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Informix Dynamic Server 11.50 Fundamentals Exam 555 certification preparation, Part 4: Examining database objects

Tables, constraints, views, indexes, triggers, sequences, and synonyms

Jeffrey S. Bohm (jbohm@us.ibm.com), Advisory Software Engineer, IBM
Jeff Bohm

Jeff has been working with Relational Database Management Systems (RDBMS) products for over 16 years. He has experienced databases from every angle: as a customer, a consultant, an instructor, and a developer. He was hired on at Informix Software in 1994 and has been working with it ever since. His jobs at Informix included advanced technical support, performance tuning and troubleshooting consultant, and customer education specialist. He currently holds a Software Engineer position with the IBM Informix Dynamic Server Stress QA team.

Jeff has worked with hundreds of IDS clients, from the smallest of businesses to the largest, including multiple large retail, grocery, and telco companies. He has helped them get the most out of their IDS installs, addressing the most basic SQL needs to the most demanding performance and feature rich implementations.

Jeff was involved in writing the IDS 9 Certification exams and currently holds Certifications for IDS 5, 7, 9, 10, and 11.

Jeff also helped author several classes that are being taught in IBM's IDS and RDBMS curriculum.

Summary:  This tutorial continues your journey into IBM® Informix® Dynamic Server by discussing many of the objects that can be created and used inside of a database. Some of these objects include tables, indexes, triggers, and views. This tutorial discusses what they are, how they are used, and how to create them.

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Date:  03 Sep 2009
Level:  Introductory
PDF:  A4 and Letter (98 KB | 38 pages)Get Adobe® Reader®

Activity:  15983 views
Comments:  

Before you start

This tutorial teaches you about the objects that can be created and used inside of a database. Some of these objects are there to hold the raw data, while others exist for pure performance reasons, and still others help keep the integrity of the data intact.

The objects being discussed in this tutorial are tables, views, indexes, triggers, constraints, synonyms, and sequences.

This tutorial discusses a little bit about their purpose as well as how to create them.

The tutorial then ends with a little discussion on a built-in tool to print out the SQL statements that could help recreate or duplicate the objects.

About this series

This complimentary series of nine tutorials has been developed to help you prepare for the IBM Informix Dynamic Server 11.50 Fundamentals certification exam (555). This certification exam will test your knowledge of entry-level administration of IDS 11.50, including basic SQL (Structured Query Language), how IDS 11.50 is installed, how to create databases and database objects, security, transaction isolation, backup and recovery procedures, and data replication technologies and purposes. These tutorials provide a solid base for each section of the exam. However, you should not rely on these tutorials as your only preparation for the exam.

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About this tutorial

This tutorial is dedicated to covering the topics in Section 4 of the exam titled "IDS Tables, Views, and Indexes."

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Objectives

When you finish this tutorial, you should be able to do the following:

  • Explain what the purpose of a database table is and how to create one
  • Explain the difference between a non-fragmented, fragmented, and partitioned table
  • Describe what a constraint is and the different types of constraints available for use in an Informix database
  • Explain how to create constraints in the database
  • Describe the concept of a view and how it differs from a table
  • Explain how to create a view
  • Describe what role indexes play in a database and how to create them
  • Explain what synonyms and sequences are, and how to create them
  • Describe what a database trigger is and how to create one
  • Explain how to print out the SQL statements (schema) of the objects in the database

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Prerequisites

This tutorial is written for up-and-coming database administrators (DBAs). Although some basic database concept knowledge may help, it is not necessarily needed.

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System requirements

To complete this tutorial, you do not need a copy of IDS. However, if you have one available to use, you will definitely get more out of the tutorial. If you don't have a copy already, you can download the free trial version (see Resources). .

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