IBM has updated the IDS System Requirements Webpage which now covers the latst IDS fixpa(c)k IDS 11.50.xC6.

As you probably know, IDS offers a superior high availability and scale out technology called MACH11 that is available on all platforms that IDS runs on. For that reason I consider IDS as IBM's flagship offering for Linux powered systems. Good news for all Linux fans:

IBM has published a brand new Redbook about Data Warehousing with Informix Dynamic Server:

• Data Warehousing with the Informix Dynamic Server

About 8 months ago I switched from Suse Linux to Ubuntu on my notebook and wasn't able to find official IBM Informix packages for that platform.

Good news to all Ubuntu fans ! IBM has now officially released several Informix packages including Informix Dynamic Server (Developer Edition), Open Admin Tool, Client Software Developer Kit, PHP Data Objects.

You can find those packages here:

Saw this new URL mentioned in a tweet on Twitter and thought it might be worth sharing it as it contains some useful links:

• IBM - Embedding Informix Dynamic Server

Another interesting URL mentioned in Pradeep's Blog:

Just want to to follow up a recent discussion that took place on c.d.i.. The discussion was about the possible benefits of the new IDS compression technology that has been introduced by IBM in IDS 11.50.xC4.

An interesting view of IBM's database business from a guy most of us know from comp.databases.informix:

• Does your company have a 'sacred cow' ?

At least I would say Mike isn't that wrong with his view of things.

After running Suse Linux on my notebook for several years now, I decided to give Ubuntu a try.

Draft Version: IBM Redbook - Embedding IDS: An Introduction

In case you haven't already seen it:

• Embedding IDS: An Introduction

Start Developing with the Linux/IDS Virtual Appliance

Amazing news for developers ! The IBM/Informix team has created a virtual appliance based on VMWare and Suse Linux. The appliance allows developers to get familiar with INFORMIX technology and immediately start the development of applications that work with this superior IBM data server.

You can find more detailed information about the IDS Virtual Appliance at Guy's Blog:

My last KVM blog entry showed how to install all the prereqs and do the initial install of the virtual machine to host your IDS toy instances.

To really start playing we'll need networking of course.
I'm not going into the details explaining every single line of config, much better explanations are already written on the web. But I'll try to give a reasonable overview.

To connect the VMs both to the outer world and between themselves we'll need a kind of virtual switch running on host machine and "wire" network interfaces in VMs to it.
We'll use virtual TUN/TAP network interface and promote it to the virtual switch using VDE utility.

A whole bunch of new INFORMIX articles

During the last 3-4 weeks a whole bunch of interesting new articles about INFORMIX technology has been published on IBM developerWorks.

First of all I like to promote the article about IDS/Linux/Xen written by my friend Martin Fuerderer (IBM IDS development group Munich/Germany) and Nicole Neubuerger (student at the University of Applied Sciences Munich). The article provides a great overview about IDS running on Linux in a Xen virtual machine:

Informix moves on ?

IBM just published their Q2 results and the Information Management software segment, where IDS is a part of, increased by 30 %. Unfortunately IBM doesn't report numbers on individual products but looking at the high growth rate of IDS in 2006 and 2007 it is most likely that INFORMIX is the driving force behind those exceptional results.

As a result of the increased demand for IDS, we have now two new distributors here in Germany which are authorized to sell the INFORMIX product portfolio beside the well known Bytec GmbH:

Two interesting Informix Blogs

The following two blogs contain interesting and useful technical information regarding IDS:

• Informix Technical Blog (nameless author)
• Informix Technical Blog (Obnoxio the Clown)

I also added them to the community section of the Informix URL Compilation.
Have fun.

Final Version: IBM Redbook - Customizing IDS for your Environment

• Customizing IDS for your Environment

From the table of contents:

• Chapter 1. IDS and your business
• Chapter 2. Optimizing IDS for your environment
• Chapter 3. Enterprise data availability
• Chapter 4. Robust administration
• Chapter 5. The administration free zone

Informix Code Exchange at IBM developerWorks

Share your clever scripts and code snippets on the the new Informix Code Exchange website at IBM developerWorks:

• IBM developer Works - Informix Code Exchange

Another great place to look for existing scripts and programs around IDS is the Software Repository at IIUG:

How to sell IDS / Erfolgreich IDS verkaufen

• Date: June the 12th, 2008
• Time: 11:00 AM Eastern Time, 17:00 Uhr (MEZ)
• Registration: ThinkThursday - How to sell IDS

I only have the german invitation text, but this the event will held in english. It will give you an overview about IDS 11.5, how to identify new business chances and how to compete against other database products:

Draft Version: IBM Redbook - IDS 11.5: Extending Availability and Replication

• IDS 11.5: Extending Availability and Replication

The new draft is based on the already published Redbook IDS 11: Extending Availability and Replication which covered IDS 11. The following chapters contain updated and additional information regarding IDS 11.5:

• Chapter 7 - Updatable Secondary servers

Draft Version: IBM Redbook - Customizing IDS for your Environment

• Customizing IDS for your Environment

From the table of contents:

• Chapter 1. IDS and your business
• Chapter 2. Optimizing IDS for your environment
• Chapter 3. Enterprise data availability
• Chapter 4. Robust administration
• Chapter 5. The administration free zone

Haste makes Waste - Stored Procedure Recompilation

During the study of the release notes of the new IDS 10.00.FC8 version I noticed a long anticipated feature that already made it into IDS 10.00.FC7:

Enhanced Concurrency after Recompilation of SPL Routines

The problem of locked rows in the dictionary table sysprocplan is something that comes up in many IDS installations that work intensively with stored procedures. The recommendation to reoptimize the stored procedures manually after DDL changes - update statistics for procedure - helps to avoid the problem but is more a kind of a workaround and is often forgotten by the administrator or application developer.

Final Version: IBM Redbook about IDS Security

A new interesting Redbook Redbook has left the draft status and has been officially published:

• Security and Compliance Solutions for IBM IDS

Download the Redbook to gain an understandig on the robust and comprehensive security technology that IDS offers. IDS is IBM's safest and most performant data server for business critical data on the Linux, Unix and Windows platforms.