Informix HQ

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IBM INFORMIX V.14.10.XC4 -

INFORMIX HQ 1.2.0
v.1a
1 © 2020 IBM Corporation

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Agenda
• New start and stop script for IHQ
• Support for Connection Manager functionality
• The ability to create custom dashboards
• Enhancements to the schema manager
• Customized system reports

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New start and stop script

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• Prior to this release, starting the IHQ server or agents required executing a raw Java
command
• There was not a graceful way to stop IHQ agent or server services except for an O/S kill command
• Starting with IHQ 1.2.0, there is a new shell script that makes starting, stopping and
managing server and agent services more easy and graceful

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• Called InformixHQ.sh (or .bat for Windows users), the script can start IHQ services
with service “names” and other parameters such as the instance locale
• These names are used to stop the service(s)
• This does NOT eliminate the need to configure the properties files for the server and agent(s)
• There is a help option that displays the command options
• Of particular note is the default locale encoding — it is utf-8 which might or might not work for your
instance environments
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• For example, to start the IHQ server component using defaults — except for locale
• In the past, to find the processes, you’d have to execute a ps -ef|grep java and look
through the results to find the one for the server or agent(s)
• With the script, the process takes the “service name”, in this case i_svr_1

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• Starting the IHQ agents may require changing the naming conventions for the properties
files
• Using the command line, you can pass any valid property file name into the Java command
• For example, if there were 7 instances to monitor you could name the properties files as follows
then start them as illustrated

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• With the new IHQ start and stop scripts, the agent and server properties files must use
the .properties suffix
• Therefore, for the 7 instances
• Rename the properties files

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• With the newly renamed properties files, start an agent
• To stop either a server or agent service, use the stop option with the service name
• For example to stop the agent on inst_1

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• There is a . . . . .
functional issue . . . you
need to know about with
the stop command
• The script does no
validation of the service
names passed to it
• Regardless of what you
pass, the script returns
Terminated
• This has been raised with
development
• For example, I have no

IHQ services running but
stop them anyway
• All return Terminated
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Support for Connection Manager

functionality

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Before continuing . . . .
• A 4 instance H/A cluster with a primary,
SD secondary, HDR and one RS
secondary is used for this section of the
presentation

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Connection Manager functionality

• Prior to IHQ 1.2.0, there wasn’t any support for Connection Manager agents in the tool
• With this release you can

• See a list of the active CM agents
• Administer SLAs
• Modify the FOC sequence
• There is a new sensor for CM functionality as well

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• With this release, a new sensor is added to monitor SLA activity
• Called SLA_Connections, it can be added to instances which support CM SLAs
• This sensor works for all SLAs, including those for ER or Grid clusters

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• With an H/A cluster built and two CM agents started, let’s look at the new IHQ CM
functionality
• First, the High Availability menu option, then clicking on the cluster primary, should display that there
are 2 CM agents active but at this time it only shows 1 for the active FOC arbitrator
• This has been raised with development
• FYI - clicking on another instance displays statistical information about that instance, not CM
information

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• Clicking on the Connection Manager menu option displays general information about
each active CM agent, including which is the active FO arbitrator
• Each agent can be expanded to show the cluster unit name(s) as well as the FO configuration for the
H/A cluster

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• Clicking on the cluster unit
name displays
• The SLAs it contains
• A option to change whether this
CM agent is the active FO
Arbitrator
• The option to modify the FO
order for the cluster
• The ability to change the Failover
Timeout value
• The option to add a new SLA to
the cluster unit

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• Before showing how to add a new SLA, drop an SLA or modify an SLA through IHQ, there
are some functional issues you need to know
• First - SQLHOSTS
• As you know, SLAs act as “pseudo-instances” from a connectivity perspective (e.g.
dbname@sla_name)
• Applications and their connectivity drivers need to know where to “find” the SLAs in order to connect to
them
• This requires an entry in SQLHOSTS
• IHQ 1.2.0 does NOT modify SQLHOSTS when you add or delete an SLA
• You must make the required changes manually
• IHQ 1.2.0 does NOT validate that an SQLHOSTS entry exists when adding a new SLA
• So it’s possible to add an SLA that applications can not connect to
• SQLHOSTS changes must made manually to ALL instances that will use / no longer use an SLA

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• Second - port and name validation

• Assuming you’ve created the SLA entry in the SQLHOSTS file, as you’ll see in a moment, when
adding an SLA, you have the option to enter a port number (e.g. 60090) or a port alias (e.g.
oltp_sla_port)
• Port aliases correspond to an entry in /etc/services (or the Windows equivalent)
SQLHOSTS /etc/services

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• Second - port and name validation
• When adding an SLA, IHQ does NOT validate if the port number / alias entered matches SQLHOSTS
• Similarly, when adding an SLA, IHQ does NOT validate if the SLA name entered matches SQLHOSTS
• This could result in an SLA that no one can connect to because of a port number or name mis-
match

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• Third - Connection Manager configuration file
• On the positive side, when you add, drop or modify an SLA, the configuration file for the CM agent is
modified to reflect the change
• The revised file keeps it’s name while the older, pre-change configuration file is renamed to
file_name.tmp
• Only one “old” file is maintained
Note: only applies to the local configuration file, not any remote files

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• For example
• To modify an existing SLA, click it’s
“pencil” / edit button
• You can specify
• Whether it is a direct or proxy agent
• If the policy uses workload or round
robin to assign new connection
requests
• Worker, network and other parameters
• The instances to participate in the SLA
• Be aware however,
• While IHQ can “see” the existing SLA,
it does NOT import its settings
• You must manually add the port
number and instances to the SLA in
the edit process
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• For example
• To drop an SLA, click the trash can / delete icon
• Remember to make the required SQLHOSTS change

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• For example
• To add a new SLA,
• Update SQLHOSTS with the
SLA entry information
• Click the Add SLA button then
enter the required information
then click Save
• You can use either a port number
or a port alias (e.g. sla_port_2)
which references to /etc/
services in the Service field

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• For example
• The SLA is added and the
configuration file is updated

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Custom dashboards

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Custom dashboards
• The ability to create a
customized IHQ
dashboard has been
available almost from the
beginning of IHQ
• These dashboards display
sensor information and is
what you see when you
click on an instance
• For example, this is the
dashboard for inst_1

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Custom dashboards
• What is new today is the ability to export the dashboard
• So you can import it across multiple IHQ servers for a consistent look and feel without having to
configure each IHQ server manually
• Additional new functionality is the ability to have a graph in a custom query
• Finally, you can now use bar or pie charts in your visualizations as well as tabular format

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Custom dashboards
• As an example, start by creating a new, custom dashboard
• Click the + Dashboard option

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Custom dashboards
• For each panel, you can select which instance you want for the sensor information
• For example, SLA connections on inst_4
• You can further refine the sensor information in the drop downs for the sensor

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Custom dashboards
• Then click Save to store that panel on the dashboard

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Custom dashboards
• You can have sensors from different instances displayed on the same dashboard
• In this case, I have the SLA connections from inst_4 and the logical log throughput rate from
inst_1

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Custom dashboards
• In addition to the available sensors, you can write a custom query and have its results
displayed in the dashboard

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Custom dashboards
• One of the new features is to change the visualization of the sensor data in the dashboard
• For example, with the logical log apply rate, the default is to use a line
• When you create the panel, or afterwards using the panel Edit option, you can change how the
sensor’s data is displayed
• Not all visualizations will be correct for the metric being displayed as shown below and on the next
slide

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Custom dashboards
• Optional visualizations in dashboards

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Custom dashboards
• Optional visualizations in dashboards

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Custom dashboards
• With the dashboard complete, save it by clicking the pencil icon and giving the dashboard
a name and saving

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Custom dashboards
• Clicking the Dashboards menu option displays the available dashboards
• Selecting one (or more) activates the option to export it
• The dashboard is saved in a json formatted file

• It’s saved in Downloads directory for the informix UID

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Custom dashboards
• You can transfer the file to the other IHQ server environments and, from the Dashboards
menu option, import the file to create the dashboard on that IHQ server

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Enhancements to the
schema manager

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Schema manager
• In earlier IHQ versions, there was very little functionality in the Schema Manager portion
of the tool
• For example, in Informix v.14.10.xC3

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Schema manager
• With IHQ 1.2.0, there are options for a wide range of database and data type operations
• Let’s look first at a database level

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Schema manager
• For example
• For stored procedures, you can see system and UDRs with their creation statement

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Schema manager
• For example
• System and UDTs

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Schema manager
• For example
• Privileges and installed datablade modules
• And so on

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Schema manager
• For example
• Clicking on a table, displays table-level options

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Schema manager
• For example
• Table level information

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Schema manager
• For example
• If the table contains extended data types, those are shown too

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Schema manager
• For example
• If a table has “hidden columns”
like vercols for updatable
secondary operations, those are
shown

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Schema manager
• You can add or drop indexes on a table by selecting it then clicking the Indexes toggle
• You can create unique, duplicate, clustered, forest of trees, XML or Basic text search indexes through
this option
• There is a View SQL toggle to see the SQL statement that will create the index

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Schema manager
• You can enable or disable indexes as well

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Schema manager
• Clicking the switch by the database selector drop down provides options to
• Create a new database
• Create a demo (stores) database
• Drop the selected database

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Schema manager
• When creating the demo (stores) database, you have most of the command line options
• Including whether or not to include TimeSeries tables
• You do NOT have the option to download the scripts

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Schema manager
• When creating a
regular database,
the usual location,
size and other
options are available
as well as locale

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Custom system reports

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Customized system reports

• When logged in to IHQ, an instance is selected, you click the Agent Data options and
sensors are running. A series of reports are displayed with information from the sensors
• The default is a 4 hour window but this can be changed from a drop down

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• Additional reports are available from the System Reports menu option

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• This list of reports can be modified however it requires the master IHQ admin user ID
• Once logged in, select the System Settings option from the user drop down
• Select the Report Management menu option

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• Clicking the Create Report
button opens a pane to
select the instance and
database(s) (including
sysmaster) then write the
query you want to execute
• You’ll get a preview of the
results

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• The default is for the report to output using the columns
names
• You can change the output names here
• You can also determine how the data is displayed by selecting
the output dat type for the column (if available)

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• You must provide a report name and
description to save it

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• IHQ stores the report information in
json within the IHQ database

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• The new report is now available to
run

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IBM INFORMIX V.14.10.XC4 -

1 © 2020 IBM Corporation

• Support for Connection Manager functionality

• The ability to create custom dashboards

• Enhancements to the schema manager

• Customized system reports

2 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

3 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

4 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

• There is a help option that displays the command options

New start and stop script

6 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

7 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

8 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

9 © 2020 IBM Corporation

New start and stop script

• For example, I have no

11 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Support for Connection Manager

12 © 2020 IBM Corporation

13 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

• With this release you can

• There is a new sensor for CM functionality as well

14 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

15 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

16 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

17 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

18 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

19 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

• Second - port and name validation

20 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

21 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

22 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

Connection Manager functionality

• Remember to make the required SQLHOSTS change

24 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

25 © 2020 IBM Corporation

Connection Manager functionality

26 © 2020 IBM Corporation

27 © 2020 IBM Corporation