIUG Insider.  Another great resource for the Informix community to get information about what’s happening through the Informix world. Here’s to another 100 editions.“

– Carlton Doe (Feb 2017)

 

Gary Ben-Israel
IIUG Insider Editor
IIUG Board of Directors
gary@iiug.org

 

Highlights

Harry Carlton Doe III February 26, 1959 – January 16, 2025

Dear Informix Community: 

It is with great sadness that we are informing you of the death of long time Informix advocate and dear friend Carlton Doe after a long battle with cancer.  Carlton passed on January 16, 2025, in Dallas, Texas at the age of 65. He was one of the original founders of the IIUG serving as President from 1996-1997 and was the current IBM Representative on the IIUG Board of Directors. 

Carlton began working with Informix products in the late 1980s as a 4GL developer, Database Administrator, and Consultant. Over time, Carlton became one of the worldwide leading experts for Informix databases. In 2000 he joined Informix Corp. as the Technical Sales Manager for the South-Central United States. He also served as technical lead for many Informix customers to provide technical briefings, conduct system architecture reviews, assisted with proofs of concept for new technologies, troubleshoot post-implementation issues and more. When IBM acquired the Informix product line Carlton went along to continue and expand his role as advocate for the Informix user Community within IBM. 

Carlton Doe III is survived by his wife Catherine; his four children Whitney (Tyler) Garrett, Cameron (Kristen) Doe, Mikhael (Jason) Baird, Ethan Doe; and his 6 grandchildren. Also left behind are his parents, Harry Carlton Doe Jr. and Margaret Sylvester Reed, and sister, Sheila (Clark) Hansen. 

Carlton was truly a friend to everyone. We are sharing the link to his obituary for you to learn more about his amazing life. 

He will be missed. 

The IIUG Board of Directors

 

Conference Corner

IBM TechXchange Conference 2025 – Orlando, FL, USA

The next IBM TechXchange Conference is scheduled for October 6-9th 2025 in Orlando FL, USA.
Book by January 7, 2025 for the lowest price.

For details about TechXchange 2025, IBM TechXchange Conference 2025 – Orlando, FL – October 6-9.

Rhonda Hackenburg
IIUG Board

 

Informix Corner

Introducing HCL Informix® 15

We’re excited to announce HCL Informix® 15. The fast, reliable, and scalable database has been re-envisioned with new capabilities, giving you a fast and easy way to modernize out-of-support IBM® Informix® applications and scale like never before. 
Here’s what’s new in HCL Informix 15 

  • HCL Informix 4GL, a fourth-generation business application development environment that is designed to simplify the building of data-centric business applications, now available from Actian. 
  • Larger row and page addresses that enhance scalability for large-scale data storage and processing. The new maximum capacity for a single instance is four times the estimated size of the internet. 
  • External smartblobs enable the storage of binary large objects like static documents, videos and photos in an external file system to facilitate faster archiving. 
  • Invisible indexes help developers and DBAs fine-tune queries by identifying which indexes are critical to specific queries by flexibly omitting them to see if they impact query runtime. 

Check out our blog for more details and watch our on-demand webinar “Secure Your Future with HCL Informix 15” to learn how to future-proof your database without enormous costs and refactoring.  

Don’t miss our special offer at the end of the webinar: a free database upgrade workshop for the first 20 eligible organizations. Our Professional Services team will review your IBM Informix database, plan your modernization, and provide 1:1 tailored advice. 

Watch the Webinar Now > 

Informix is a trademark of IBM Corporation in at least one jurisdiction and is used under license. 

 

Karen Qualley
HCL

 

 

New Social Media Content

IIUG’s own Art Kagel was recently features on the Tech Sharmit Podcast to talk about his life and involvement with Informix and database systems.

Catch the podcast here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l81pLa7i-J0)

 

 

New Technical Articles

Oninit: https://www.oninitgroup.com/technical-articles/

WAIUG (Washington Area Informix User Group) Tech Tips https://waiug.com/category/techtip/

 

Informix Tech Talks on YouTube

Upcoming Informix Tech Talks

Date: February 20, 2025
Time: 2:00 PM EST
Title: User-Friendly External Smartblobs
Speaker: Mary Schulte of Actian – a division of HCL Software

This tech talk starts with a brief overview of the new version 15 external smartblobs feature, but then covers a clever solution she devised for a customer to make them a lot more user friendly as discussed in her recent blog here. 

Mary Schulte is a Senior Sales Engineer at Actian, the database division of HCL Software.  She spent decades working for Informix Corp and IBM in their Dallas offices before coming to Actian in 2006.

REGISTER HERE!

Rhonda Hackenburg
IIUG Board

 

Last Informix Tech Talks Replay

Replay of the Last Informix Tech Talks:  Washington Area Users Group (WAIUG) Meeting – November 2024

 

Informix Tech Talks YouTube Channel

Our YouTube Channel now has:

  • 538 subscribers (6 new subscribers)

  • 111 videos (no new videos)

  • 21,425 views (457additional views)

Informix Tech Talks YouTube Channel Videos

Past Informix Tech Talks Replays

 

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 Art Kagel or Rhonda Hackenburg for additional information.

Rhonda Hackenburg
IIUG Board

 

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/

 

RFE Corner

IBM has an RFE – Request For Enhancements website.
Please visit the RFE site to vote for your favorite enhancements and place new requests. It is friendly and has a nice look and feel.

Recent
V15 sqlca structure to report BIGSERIAL & SERIAL8 value assigned by INSERT 

Popular (Over 50 votes)
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: 107 (+1)
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: 93 (+0)
Created: December 24, 2018
Status: Future consideration

 

IBM Informix Forum Corner

Join and visit the IBM Informix community forum
Recent Posts:
Who needs a HOME? 
Best approach for migrating 2.5 billion rows 
GSKit Changes With 14.10FC10W1 – FC11 
Resync RSS server 

 

Gary Ben-Israel
IIUG Board

 

Informix Resources

IIUG Website
Not a member, become an IIUG member and keep updated on all things Informix. It’s free.

IBM Informix Community
Not a member, join the IBM Informix community and connect with other Informix data experts.

Blogs

Art Kagel – https://informix-myview.blogspot.com/ 

IBM Informix RFE

IBM Informix RFE – Informix Requests for Enhancements.

 

Technical Articles

Oninit Group: https://www.oninitgroup.com/technical-articles/
WAIUG (Washington Area Informix User Group) Tech Tips
Over 10 Years of Informix Webcast Replays
Over 30 Years of Informix Blog Posts

 

Social Media

YouTube LinkedIn X (Twitter) Facebook

IIUG’s own Art Kagel was recently features on the Tech Sharmit Podcast to talk about his life and involvement with Informix and database systems.
Catch the podcast here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l81pLa7i-J0)

Forums, Groups, Videos, and Magazines

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