Informix Dynamic Server and Linux -- Up and running

A cookbook for installing Linux and IDS

Andreas Breitfeld
Published on March 09, 2006

IDS was one of the first commercial database products ported to Linux. Today the advantages of running IDS 10.0 on the Linux platform are:

• Support for new Linux platforms
• Transparent optimization and exploitation of Linux environments
• Exploitation of Linux 2.6 kernel features
• Utilization of asynchronous I/O and direct I/O for enhancing I/O performance
• Processor affinity to achieve improved scalability and parallelism
• Performance optimization using configurable page sizes
• Additional installation methods on Linux systems
• Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) support
• Interprocess communication with stream pipes
• Scalability on the 2.6 kernel

This article describes a test configuration of IDS on Linux. By following the details I describe, you should be able to customize your own IDS configuration on Linux. We'll start by looking at the setup of Linux itself.

Installing Linux

Technical details for the sample system

The system used for installing Linux and IDS was a standard PC:

• Pentium III 600MHz
• 512MB RAM
• 2 x 15.3GB disks (Maxtor 51536U3 ATA)

For IDS version 10.0 (32-bit) the CPU must be compatible with an Intel i686. Compatible CPU types should be at a minimum Intel Pentium II / Pentium Pro or AMD Athlon. For our sample system, the first disk was dedicated for installing the Linux OS, and the second disk provided space for the IDS databases. No partitions should exist on the disks.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4

For this example, Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 4 (Nahant) was installed on the sample PC. The following steps will help you to set up a Linux system that is ready to install and run IDS. Please note, the installation of Linux will destroy any operating system and data on the PC.

Detailed instructions can be found at the "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Documentation" page in the document "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Installation Guide for the x86, Itanium, and AMD64 Architectures.". See the Related topics section "Learn" for links.

During installation, you can use the default settings in most cases. Here are some hints and exceptions:

• Boot the PC from the first of the 4 CDs.
• In step Language Selection choose English.
• In step Keyboard Configuration choose the layout for your keyboard.
• In step Upgrade Examine select Install Red Hat Enterprise for a fresh install.
• In step Automatic Partitioning select /dev/hda only (deselect /dev/hdb).
• In step Package Installation Defaults select Customize software packages ....
• In step Package Group Selection, make these selections:
  • in chapter Applications select Graphical Internet (get Firefox browser).
  • in chapter Development select Legacy Software Development (get packages for compatibility to older Red Hat versions).
• Reboot after the installation is completed.
• Log in as user root and open a terminal (Applications -> System Tools -> Terminal).
• For IDS graphical tools, install OpenMotif runtime from CD #3:
  • Put CD #3 in the drive. It should be automatically mounted
  • To install the package, type following command in the terminal:

    1	rpm -Uvh /media/cdrom/RedHat/RPMS/openmotif-2.2.3-6.RHEL4.2.i386.rpm

  • To eject the CD from the drive type the command:

    1

    eject

• To access IDS raw devices with Kernel Asynchronous Input Output (KAIO), install libaio from CD#3:
  • Put CD#3 in the drive. It should be automatically mounted.
  • To install the package, type following command in the terminal:

    1	rpm -Uvh /media/cdrom/RedHat/RPMS/libaio-0.3.102-1.i386.rpm

  • To eject the CD from the drive type the command:

    1

    eject

Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9

For this example SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 (SLES 9) was installed on the sample PC. The following steps should help to set up a Linux system which is ready to install and run IDS. Please note, the installation will destroy any operating system and data on the PC.

Detailed instructions can be found at the "SUSE Linux Documentation" page in the document "SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server 9 Administration and Installation" (PDF). See the Related topics section "Learn" for links.

During installation, you can use the default settings in most cases. Some hints and exceptions are listed below:

• Boot the PC from the first of the 4 binary CDs.
• In step Select your language, choose English (US).
• In step Installation Settings
  • Click on Keyboard layout and choose the appropriate layout.
  • Click on Partitioning and check swap and root partitions are created in /dev/hda.
    • Choose Base partition setup on this proposal.
    • Choose root partition (should be /dev/hda2) and change its file system type to ext3 using the Edit menu.
  • Click on Time Zone and choose the appropriate time zone.
• Accept the installation settings and confirm the start of installation.
• Reboot after the installation is completed.
• Log in and open a terminal (click on terminal looking icon in the panel).

Installing IDS

For this example, the trial version of IDS version 10 (32-bit) can be downloaded using installed Firefox or Konqueror browser from "Informix product family -- How to get Informix product downloads -- IBM Software" page. See the Related topics section "Get products and technologies" for a link. Click on Informix Dynamic Server EE V10.0 Trials for getting the tar archive iif.10.00.UC3R1TL.Linux.tar and save it to /tmp directory. Sign in with IBM ID and password may be required. Choose download using http.

If you are not already logged in as user root, then switch user id to root:

Create group and user informix, and enter password:

Unpack the downloaded archive of IDS:

If you purchased IDS version 10, then you will probably get the IDS bundle. In this case copy the contents of directory SERVER of the unpacked bundle to the working directory and proceed.

Set environment:

Install the IDS packages:

Logout from user root:

Configuring IDS

Set up the environment

If you are not already logged in as user informix, then switch user id to informix:

Create an environment file called ids.env using a graphical text editor (such as gedit or kate), for example:

Or, use the famous console editor vi:

Add the following lines to the ids.env file:

Save the file and exit the editor.

Set the environment for IDS:

(type: dot blank dot slash ids.env)
Each time you need to access this IDS instance you can set the environment from this file again.

Create and edit IDS configuration files:

Edit file onconfig using the editor of choice (see above), change parameters from - to:

Find the network node hostname of the machine:

asterix is printed for example.

Edit file sqlhosts using the editor of choice (see above), change line from - to:

(Replace the word "asterix" with the network node hostname of your machine.)

Create the logs directory:

Create the root dbspace:

Startup and shutdown

Start and initialize the configured IDS instance:

prints following message:

If you are certain that you want to initialize this instance of IDS, type y to initialize the instance. Note, all data will be lost if the instance has been used previously.

Now IDS is running. For testing purposes, you can create the demo database by executing the script dbaccessdemo7 To access databases, the console utility dbaccess can be used.

You can shut down the IDS instance with the command:

and started (without initialization) with this command:

IDS documentation can be read online at "IBM Informix Dynamic Server information center" page. Manuals for all Informix products in different languages can be found at "Informix library" page. See the Related topics section "Learn" for links.

Configuring a raw device

The whole second disk from the example machine can be configured as a raw device. Please note all data will be lost on this disk.

The first step is to create a partition. For this, use the interactive console utility fdisk. Switch to user id root to run following commands:

For example:

To make sure the OS is informed about the partition table changes, run this command:

Once the partition /dev/hdb1 is created, its permissions must be changed for use by IDS:

Note, the change of permissions may be required again after reboot of the machine. This can be done using an init script.

If you are not already logged in as user informix, then switch user id to informix:

Set the environment for IDS:

(Type: dot blank dot slash ids.env)

To remember which chunks are configured, create symbolic links in the dbspaces directory:

Now we create the chunk path named '/home/informix/dbspaces/chunk1' of the dbspace named 'dbspace1'. The size of the partition in kilobytes can be found in raw 'Blocks' in output of 'fdisk' command 'p'. It is given as parameter of option '-s' and has the value 14944072 in our example. Switch to userid informix and set ids.env environment to run following commands:

For testing, create the demo database in dbspace1:

Conclusion

In this article we've walked through the installation and configuration of specific versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for running IDS 10, to help you get Informix up and running on Linux without difficulty. Adaptation for newer versions of the operating systems should be easy by updating the version numbers of mentioned packages.

https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/data/library/techarticle/dm-0603breitfeld/index.html

Problem(Abstract)

I receive the below error when applying the DB2 Enterprise Server Edition license on a 32-bit Linux system:

LIC1449N The license was not installed due to a platform restriction. 

Explanation: 
This DB2 product is only supported in trial mode, also known as "Try and Buy" mode, on this platform. 

User response: 
Continue to use this product in trial mode, or install one which is fully supported on this platform. 

Cause

Resolving the problem

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21421213