Last chance to submit your DB2 presentation abstracts to IDUG

IDUG website: IDUG 2008 North America - Call for Presentations

Labor Day weekend brings many things, and for me, one of those things is the yearly reminder to submit my IDUG presentation abstracts before the rapidly approaching deadline. If you've been waiting until the last minute to write and submit an abstract to IDUG for their 2008 conference, well here it is: The deadline for submitting an abstract for a DB2 or IMS technical session is Tuesday, September 4, 2007, so this weekend is your last chance.

They're not looking for a lot of detail in your abstract, just a paragraph overview and five bullet points, but you still don't want to be scrambling to submit it at the last minute, because the IDUG committee members have built a trapdoor contraption that quickly and mercilessly swallows up scruffy, hastily-written abstracts. Take some time to polish it just right, and it may be one of the 120+ sessions that are accepted for next year's conference in Dallas, and that would mean you don't have to pay the registration fee to attend IDUG 2008 North America.

Good luck!

DB2 Fix Packs ripe for the picking

IBM website: Fix Packs for DB2 V8 and DB2 9

After a long growing season, IBM has raised two delicious DB2 Fix Packs for your consumption. DB2 V8 FixPak 15 and DB2 9 Fix Pack 3 are both available from IBM's FTP site. They are full of juicy fixes, but you should still test them first on a non-production machine. Bon appétit!

Compress your way to a free IDUG conference registration

IDUG website: DB2 9 Deep Compression Challenge

If the idea of submitting a presentation abstract intimidates you, you now have one more way to try out for a free registration to one of next year's IDUG conferences.

This is something I've been waiting to write about since it was briefly announced during the IDUG 2007 conference in San Jose. IBM and IDUG are teaming up to raffle off four registration passes to next year's IDUG conferences. All you need to do to enter the drawing is provide a brief description of the space savings you've achieved with DB2's deep compression feature. Here's where it gets good: not only do you not need to realize the best compression ratio to win, you don't even need to be running DB2. If you're not running a version of DB2 9 with deep compression enabled, you can run your data through IBM's free Database Storage Analyzer and it will provide a very accurate estimate of the savings you'd get with deep compression.

You have until October 1, 2007 to pull it together. Like I said, if you do end up pulling off an amazing feat of compression, your chances of winning the raffle are the same, but you will get an attaboy at this fall's IOD conference.

Superb, high-density photo courtesy of Gerald Oh

Award-winning, eighteen-terabyte BCU data warehouse featured in latest DB2 Magazine

DB2 Magazine: Volume 12, Issue 2

IBM's balanced configuration unit methodology for designing and sizing data warehouses may not absolutely guarantee a successful implementation, but it does go a long way toward simplifying the process. The cover story of the latest issue of DB2 Magazine chronicles the path taken by Ingenix to implement Galaxy, the name they gave to their TDWI award-winning enterprise data warehouse.

In other news, IIUG President Stuart Litel reveals that they're tired of us DB2 nerds and are taking their ball and holding their own Informix-only conference next April near the big Informix lab in Lenexa, KS. Sorry you feel that way, guys. You were a fun bunch.

Speaking of conferences, Howard Fosdick drops an interesting factoid in his certification column: over 60% of IDUG conference attendees are not DBAs. I knew there was something suspicious about those folks.

If you didn't get a printed copy of DB2 Magazine this month, then you have no choice but to go here to check it out.

Are you using forbidden features in Express-C?

developerWorks article: Compare the distributed DB2 9 data servers

If you've spent much time playing with DB2 Express-C, you may have noticed it contains some very powerful features:

• multi-dimensional clustering (MDC)


• materialized query tables (MQTs)


• deep compression


• compressed backups

Technically, Express-C users have no permission from IBM to use the features listed above, even though the product currently doesn't prevent anyone from doing so. IBM generally doesn't disable advanced features on lower-end editions of a shared codebase, and Express-C is no exception, so it's up to the user to understand what is and isn't compliant. Each feature listed above requires a licensed DB2 product edition and one or more add-on packages in order to be legit to use. If IBM suddenly decided to follow through on their rules and disable those features in Express-C, you'd be in a pretty bad spot if your app relied on them, unless you were ready to spend a significant amount of money on emergency upgrades.

If any of this comes as a shock, you'll appreciate the lovingly arranged table of features and products assembled by DB2 maven Paul Zikopoulos. Read it, and your excuses of DB2 licensing ignorance will magically disappear.

By the way, none of this applies to pureXML, which IBM has fully authorized for use in DB2 Express-C, so feel free to use the heck out of that until the neighbors come over and ask you to stop.

Stern, commanding photo courtesy of Michael M. Rubino