Best practices for transactional environments

IBM data server security

Securing data requires a holistic and layered approach that considers a broad range of threats. This is commonly referred to as defense in depth and requires a security by design approach. This approach espouses security as part of the core design of database environments, the supporting infrastructures, and business practices around these environments. Multiple layers of security work together to meet the three ultimate objectives of security, commonly known as the CIA triad: confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

IBM understands data security threats and designs security features into its Db2 and Informix® families of data servers. Both data server families are designed with a wide range of security and auditing capabilities to help protect the most critical data.

In the IBM data server security best practice paper, discover common threats to databases, and learn how to protect data servers against the common data security threats and some uncommon threats. Also, learn about useful countermeasures for these threats. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM® Hybrid Data Management Community site: IBM data server security.

Data protection in the cloud

Public cloud computing is a technology that uses the Internet and central remote servers to host data and applications. Through cloud computing, consumers and businesses can use applications without installing them locally and access information from any computer with Internet access. Cloud computing allows for much more efficient computing by using centralized storage, memory, and processing. The benefits of cloud computing are clear, and so is the need to develop appropriate security for cloud implementations.

The Gain confidence about data security in the cloud paper is important to you if you are setting up or managing databases in a public cloud environment. The details and best practices in this paper will help you protect yourself and your organization from security leaks and exposures by applying a standard, high-grade security policy to all databases that are hosted in a public cloud. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Gain confidence about data security in the cloud .

Data security: A practical guide to restrictive databases

While restrictive databases provide better out of the box security compliance than non restrictive databases, their use has been limited because administrators did not know what privileges to grant their end users to make them more usable. For example, administrators might not understand why they needed to grant EXECUTE privilege on some CLP package that, on the surface, has nothing to do with the statement their user issued. This paper provides you with all the information you need to more effectively make use of restrictive databases.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: A practical guide to restrictive databases.

Data security: A practical guide to implementing row and column access control

This paper reviews traditional methods for tackling row and column access control problems and introduces the new row permission and column mask concepts as an elegant and more effective alternative to the traditional methods.

Get an introduction to the new permission and mask dependencies in Db2 Version 10, along with secure functions and secure triggers. A use scenario illustrates how to use row permissions and column masks to meet required access controls. The a practical guide to implementing row and column access control paper provides a set of best practices to follow when using row permissions and column masks.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: A practical guide to implementing row and column access control.

Database storage

Discover best practices for database storage, including guidelines and recommendations for physical disks and logical unit numbers (LUNs), stripe and striping, transaction logs and data, file systems versus raw devices, Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID) devices, registry variable and configuration parameter settings, and automatic storage.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Best practices for database storage.

Db2 databases and the IBM General Parallel File System

Reduce management costs, add flexibility, and simplify storage management by using the IBM General Parallel File System (GPFS) software. GPFS software is a high-performance shared-disk file management solution that provides fast, reliable access to a common set of file data. Data can be shared between as few as two computers or as many as hundreds of systems. A GPFS file system brings together mixed server and storage components to provide a common view of enterprise file data. Pairing GPFS file systems and Db2 databases creates a powerful platform for your high-performance database systems.

Use the Db2 databases and the IBM General Parallel File System paper to learn about the strategic benefits of GPFS software and the best practices for deploying it with Db2 software. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Db2 databases and the IBM General Parallel File System.

Deep-dive performance analysis with InfoSphere Optim Performance Manager V5.3

This Db2 webcast provides an in-depth tutorial to help you use IBM InfoSphere Optim Performance Manager V5.3 (OPM) to diagnose, analyze, and correct potential performance problems with your Db2 systems. The webcast also provides an overview of the new features included in OPM V5.3.

You can view this webcast from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Deep-dive performance analysis with InfoSphere Optim Performance Manager V5.3.

Deploying IBM Db2 Express-C with PHP on Ubuntu Linux

Combining the power of IBM Db2 Express-C software with the Apache HTTP server and the PHP programming language on a system running the Ubuntu Linux® operating system provides a powerful, flexible, and reliable application development platform. This platform is ideal for small businesses, developers, instructors, and students because the software components are free to download and use.

The Deploying IBM Db2 Express-C with PHP on Ubuntu Linux best practice paper provides a step-by-step approach to installing and configuring such a system. After completing the steps in this paper, you will have a fully functioning PHP web application server that uses the Db2 Express-C software as the back-end data server. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Deploying IBM Db2 Express-C with PHP on Ubuntu Linux.

Deploying Optim Performance Manager in large-scale environments

Large-scale environments often have special considerations when it comes to managing performance. In such environments, it is very important to have a comprehensive, proactive performance management approach. IBM InfoSphere® Optim™ Performance Manager software offers such an approach.

Use the Deploying Optim Performance Manager in large-scale environments paper to learn about best practices for deploying InfoSphere Optim Performance Manager Extended Edition software in large-scale environments. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Deploying Optim Performance Manager in large-scale environments.

Db2 high availability disaster recovery

Use the Db2 high availability disaster recovery paper to learn about the best practices for setting up and maintaining a Db2 high availability disaster recovery (HADR) environment in ways that balance the protection that HADR provides with performance and cost. This best practice paper explains optimizing for fast failovers, tuning parameters for network and logging performance, and understanding table reorganization methods and load operations in an HADR environment.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Db2 high availability disaster recovery.

Managing data growth

Because of business needs for data retention and regulatory compliance, enterprises need to manage increasingly large databases ranging from hundreds of gigabytes to many terabytes, or even petabytes, in size. As data continues to grow at an exponential rate, DBAs and IT professionals in these organizations face daunting challenges when designing and operating such large databases. The data must be well organized to effectively cope with data growth and to meet service requirements. This document communicates best practices for managing data growth using the rich set of features in IBM Db2 software.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Managing data growth.

Managing XML data

Use the Managing XML data paper to learn about principles and guidelines for using the Db2 pureXML® Feature software to solve business problems effectively and to achieve high performance when managing XML data in enterprise applications. The examples illustrating the best practices are based on a real-world financial application scenario and demonstrate how to implement the guidelines. You can easily adapt the examples to other types of XML applications. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Managing XML data.

Optimizing analytic workloads using Db2 10.5 with BLU Acceleration

BLU Acceleration is a new collection of technologies for analytic queries that are introduced in Db2 Version 10.5. At its heart, BLU Acceleration is about providing faster answers to more questions and analyzing more data at a lower cost. Db2 with BLU Acceleration is about providing order-of-magnitude benefits in performance, storage savings, and time to value.

This paper gives you an overview of these technologies, recommendations on hardware and software selection, guidelines for identifying the optimal workloads for BLU Acceleration, and information about capacity planning, memory, and I/O.

A section on system configuration shows you how IBM’s focus on simplicity enables you to set up Db2 so that it automatically makes optimal configuration choices for analytic workloads. Other sections describe how to implement and use using Db2 with BLU Acceleration. Unlike other best practices that show you multiple choices, this paper focuses on how BLU Acceleration works and what it is doing under the covers. This will really give you an appreciation of the simplicity built into BLU Acceleration and show you how it really does deliver “Super Analytics, Super Easy”.

You can download the Optimizing analytic workloads using Db2 10.5 with BLU Acceleration best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Optimizing analytic workloads using Db2 10.5 with BLU Acceleration.

Physical database design for OLTP environments

Physical database design can be the single most important factor that affects database performance. Physical database design covers all of the design aspects that relate to the physical structure of the database. These aspects include data type selection, table normalization and denormalization, indexes, materialized views, data clustering, multidimensional data clustering, table (range) partitioning, and database (hash) partitioning. Good physical database design reduces hardware resource utilization (I/O, CPU, and network utilization) and improves your administrative efficiency.

You can download the Physical database design for OLTP environments best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site:Physical database design for OLTP environments.

Db2 V10 silent installation and uninstallation

This document addresses IBM Business Partners and clients planning on deep-embedding Db2 software within their solutions. Deep embedding means that no database administrator is involved and that all administration is done programmatically. This paper describes the processes of Db2 silent installation and uninstallation, silent Db2 fix pack updates, and silent upgrades to later Db2 versions and releases. You can use Db2 silent installation and uninstallation to install and uninstall Db2 products or components without any user interaction. Silent installation is useful for large-scale deployments of Db2 product editions. As an IBM Business Partner or IBM client, you can also use silent installation or uninstallation to embed the Db2 installation and uninstallation processes inside the procedures for your solutions. In addition to explaining and providing best practices for the Db2 silent installation and uninstallation process, silent fix pack updates, and silent version and release upgrades, this paper also includes practical scenarios to illustrate both simple and complex silent installation and uninstallation of a Db2 product.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Db2 V10 silent installation and uninstallation.

Storage optimization with deep compression

This paper communicates best practices for using the Db2 Storage Optimization Feature with the Db2 product. You can use the Db2 Storage Optimization Feature to apply compression on various types of persistently stored data and temporary data.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Storage optimization with deep compression.

Temporal data management with Db2 V10

The temporal features in the IBM Db2 Version 10 product provide rich functionality for time-based data management. For example, you can choose to record the complete history of data changes for a database table so that you can "go back in time" and query any past state of your data. You can also indicate the business validity of data by assigning a pair of date or timestamp values to a row to indicate when the information is deemed valid in the real world. Using new and standardized SQL syntax, you can easily insert, update, delete, and query data in the past, present, or future.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Temporal data management with Db2 V10.

Troubleshooting Db2 servers

Even in a perfectly engineered world, things can break. Hardware that is not redundant can fail, or software can encounter a condition that requires intervention. You can automate some of this intervention. For example, you can enable your Db2 server to automatically collect diagnostic data when it encounters a significant problem. Eventually, however,a human being must look at the data to diagnose and resolve the issue. When the need arises, you can use several Db2 troubleshooting tools that provide highly granular access to diagnostic data. The information and scenarios in this paper show how you can use the Db2 troubleshooting tools to diagnose problems on your server.

In large database environments, the collection of diagnostic data can introduce an unwanted impact to the system. This paper shows how you can minimize this impact by tailoring the values of a few basic troubleshooting configuration parameters such as diagpath, DUMPDIR, and FODCPATH and by collecting data more selectively. The result? When things do break, you are well prepared to make troubleshooting as quick and painless as possible.

You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Troubleshooting Db2 servers.

Tuning and monitoring database system performance

Most Db2 systems go through some kind of a performance evolution. You must first configure the software and hardware of the system. In many ways, configuration sets the stage for how the system behaves when it is in operation. Then, after you deploy the system, it is important to monitor system performance, to detect any problems that might develop. If such problems develop, you reach the next phase: troubleshooting. Each current phase depends on the previous ones, in that without correct preparation in the previous phases, you are much more likely to have difficult problems to solve in the current phase.

Use the Tuning and monitoring database system performance paper to learn about best practices for the performance evolution of a Db2 data server. Topics range, from important principles of initial hardware and software configuration to monitoring techniques that help you understand system performance under both operational and troubleshooting conditions. This paper provides a stepwise, methodical approach for troubleshooting a performance problem. You can download this best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Tuning and monitoring database system performance.

Integrating IBM PureData System for Transactions into a data center network

IBM PureData System for Transactions is an expertly integrated system to help deploy optimized and continuously available mission-critical databases. This paper covers the network requirements for integrating PureData System for Transactions into a data center environment and provides popular sample network topologies. Using the graphical interfaces in the system, you can easily configure the network switches to integrate with a corporate network.

You can download the Integrating IBM PureData System for Transactions into a data center network best practice paper from the IBM Hybrid Data Management Community site: Integrating IBM PureData System for Transactions into a data center network.