2020-01 How RUNSTATS causes an error SQLCODE

Impossible! I hear you all say… How can a RUNSTATS *cause* an SQL error code? Well, my gentle readers, read on.


Two examples in SPUFI at the end of this newsletter

What we know

We are all, I hope, aware that a badly timed RUNSTATS can cripple your SQL Performance. Just think of a see-sawing, or volatile table, and it gets a RUNSTATS at the zero point… Tablespace scan is then a good access choice… After a couple of million inserts that is probably not the best!

Awful, Implicit Casting

Implicit casting came along a few Db2 releases ago and either made you very happy: “I never have to worry about using apostrophes again!” or very angry: “Developers must know what they are coding!” The thing is, we got it and you cannot *not* do it!

It goes both ways…

The idea behind Implicit casting, in case you don’t know, is that:

The predicate COL1 = 1 and COL1 = ‘1’ are the same to Db2.

It will take that ‘1’ and “cast” it to a variable type that will then be able to be compared to whatever type COL1 is.

So,

  • if COL1 contains a numeric representation of data everything is ok.
  • But if COL1 is CHAR(1) and contains a ’Y’ you then get an SQLCODE -420

– Nasty, nasty business…

Access path is also sub-optimal

When Db2 does implicit casting, it casts to DECFLOAT to then do the comparison etc. (See my DECFLOAT newsletter about what I think about that data type!) Anyway, it is *not* good for performance. In fact, it got so annoying that a few users actually asked for a ZPARM to switch off implicit casting! They actually wanted an error whenever they compared mismatched data types. This request was, of course, turned down.

So where’s the beef?

So, what happened in production was quite simple really: a query had been running for three years with never a problem. Then one day, after a RUNSTATS, it started returning SQLCODE -420. This was due to the fact that the table processing order had switched, due to the RUNSTATS running at a “bad” time.

This in turn exposed the buggy SQL WHERE predicate that previously had never seen the bad data as it was removed in an earlier branch! This could also happen when the column in question actually contains non-numeric data perhaps dues to a code bug:

See the example SQL at the end.

RUNSTATS Rescue for Db2 Zos

This user site has our software RUNSTATS Rescue so they quickly got the query up and running, without doing a code change, in a matter of seconds. Of course, this bad code was discovered in the middle of the year end production freeze so they could not simply change the application code! This code change has been scheduled and will be done in the new year.

Bottom Line

RUNSTATS can cause negative SQLCODEs to be returned and RUNSTATS Rescue buys you the needed time to continue running – even with buggy SQL code!

As always, I would be pleased to hear from you and any war stories you have!

TTFN,
Roy Boxwell
Senior Architect


PS: Just for the record, here are two examples in SPUFI:


 SELECT *                                                               
 FROM SYSIBM.SYSDUMMY1                                                  
 WHERE IBMREQD = '1'                                                    
 ;                                                                      
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+-
 IBMREQD                                                                
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+-
 DSNE610I NUMBER OF ROWS DISPLAYED IS 0                                 
 DSNE616I STATEMENT EXECUTION WAS SUCCESSFUL, SQLCODE IS 100            
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+-
 SELECT *                                                               
 FROM SYSIBM.SYSDUMMY1                                                  
 WHERE IBMREQD = 1                                                      
 ;                                                                      
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+-
 IBMREQD                                                                
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+-
 DSNE610I NUMBER OF ROWS DISPLAYED IS 0                                 
 DSNT408I SQLCODE = -420, ERROR:  THE VALUE OF A STRING ARGUMENT WAS NOT
          ACCEPTABLE TO THE DECFLOAT FUNCTION     
 DSNT418I SQLSTATE   = 22018 SQLSTATE RETURN CODE                        
 DSNT415I SQLERRP    = DSNXRNUM SQL PROCEDURE DETECTING ERROR            
 DSNT416I SQLERRD    = -245 0  0  -1  0  0 SQL DIAGNOSTIC INFORMATION    
 DSNT416I SQLERRD    = X'FFFFFF0B'  X'00000000'  X'00000000'  X'FFFFFFFF'
          X'00000000'  X'00000000' SQL DIAGNOSTIC INFORMATION            
And the result when the column actually contains a numeric valid value and not “Y”:
CREATE TABLE BOXWELL.SYSDUMMY1 LIKE SYSIBM.SYSDUMMY1       
 ;                                                          
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 DSNE616I STATEMENT EXECUTION WAS SUCCESSFUL, SQLCODE IS 0  
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 INSERT INTO  BOXWELL.SYSDUMMY1 VALUES ('1')                
 ;                                                          
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 DSNE615I NUMBER OF ROWS AFFECTED IS 1                      
 DSNE616I STATEMENT EXECUTION WAS SUCCESSFUL, SQLCODE IS 0  
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 SELECT *                                                   
 FROM BOXWELL.SYSDUMMY1                                     
 WHERE IBMREQD = '1'                                        
 ;                                                          
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 IBMREQD                                                    
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 1                                                          
 DSNE610I NUMBER OF ROWS DISPLAYED IS 1                     
 DSNE616I STATEMENT EXECUTION WAS SUCCESSFUL, SQLCODE IS 100
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 SELECT *                                                   
 FROM BOXWELL.SYSDUMMY1                                     
 WHERE IBMREQD = 1                                          
 ;                                                          
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 IBMREQD                                                    
 ---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------
 1                                                          
 DSNE610I NUMBER OF ROWS DISPLAYED IS 1                     
 DSNE616I STATEMENT EXECUTION WAS SUCCESSFUL, SQLCODE IS 100
Cool and dangerous! Just like me! LoL ! ! !

2018-03 RTS RUNSTATS

 „Breaking the rules is often fun, although we cannot condone it. But breaking the rules of Real Time Statistics (RTS) in Db2 12 can really land you in hot water.

We provide two queries that may give you a Get Out of Jail Free Card – at least as far as RTS is concerned…”

In this short newsletter, I wish to briefly discuss a change in behavior of the Real Time Statistics (RTS) tables that I have now seen at customer sites. I am not too happy about it! Before we start, a quick resumé of the RTS is required.

The Arrival of RTS

The Real Time Statistics were basically created by Dr Jim Teng in Db2 V7 and have always obeyed a few quite simple rules.


Real Time Statistics (RTS) rules:


  1. Rule Number one
    If in doubt set to NULL.
    This might read a bit odd but the idea from Jim was that if any value is not 100% known then the column must be set to the NULL value.


  2. Rule Number two
    Externalize when asked, or by timer.


  3. Rule Number three
    No DEFINE NO data.


  4. Rule Number four
    Utilities will always update the RTS unless it cannot – see Rule Number one.


  5. Rule Number five
    SQL updates the counters unless they cannot – Think Mass Delete in a multi-table tablespace. Totalrows cannot be updated.

Rules are made to be broken

A couple of years into RTS usage and the clamor for changing various insert values got too big, so IBM enhanced the RTS so that on creation the REORGLASTTIME got set to the created timestamp and all the counter columns got set to zero instead of NULL. Now this was a good change as adding 1,000,000 to NULL you get NULL, whereas adding 1,000,000 to zero means you get 1,000,000 which is obviously better for working out whether or not you need a utility to run. The REORGLASTTIME was also accepted as when you create a nice empty object or you insert one row into an object, then by definition, it is in a perfectly reorganized state!

RTS rule one broken

Mass delete always caused problems, as mentioned earlier, so IBM then made a “half way” fix for the INDEX statistics in Db2 9 by zeroing the TOTALENTRIES when there is a Mass Delete as Db2 knows that the index is now empty.

(PM34730: RTS SYSINDEXSPACESTATS TOTALENTRIES INCORRECT AFTER MASS DELETE.)

Of course it did not update the TOTALROWS, as it didn’t “know” how many rows were mass deleted or truncated. This causes “drift” between the TS and IX statistics, but is only a minor annoyance.

Db2 12 breaks rule one

Now in Db2 12 Rule one has been broken again. Not that much of a break, but still not brilliant! What they have done, is change the STATSLASTTIME to now also be, nearly, the created TS – as if creating an object sets the runstats columns to valid data!

Naturally, the Db2 Catalog is still all -1’s. This makes generating utilities based on the RTS a little bit tricky, as you cannot trust the STATSLASTTIME to now ever actually be the time a RUNSTATS utility really ran – which was the *whole*, and only, purpose of this column! If only they had set the STATSLASTTIME to ‘0001-01-01-00.00.00.00.000000’ then all would be well…

Who woke the dogs up? (Or: Who let the dogs out? I.e. American jargon)

PI79234: SYSIBM.SYSTABLESPACESTATS.STATSINSERTS IS NOT UPDATED BY RTS EXTERNALIZATION SINCE OBJECT IS CREATED.
Is the APAR (PTF UI48494) that caused me all the trouble.

Where’s the beef?

Well, the problem is, if you are generating RUNSTATS based on the RTS – and who isn’t these days? – Then you are probably using this column. Now it *looks* like a RUNSTATS has been run at least once.

This is false and can lead to the not running of RUNSTATS when it most definitely should have been run.

Check all your home-grown RUNSTATS checkers. Remember DSNACCOX is also a little bit broken, as it uses these predicates:

(STATSLASTTIME IS NULL OR
 STATSLASTTIME<LOADRLASTTIME OR
 STATSLASTTIME<REORGLASTTIME OR
 STATSLASTTIME< latest PROFILE_UPDATE for the table space1 OR

Make sure you do not use the STATSLASTTIME, but instead join across to the SYSINDEXPART or SYSTABLEPART and pull out the STATSTIME column. This data is still ok and not fake news!

The scope of the problem

To find out the scope of the problem at your site, or even if you have this problem, you can run these two queries which simply list out all the objects that have, according to the Db2 Catalog, never been RUNSTATted, but according to the RTS they have been RUNSTATted:

Query 1

-- SELECT LIST OF TABLESPACES THAT ACCORDING TO DB2 CATALOG HAVE NOT 
-- BEEN RUNSTATTED BUT ACCORDING TO RTS HAVE BEEN.  
-- IGNORE DSNDB01 AS NO RUNSTATS FOR DIRECTORY OBJECTS 
-- IGNORE WORK DEFINED DATABASES AS NO RUNSTATS FOR THESE 
-- ONLY CHECK FOR TABLE TYPES H,M,P,R AND T 
-- DISTINCT IT FOR MULTI TABLE TABLESPACES 
SELECT DISTINCT A.DBNAME, A.NAME, A.PARTITION 
      ,A.REORGLASTTIME, A.STATSLASTTIME 
      ,B.STATSTIME, B.CREATEDTS 
FROM SYSIBM.SYSTABLESPACESTATS A 
   ,SYSIBM.SYSTABLEPART        B 
   ,SYSIBM.SYSDATABASE         C 
   ,SYSIBM.SYSTABLES           D 
WHERE B.STATSTIME = TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000') 
  AND NOT COALESCE(A.STATSLASTTIME 
                   ,TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000')) 
                  = TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000') 
  AND NOT A.DBNAME = 'DSNDB01' 
  AND A.DBNAME = C.NAME 
  AND NOT C.TYPE = 'W' 
  AND A.DBNAME = B.DBNAME 
  AND A.NAME = B.TSNAME 
  AND A.PARTITION = B.PARTITION 
  AND A.DBNAME = D.DBNAME 
  AND A.NAME = D.TSNAME 
  AND D.TYPE IN ('H' , 'M' , 'P' , 'R' , 'T') 
ORDER BY 1 , 2 , 3 
; 

Query 2

-- SELECT LIST OF INDEXSPACES THAT ACCORDING TO DB2 CATALOG HAVE NOT 
-- BEEN RUNSTATTED BUT ACCORDING TO RTS HAVE BEEN. 
-- IGNORE DSNDB01 AS NO RUNSTATS FOR DIRECTORY OBJECTS 
-- IGNORE HASH INDEXES AS NO RUNSTATS ALLOWED 
-- ONLY CHECK FOR TABLE TYPES H,M,P,R AND T 
SELECT A.DBNAME, A.INDEXSPACE, A.PARTITION 
      ,A.REORGLASTTIME, A.STATSLASTTIME 
      ,B.STATSTIME, B.CREATEDTS 
FROM SYSIBM.SYSINDEXSPACESTATS A 
    ,SYSIBM.SYSINDEXPART       B 
    ,SYSIBM.SYSINDEXES         C 
    ,SYSIBM.SYSTABLES          D 
WHERE B.STATSTIME = TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000') 
  AND NOT COALESCE(A.STATSLASTTIME 
                  ,TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000')) 
                  = TIMESTAMP('0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000') 
  AND NOT A.DBNAME = 'DSNDB01' 
  AND A.CREATOR = B.IXCREATOR 
  AND A.NAME = B.IXNAME 
  AND A.PARTITION = B.PARTITION 
  AND A.CREATOR = C.CREATOR 
  AND A.NAME = C.NAME 
  AND NOT C.HASH = 'Y' 
  AND C.TBCREATOR = D.CREATOR 
  AND C.TBNAME = D.NAME 
  AND D.TYPE IN ('H' , 'M' , 'P' , 'R' , 'T') 
ORDER BY 1 , 2 , 3 -
;

You can run these in any version of Db2 you like, but you will only get results from a Db2 12 system with this APAR applied and you have created an index or a tablespace. When I run them here on my Db2 10 and 11 systems I get zero rows back and on my test Db2 12 FL501 system I get 172 rows.

The good news is…

Our product for helping you all get “agile” in Db2 12, CDDC – ContinuousDelivery DeploymentCheck, detects and reports these data constellations as does our Statistics Health Check, of course.

I would be very interested to hear your opinions about this “little change in behavior”. Have you come across this at your site?

 

As always, any questions or comments would be most welcome!

TTFN,

Roy Boxwell

2018-02 Db2 Catalog Statistics revisited

Db2 Optimizer & access path selection for Db2 11 & Db2 12 :

Db2 Catalog dataProblematic default values | Correlations in the Db2 Catalog 

It has been six years since the last update so I thought, after Terry Purcell’s excellent presentation in January 2018, it would be a good point in time to go over and rake the coals again—especially as a couple of things have changed for Db2 12!


Terry Purcell – Db2 12 for z/OS Optimizer and RUNSTATS improvements
Webcast replay          Abstract

Are you a RUNSTATS Master?

Every now and again, I hold a little presentation called “Are you a RUNSTATS Master?” Actually these days it’s called “Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics…” where I describe in detail, what the Db2 Optimizer uses for access path selection in relation to the Db2 Catalog data.

Surprised? You will be!

Personally, I am always surprised at how often people say “just that data?” or “is that it?” (the various other reasons for access path selection like CP speed, RID Pool size, Sort Pool size, Max data caching size, and, of course, the 80 bufferpools are also mentioned, but these have nothing to do with RUNSTATS).

So generally the answer is “Yes.” However, the permutations and combinations make the devil in the detail – The Db2 Optimizer’s algorithms are top secret, but the input data it uses is fully described in the documentation.

Just the facts ma’am

What I want to do, is show :

  • the Db2 Catalog data that is used
  • the default values that can cause surprising things to happen
  • the problem of correlations in the Db2 Catalog

Which data are used by the Db2 Optimizer and which are updated by RUNSTATS?

Here is a complete list of the eleven tables used by the Db2 Optimizer:

  1. SYSIBM.SYSCOLDIST
  2. SYSIBM.SYSCOLSTATS *
  3. SYSIBM.SYSCOLUMNS
  4. SYSIBM.SYSINDEXES
  5. SYSIBM.SYSINDEXPART
  6. SYSIBM.SYSKEYTARGETS (same as SYSCOLUMNS)
  7. SYSIBM.SYSKEYTGTDIST (same as SYSCOLDIST)
  8. SYSIBM.SYSROUTINES
  9. SYSIBM.SYSTABLES
  10. SYSIBM.SYSTABLESPACE
  11. SYSIBM.SYSTABSTATS

* degree of parallelism only and, after APAR PK62804, also „sometimes“ used to bound filter factor estimates…

By the Columns

Now we can also list out all of the columns (obviously not including the key columns) which are used by the Db2 Optimizer:


SYSCOLDIST
CARDF, COLGROUPCOLNO, COLVALUE, FREQUENCYF, HIGHVALUE, LOWVALUE, NUMCOLUMNS, QUANTILENO, STATSTIME


SYSCOLSTATS
COLCARD, HIGHKEY, LOWKEY


SYSCOLUMNS
COLCARDF, HIGH2KEY, LOW2KEY


SYSINDEXES
CLUSTERING*, CLUSTERRATIO, CLUSTERRATIOF, DATAREPEATFACTORF, FIRSTKEYCARDF, FULLKEYCARDF, NLEAF, NLEVELS


SYSINDEXPART
LIMITKEY*


SYSKEYTARGETS
CARDF, HIGH2KEY, LOW2KEY, STATS_FORMAT


SYSKEYTGTDIST
CARDF, KEYGROUPKEYNO, KEYVALUE, FREQUENCYF, HIGHVALUE, LOWVALUE, NUMKEYS, QUANTILENO, STATSTIME


SYSROUTINES
CARDINALITY*, INITIAL_INSTS*, INITIAL_IOS*, INSTS_PER_INVOC*, IOS_PER_INVOC*


SYSTABLES
CARDF, EDPROC*, NPAGES, NPAGESF, PCTROWCOMP


SYSTABLESPACE
NACTIVE, NACTIVEF


SYSTABSTATS
CARD, CARDF, NPAGES


Notes: * Columns are not updated by RUNSTATS and _ Columns are not updatable at all. The column STATSTIME is used only if there are duplicates in the SYSCOLDIST table, and then the Db2 Optimizer will use the “newer” data that was probably inserted by a User.

Know your defaults

Which default column values trigger the Db2 Optimizer to use its own internal default values?


SYSCOLUMNS


If COLCARDF                       = -1 then use 25


SYSINDEXES


If CLUSTERRATIOF            = 0 then use CLUSTERRATIO


If CLUSTERRATIO              = 0 then use 0.95 if the index is CLUSTERing = ‘Y’ otherwise 0.00


DATAREPEATFACTORF    = -1 then is ignored


If FIRSTKEYCARDF            = -1 then use 25


If FULLKEYCARDF             = -1 then use 25


If NLEAF                              = -1 then use 33 (Which is SYSTABLES.CARDF / 300)


If NLEVELS                         = -1 then use 2


SYSROUTINES


If CARDINALITY                  = -1 then use 10,000  


If INITIAL_INSTS                 = -1 then use 40,000


If INITIAL_IOS                     = -1 then use 0


If INSTS_PER_INVOC        = -1 then use 4,000


If IOS_PER_INVOC            = -1 then use 0


If IOS_PER_INVOC            = -1 then use 0


SYSTABLES


If CARDF                             = -1 then use 10,000


If NPAGESF                      <= 0 then use NPAGES


If NPAGES                          = -1 then use 501 (Which is CEILING (1 + SYSTABLES.CARDF / 20))

Here you must be very careful if using NPGTHRSH ZPARM as 501 is more than the default value in most shops. This is one of the little changes in Db2 12 where the value -1 is treated as -1 for the NPGTHRSH check.


SYSTABLESPACE


If NACTIVEF                     = 0 then use NACTIVE


If NACTIVE                       = 0 then use 501 (Which is CEILING (1 + SYSTABLES.CARDF / 20))


SYSTABSTATS


If CARDF                         = -1 then use 10,000


If NPAGES                       = -1 then use 501 (Which is CEILING (1 + SYSTABSTATS.CARDF / 20))


So now you can see that non-floating point “old” data, may still be used today and this may cause access path headaches!

Never ever say never

Now to top it all, the data in the SYSCOLDIST and SYSKEYTGTDIST never gets simply “deleted”.

Well, actually, in Db2 12 you can now do a RUNSTATS xxx.yyy RESET ACCESSPATH to delete all SYSCOLDIST and SYSKEYTGTDIST data and set all other relevant columns to their respective defaults, but you must time this RUNSTATS very wisely! If you run it and then forget to do a normal full RUNSTATS…

Oldie but a goldie

Once the data are inserted, they stay there, until they are overwritten by new data, a RUNSTATS RESET, or the object is dropped. This all leads to some very old data in these two tables that can and do cause the Db2 Optimizer a ton of grief! One of the first things I do is to simply select the MIN(STATSTIME) from these tables just to see how old the data really is. Do it yourself and be surprised! I have seen sites with eight-year old data in the SYSCOLDIST and that cannot be good!

Correlate the world

Now onto correlations… There are lots of little tricks that DBAs use to “massage” access path choice. One of these, is to just set NLEVELS to 15 for a given index. Then lots of queries simply refuse to touch it as it would appear to be HUGE. Now, just simply updating columns can cause the Db2 Optimizer, in the best case, to ignore the updates or, perhaps, makes things even worse! So here is a list of the correlations (In other words, if you change xxx remember to change yyy and zzz as well):

Relationships exist among certain columns of certain tables:

  •       Columns within SYSCOLUMNS
  •       Columns in the tables SYSCOLUMNS and SYSINDEXES
  •       Columns in the tables SYSCOLUMNS and SYSCOLDIST
  •       Columns in the tables SYSCOLUMNS, SYSCOLDIST, and SYSINDEXES

 If you plan to update some values, keep in mind the following correlations:

  •  COLCARDF and FIRSTKEYCARDF/FULLKEYCARDF (They must be equal for the 1st column and full, if a single column index)
  •  COLCARDF, LOW2KEY and HIGH2KEY. (For non-default COLCARDF LOW2KEY and HIGH2KEY key must be filled with data) and if the COLCARDF is 1 or 2 Db2 uses LOW2KEY and HIGH2KEY as domain statistics to generate frequencies.
  • CARDF in SYSCOLDIST.  CARDF is related to COLCARDF and FIRSTKEYCARDF and FULLKEYCARDF. It must be at a minimum
  • A value between FIRSTKEYCARDF and FULLKEYCARDF if the index contains the same set of columns
  • A value between MAX(colcardf of each col) and the product of all the columns COLCARDFs in the group
  • CARDF in SYSTABLES. CARDF must be equal or larger than any other cardinalities, such as COLCARDF, FIRSTKEYCARDF, FULLKEYCARDF, and CARDF in SYSCOLDIST
  • FREQUENCYF and COLCARDF or CARDF. The number of frequencies collected must be less than or equal to COLCARDF for the column or CARDF for the column group
  • FREQUENCYF. The sum of frequencies collected for a column or column group must be less than or equal to 1

New in Db2 11

In Db2 11, the table SYSSTATFEEDBACK was introduced giving us the first chance to see what the optimizer thinks is missing. This is truly awesome, as then we can tailor our RUNSTATS to generate exactly what the optimizer needs to really validate and generate a good, stable access path. Of course, you should be a little bit careful with this data as too much of a good thing can be bad for you!

New in Db2 12

(Not just the lowercase b!)

In Db2 12, the SYSSTATFEEDBACK was made even more interesting by now externalizing the required RUNSTATS options *directly* into the already existing RUNSTATS profile or, indeed, actually creating a RUNSTATS profile for you.

I think that is really dangerous, as then you could easily flood your system with bogus stats for end user QMF/SPUFI queries that were run “by accident,” or so called “boss queries” where someone with *no* idea of SQL clicks together a highly complex and badly written SQL before letting it run for a weekend. Naturally the SQL gets rewritten by a helpful ever present DBA, but the statistics recommendations have now landed in the profile and will be updated and kept from this point on.

My personal recommendation is to switch off this feature as it is sadly *on* by default!

Here are the ZPARMs of interest

ZPARM STATFDBK_SCOPE set to ALL by default.
ZPARM STATFDBK_PROFILE set to YES by default.
Plus, in table SYSIBM.SYSTABLES column STATS_FEEDBACK is set to Y by default.

Out-of-the box it starts automatically creating (for TYPE=’C’ with NUMCOLS > 1 and TYPE=’F’ or ‘H‘) profiles and updating existing profiles…Here you must manually check the size of your profiles every now and again just to make sure everything is ok!

One other new thing in Db2 12, is that XML columns can get statistics now to help XMLEXISTS get a better access path.

and finally

Do not forget that our little Freeware tool StatisticsHealthCheck will find all bad correlations, old data and badly updated data for you and it is FREE!

So I hope this little round-up of Db2 Catalog Statistics data was interesting, and, as usual, if you have any comments or questions, then please, feel free to mail me!

TTFN

Roy Boxwell

 

 

Southwest Db2 Users Group – February 2018

Db2 Forum.  Southwest Db2 Users Group – February 2018 – Grapevine (Dallas), TX, USA

SEGUS & SOFTWARE ENGINEERING proudly sponsor this event & present

1 – Pdf Präsentation Compliance with compliments! Viable Db2 z/OS workload tracking.

2 – Pdf Präsentation Db2 12 Continuous Delivery – New challenges for deployment.

3 – Pdf Präsentation –  Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics… 


1 – Db2 z/OS Security Audit: Compliance with compliments! Viable Db2 z/OS workload tracking.

Audit and Compliance is a need that many companies want and have to fulfill.

There’s different ways and tools that promise to be able to do it, but what can they really do and what are the associated costs? This presentation introduces Db2 10/11 technology exploitation that delivers any DML, DDL, DCL being executed in a Db2 environment along with identification details. Learn how you can run Audit analytics against a long‐term repository, pinpointing who executed a query, when and from where. Analyze your entire workload to understand access patterns and abnormalities.


More about Db2 Audit

Presentation Outline

  • Audit needs and musts Take a journey to GLB HIPAA PCI‐DSS Basel III Sarbanes‐Oxley CA SB1386 Federal Information Security Management Act “ed Flag”Rules (FRCA)5.
  • Solution overview and their Pros/Cons Get an overview about the existing solutions and understand how they work.
  • The viable way – let Db2 do the magic! Learn about Db2 enhancements in Db2 10/11 that deliver the Db2 workload being processed and understand why it’s so efficient.
  • Customer results from the banking industry Receive some experience from a large banking company and how they successfully replaced their Db2 Audit feature based reporting by a modern SQL tracking and analytics process.

 


2 Db2 12 Continuous Delivery – New challenges for deployment.

Fundamental changes in the Db2 z world often lead to concerns. Let’s face it – some changes force us to change! While a Db2 version migration usually took months, or even years, there will be no new Db2 version after 12, but continuous code drops.

This will have a tremendous impact on migration strategies, because we have to find a reliable way to test these code deliveries in a fraction of time. If we make it, Business Divisions will become enthused at how quickly new technology becomes available for new applications. This presentation will describe the difference between Code, Catalog, Function and Application Levels, how you can control them and how you can fallback in case of anomalies. It also illustrates how we still can be pro-active in testing without burning weeks and months.
Learn how to choose from four different levels of testing and a new way of automation. CD-Screening allows you to pick and choose from KPI based test automation. The levels include simple anomaly alerting, access path verification, clone Pre-apply and even workload capture/replay to easily discover different behaviour resulting from a new code Level.


More about Db2 Continuous Delivery – CD

Presentation Outline

Joining this presentation, you’ll learn how to align Continuous Delivery to your Continuous Availability.

  • Agile, Continuous Delivery, DevOps – just buzz words, or new methodologies?
  • Db2 Code, Catalog, Function and Application Levels – differences and dependencies.
  • Activation/Deactivation of new code and how to fallback and when you can’t.
  • Different flavors of (pro-active) CD-Screening and how it can be automated:

* Anomaly alerting based on Incompatibility Change Indicators (ICIs)
* Dyn./Stat.Access Path Change Detection e.g.via Plan Management
* Clone based code change pre-apply exploiting Backup System
* Workload-KPI verification using SQL replay and KPI comparison

Audience Experience:   Intermediate Advanced
Platform:                        Db2 z/OS
Presentation Length:     60 minutes
Presentation Category:  Database Administration Performance Management Db2 Migration

 


3 Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics…

– Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of England (1868, 1874-1880)

The above line may, or may not, have been spoken well over 100 years ago, but the need for statistics and, above all else, accurate statistics is more important than ever in the Db2 world of today.


More about Db2 RUNSTATS

Presentation Outline

  • Db2 RUNSTATS basics & catalog tables and Columns used for access path
  • IBM recommendations through the ages : from Db2 V3 to Db2 12
  • Db2 RUNSTATS advanced
  • SYSCOLDIST explained
  • RUNSTATS real world Q&A :
    use of SAMPLE, COLGROUP, PROFILE, REOPT (ONCE), TABLESAMPLE SYSTEM, HISTOGRAM, …
  • RUNSTATS reversal

Speaker biography

Roy Boxwell has more than 32 years of experience in MVS, OS/390, and z/OS environments – 30 of those in Db2. He specializes in installation, migration, and performance monitoring and tuning. Roy leads the SEG development team responsible for the real time database maintenance solutions. He is also an active participant, speaker and contributor on the IDUG Db2 Listserv and sends out a monthly Db2 z/OS Newsletter.

Heart of Texas Db2 Users Group – February 2018

HOTDUG – Heart of Texas Db2 User Group – February 2018 –  Austin, TX, USA

SEGUS & SOFTWARE ENGINEERING proudly sponsor this event & present

1 – Pdf PresentationCompliance with compliments! Viable Db2 z/OS workload tracking.

2 Pdf PresentationDb2 12 Continuous Delivery – New challenges for deployment.

3 Pdf PresentationDb2 z/OS Lies, Damn lies, and Statistics… 


1 – Db2 z/OS Security Audit: Compliance with compliments! Viable Db2 z/OS workload tracking.

Audit and Compliance is a need that many companies want and have to fulfill.

There’s different ways and tools that promise to be able to do it, but what can they really do and what are the associated costs? This presentation introduces Db2 10/11 technology exploitation that delivers any DML, DDL, DCL being executed in a Db2 environment along with identification details. Learn how you can run Audit analytics against a long‐term repository, pinpointing who executed a query, when and from where. Analyze your entire workload to understand access patterns and abnormalities.


More about Db2 Audit

Presentation Outline

  • Audit needs and musts Take a journey to GLB HIPAA PCI‐DSS Basel III Sarbanes‐Oxley CA SB1386 Federal Information Security Management Act “ed Flag”Rules (FRCA)5.
  • Solution overview and their Pros/Cons Get an overview about the existing solutions and understand how they work.
  • The viable way – let Db2 do the magic! Learn about Db2 enhancements in Db2 10/11 that deliver the Db2 workload being processed and understand why it’s so efficient.
  • Customer results from the banking industry Receive some experience from a large banking company and how they successfully replaced their Db2 Audit feature based reporting by a modern SQL tracking and analytics process.

 


2Db2 12 Continuous Delivery – New challenges for deployment.

Fundamental changes in the Db2 z world often lead to concerns. Let’s face it – some changes force us to change! While a Db2 version migration usually took months, or even years, there will be no new Db2 version after 12, but continuous code drops.

This will have a tremendous impact on migration strategies, because we have to find a reliable way to test these code deliveries in a fraction of time. If we make it, Business Divisions will become enthused at how quickly new technology becomes available for new applications. This presentation will describe the difference between Code, Catalog, Function and Application Levels, how you can control them and how you can fallback in case of anomalies. It also illustrates how we still can be pro-active in testing without burning weeks and months.
Learn how to choose from four different levels of testing and a new way of automation. CD-Screening allows you to pick and choose from KPI based test automation. The levels include simple anomaly alerting, access path verification, clone Pre-apply and even workload capture/replay to easily discover different behaviour resulting from a new code Level.


More about Db2 Continuous Delivery – CD

Presentation Outline

Joining this presentation, you’ll learn how to align Continuous Delivery to your Continuous Availability.

  • Agile, Continuous Delivery, DevOps – just buzz words, or new methodologies?
  • Db2 Code, Catalog, Function and Application Levels – differences and dependencies.
  • Activation/Deactivation of new code and how to fallback and when you can’t.
  • Different flavors of (pro-active) CD-Screening and how it can be automated:

* Anomaly alerting based on Incompatibility Change Indicators (ICIs)
* Dyn./Stat.Access Path Change Detection e.g.via Plan Management
* Clone based code change pre-apply exploiting Backup System
* Workload-KPI verification using SQL replay and KPI comparison

Audience Experience:   Intermediate Advanced
Platform:                        Db2 z/OS
Presentation Length:     60 minutes
Presentation Category:  Database Administration Performance Management Db2 Migration

 


3Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn lies, and Statistics…

– Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of England (1868, 1874-1880)

The above line may, or may not, have been spoken well over 100 years ago, but the need for statistics and, above all else, accurate statistics is more important than ever in the Db2 world of today.


More about Db2 RUNSTATS

Presentation Outline

  • Db2 RUNSTATS basics & catalog tables and Columns used for access path
  • IBM recommendations through the ages : from Db2 V3 to Db2 12
  • Db2 RUNSTATS advanced
  • SYSCOLDIST explained
  • RUNSTATS real world Q&A :
    use of SAMPLE, COLGROUP, PROFILE, REOPT (ONCE), TABLESAMPLE SYSTEM, HISTOGRAM, …
  • RUNSTATS reversal

Speaker biography

Roy Boxwell has more than 32 years of experience in MVS, OS/390, and z/OS environments – 30 of those in Db2. He specializes in installation, migration, and performance monitoring and tuning. Roy leads the SEG development team responsible for the real time database maintenance solutions. He is also an active participant, speaker and contributor on the IDUG Db2 Listserv and sends out a monthly Db2 z/OS Newsletter.

2017-11 Db2 APAR list: An APAR a day keeps the bugs at bay

Db2 12 APAR – time saving list

With all the talk about “agile” going on, and referring to one of my older 2017-09 newsletters* on APARS, I think it is time to tell you all about another little service that our company offers.

(completely free, simple and no marketing spam)


Db2 12 Agile & APAR previous newsletter:

2017-09: Db2 12 SQL Access path: Death by APAR :  How many APARs really can affect access paths?

APAR Database

The APAR database can be accessed by anyone with an IBM Userid and you can merrily search to see if the problem that you have hit is already found and fixed, or a fix is in the works.

The problem is: What about the bugs that you do not *know* you have hit?

Get someone else to do the donkey work

The answer is to get someone else to do all the research for you, and deliver the answer by e-mail every month for all current releases of Db2 going back two years.

Who is that donkey? You will never guess…  😉

Three is the key

There are three Excel spread sheets here.


  1. SQL Performance
    The first is RTS. This lists any and all APARs to do with the Real-Time Statistics tables. If you rely on these tables to decide when to run REORG, COPY and RUNSTATS, then you want to make sure that they are being correctly updated, don’t you?


  2. SQL Access Path
    The second is RUNSTATS. RUNSTATS is a critical utility program and contains bugs like any other non-trivial program. I count RUNSTATS bugs as *always* a personal HIPER. I rely on statistics and so does the Db2 Optimizer. If there is bad data here, then your access paths have no chance!


  3. Performance PTFs
    Finally, and the biggest list, is those APARs that have anything to do with SQL Performance and SQL Access paths (If not already in the RUNSTATS list of course!) Performance PTFs are pretty important!

Going hyper over HIPER

All the APARs have their related PTF. A handy little HIPER column tells you whether or not this is a really important fix. As I mentioned, I treat the RUNSTATS ones as personal HIPERS. Also added is a PE indicator when a PTF goes bad on you (PTF in Error) so you can see if you introduced a problem by correcting another.

One Excel Example: The SQL Performance spread sheet

Db2 12 APAR list free for Db2 z/OS: SQL Performance (RTS) - Performance PTFs - SQL Access Path (RUNSTATS) -

This is from the SQL Performance spread sheet and you can see how it looks

The same table in HTML:

APARCLOSEDSTATUSDb2 10 Db2 11Db2 12HYPERDescription
PI85305
2017-11-01
Closed
N/A
UI51606
UI51601
INEFFICIENT INDEX CHOSEN WHEN INDEX CAN DO INDEX SKIPPING…
 PI85418
 2017-19-25
Modified
UI50098
UI50099
UI50582
PREPARE TAKES LONG TIME AND HIGH CPU IF THE QUERY CONTAINS MA…
 PI85463
New & Closed
 N/A
 N/A
UI51342
TABLESPACE SCAN INSTEAD OF INDEX ACCESS – WITH INDEX HAVIN…

 …

 …

 …

 …

 …

 …

 …

 …

Interested in making your life a little bit easier and safer?

If you are interested in Db2 APARs and you have *no* time to go and scrabble around the internet trying to find out which APARs are needed, worthwhile, or dangerous, then

just email our technical support techsupport@seg.de and ask to be added to the APAR Mailing list.

It is completely free, you will not get marketing spam and it really is as simple as that!

 

Get AGILE now!

With these handy lists, you can quickly and easily review the state of your Db2, and react quickly and in a timely manner when you have to.

 

As usual, if you have any comments or queries please feel free to drop me a line!

TTFN

 

Roy Boxwell

Central Ohio Db2 Users Group – December 2017

CODUG – Central Ohio Db2 Users Group – December 2017

December 05th, 2017

SEGUS & SOFTWARE ENGINEERING present

Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

..Lies, damn lies, and statistics… – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of England (1868, 1874-1880)

The above line may, or may not, have been spoken well over 100 years ago, but the need for statistics and, above all else, accurate statistics is more important than ever in the Db2 world of today.

Presentation Outline

  • Db2 RUNSTATS basics & catalog tables and Columns used for access path
  • IBM recommendations through the ages : from Db2 V3 to Db2 12
  • Db2 RUNSTATS advanced
  • SYSCOLDIST explained
  • RUNSTATS real world Q&A :
    use of SAMPLE, COLGROUP, PROFILE, REOPT (ONCE), TABLESAMPLE SYSTEM, HISTOGRAM, …
  • RUNSTATS reversal

Speaker Biography

Ulf Heinrich is the Director of Solutions Delivery at SOFTWARE ENGINEERING GmbH. He specializes in Db2 recovery issues and database maintenance, focusing on the growing requirement for cost reduction and 24×7 operations. As a consultant at large customer sites, he has implemented database maintenance procedures and recovery strategies, and also experienced the pitfalls of recovery scenarios under real‐world recovery pressure. His activities cover EMEA, as well as North America through SE’ U.S. subsidiary, SEGUS Inc. He’s involved in the development of SE’ maintenance and recovery Solutions.

Michigan Db2 Users Group – December 2017

MDUG – Michigan Db2 Users Group

December 6th, 2017

SEGUS & SOFTWARE ENGINEERING present

1- 25 Years of Missed Opportunities? SQL Tuning Revisited

2- Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics


1- 25 Years of Missed Opportunities? SQL Tuning Revisited

“But that’s the way we’ve always done SQL Tuning” – sound familiar?

The definition of madness is to keep doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome.
Find out how to stop the madness.

Nothing is more expensive than a missed opportunity” (H. Jackson Brown, Jr).

This is especially true when it comes to SQL Tuning!

There are many low-hanging fruits within easy grasp of anyone tasked with tuning their systems. But how do you know what is dangling within reach if you can’t see it?

Find out how a modern DB2 z/OS SQL warehouse can collect and store all executed static and dynamic SQL (plex-wide) with basically no overhead.

By comparing SQL statements side-by-side, the “easy pickings” will immediately become apparent. But why stop there? Experts can effortlessly dig deeper and find the totally hidden gems: Disc Problem Detection, Delay Detection, Never executed SQL, SQL Timeline. Precisely pinpoint specific areas to target and get the most out of your DB2 system – while reducing costs.

Outlines

1 – Tuning SQL – how we always done it

2 – Single SQL, package, application

3 – Tuning SQL – year 2004 – ACCESS PATH comparison and simulation

4 – Tuning SQL Revisited – A new methodology

5 – Harvesting the low hanging fruit


2- Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

..Lies, damn lies, and statistics… – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of England (1868, 1874-1880)

The above line may, or may not, have been spoken well over 100 years ago, but the need for statistics and, above all else, accurate statistics is more important than ever in the Db2 world of today.

Presentation Outline

  • Db2 RUNSTATS basics & catalog tables and Columns used for access path
  • IBM recommendations through the ages : from Db2 V3 to Db2 12
  • Db2 RUNSTATS advanced
  • SYSCOLDIST explained
  • RUNSTATS real world Q&A :
    use of SAMPLE, COLGROUP, PROFILE, REOPT (ONCE), TABLESAMPLE SYSTEM, HISTOGRAM, …
  • RUNSTATS reversal

Speaker Biography

Ulf Heinrich is the Director of Solutions Delivery at SOFTWARE ENGINEERING GmbH. He specializes in Db2 recovery issues and database maintenance, focusing on the growing requirement for cost reduction and 24×7 operations. As a consultant at large customer sites, he has implemented database maintenance procedures and recovery strategies, and also experienced the pitfalls of recovery scenarios under real‐world recovery pressure. His activities cover EMEA, as well as North America through SE’ U.S. subsidiary, SEGUS Inc. He’s involved in the development of SE’ maintenance and recovery Solutions.

Northeast Ohio Database Users Group – December 2017

NEODBUG – Northeast Ohio Database Users Group – December 2017

December 07th, 2017

SEGUS & SOFTWARE ENGINEERING present

1- 25 Years of Missed Opportunities? SQL Tuning Revisited

2- Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn lies, and Statistics


1- 25 Years of Missed Opportunities? SQL Tuning Revisited

“But that’s the way we’ve always done SQL Tuning” – sound familiar?

The definition of madness is to keep doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome.
Find out how to stop the madness.

Nothing is more expensive than a missed opportunity” (H. Jackson Brown, Jr).

This is especially true when it comes to SQL Tuning!

There are many low-hanging fruits within easy grasp of anyone tasked with tuning their systems. But how do you know what is dangling within reach if you can’t see it?

Find out how a modern DB2 z/OS SQL warehouse can collect and store all executed static and dynamic SQL (plex-wide) with basically no overhead.

By comparing SQL statements side-by-side, the “easy pickings” will immediately become apparent. But why stop there? Experts can effortlessly dig deeper and find the totally hidden gems: Disc Problem Detection, Delay Detection, Never executed SQL, SQL Timeline. Precisely pinpoint specific areas to target and get the most out of your DB2 system – while reducing costs.

Outlines

1 – Tuning SQL – how we always done it

2 – Single SQL, package, application

3 – Tuning SQL – year 2004 – ACCESS PATH comparison and simulation

4 – Tuning SQL Revisited – A new methodology

5 – Harvesting the low hanging fruit


2- Db2 z/OS Lies, Damn lies, and Statistics

..Lies, damn lies, and statistics… – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of England (1868, 1874-1880)

The above line may, or may not, have been spoken well over 100 years ago, but the need for statistics and, above all else, accurate statistics is more important than ever in the Db2 world of today.

Presentation Outline

  • Db2 RUNSTATS basics & catalog tables and Columns used for access path
  • IBM recommendations through the ages : from Db2 V3 to Db2 12
  • Db2 RUNSTATS advanced
  • SYSCOLDIST explained
  • RUNSTATS real world Q&A :
    use of SAMPLE, COLGROUP, PROFILE, REOPT (ONCE), TABLESAMPLE SYSTEM, HISTOGRAM, …
  • RUNSTATS reversal

Speaker Biography

Ulf Heinrich is the Director of Solutions Delivery at SOFTWARE ENGINEERING GmbH. He specializes in Db2 recovery issues and database maintenance, focusing on the growing requirement for cost reduction and 24×7 operations. As a consultant at large customer sites, he has implemented database maintenance procedures and recovery strategies, and also experienced the pitfalls of recovery scenarios under real‐world recovery pressure. His activities cover EMEA, as well as North America through SE’ U.S. subsidiary, SEGUS Inc. He’s involved in the development of SE’ maintenance and recovery Solutions.

2017-01 Db2 12 technical overview: Roy’s first features review

This Db2 12 technical overview presents in an “easy to read” table list a review of new Db2 12 features

Have you encountered any other Db2 12 changes you’d like to discuss?

 

Now that Db2 12 has gone GA I can finally talk about it. So here’s another new Features “first look” at what I think is cool, great, or odd ! This is my personal list for a Db2 12 technical overview – in no particular order :

  •  Db2 12 SQL Optimizer, triggers, Arrays, Merge, UNICODE Columns. Temporal, SQL pagination, SQL Stability, Log, Partitions,…
  •  Data Sharing
  •  Utilities DSN1COPY, Alternate Copy Tools, Audit, REORG, PBG reorgs, COMPRESSRATIO, RELOAD, RO tablespaces, LOAD, BACKUP and Recovery, PiT, RUNSTATS…

 

AGILE This release of Db2 will be ”the last” release, as Db2 Development has gone all agile on us and will be doing Continuous Delivery (CD) from now on. CD promises Easier, Cheaper, Faster and Simpler Db2 maintenance and the quick realization of new functionality.

 


Db2 12 – SQL


Optimizer


MQT or Table expression columns are “trimmed” if they are not used in the outer query.

In LEFT OUTER JOIN, if columns are not used, they can be Pruned.

UNION ALL gets major work when pushing down join predicates as well as pushing down ORDER BY and FETCH FIRST

Outer table joins can get reordered to avoid unnecessary materializations

User-defined functions get two improvements with merge and the introduction of indexes on the join or correlation predicates that are passed in as parameters

Adaptive Index is designed for Multi Index and single index list prefetch to determine at execute time the filtering of each index. This ensures the optimal execution sequence of indexes or, perhaps, a quicker fallback to Tablespace scan if no filtering index exists.


TRIGGERS

The new “advanced” triggers enable SQL and Global variable usage and SQL PL.


ARRAYS

Get a couple of nice new features, specifically the use of a global variable as an array type and the ability to use the ARRAY_AGG without forcing an ORDER BY.


GLOBAL VARIABLES

Get LOB support and in a SET they can be the target.


PureXML

The XMLMODIFY can do multiple document updates in a single invocation. Various XML performance boosts are also included, e.g. XMLTable and the XSLTRANSFORM allows transformations to different formats.


JSON

When using the JSON_VAL function the first argument must not now always be a BLOB. It can be a view, CASE, table expression, trigger transition variable or SQL PL variable or parameter.


MERGE

Is now a full MERGE with the ability to use table references with multiple MATCHED clauses, including DELETE operations.


SQL PAGINATION

The ability of Db2 to “understand” typical paging has been greatly boosted. Typically it was always coded like:

SELECT blah blah blah
FROM mytable
WHERE (SURNAME = ‘BOXWELL’ AND FORENAME > ‘ROY’)
        OR (SURNAME > ‘BOXWELL’)

This is pretty horrible for the Db2 optimizer but we *all* know what we really mean! Now in Db2 12, so does the optimizer! Sadly you must rewrite your queries a little so this example becomes:

SELECT blah blah blah
FROM mytable
WHERE (SURNAME, FORENAME) > (‘BOXWELL’, ‘ROY’)

Also with this comes a nice little feature called OFFSET ROWS. Typically, this is for when the connection to the server is a bit shaky and so after some paging, when the cursor is reopened, the code “knows” it can miss the first 60 rows, so the cursor changes to be:

SELECT * FROM mytable OFFSET 60 ROWS

Nice feature, but beware of polluting the DSC! It is much better to use a parameter marker for these Offsets!


UNICODE Columns

In DB2 11, we got a “fix” for UNICODE columns that was really a “crutch”. This has now been fixed with real UNICODE columns in DB2 12. You must migrate your existing data though!


Piece-wise DELETE

This is a feature I have wanted for decades! Simply add the FETCH FIRST nnnn ROWS ONLY within a DELETE and then programmatically loop around until you are done. Much easier than the method we have today of DECLAREing a CURSOR with an UPDATE of a dummy column and the DELETE WHERE CURRENT OF and after 5000 or so issue a COMMIT.


TEMPORAL RI

You can now add RI as normal and not be forced to use a trigger or stored procedure.


TEMPORAL TABLES

Get the ability to not just be inclusive-exclusive but also inclusive-inclusive.


TEMPORAL Logical Transactions

Another new feature with temporal tables, is the ability to support logical units of work for SYSTEM_TIME. These logical units of work are not determined by COMMIT or ROLLBACK but by using a built-in Global Variable.


PERCENTILE functions

Two new functions PERCENTILE_CONT and PERCENTIL_DISC are new BIFs.


DRDA Fast Load

Is the ability to load data into z/OS DB2 from files sitting on distributed clients.


ODBC

Gets a new INI keyword KEEPDYNAMIC and the connection attribute of SQL_ATTR_KEEP_DYNAMIC.


Obfuscated Code

Mainly of interest to Vendors is the ability to hide your stored procedure, TRIGGER or UDF coding from prying eyes.


RLF for Static SQL

This is a big one! The Resource Limit Facility has always only been available for dynamic SQL. Now you can also use it to cap Static SQL.


TRANSFER OWNERSHIP

This is a very handy way of clearing out all the old owners from a DB2 system.


SQL Stability

Dynamic Plan Stability is nearly the same as BIND QUERY, but the hope is that it will be easier and better to use! But beware of saving all of your dynamic SQL away!

Static Plan Stability gets a good enhancement that allows FREE on the original or previous. What is really good, is that the current version can be in use so there is no application outage anymore.


Insert

New Insert algorythm can be used for faster unclustered insert processing in some cases. Only for UTS MEMBER CLUSTER (This is actually the default for these spaces).


CONCENTARTE LITERALS

Now supported at the Package Level.


FTB

Fast Index Traversal – Especially good for randomly accessed indexes. If the index is unique, and 64 bytes or less, it is eligible. Index is controlled with the new Catalog table SYSIBM.SYSINDEXCONTROL and the -DISPLAY STATS(INDEXMEMORYUSAGE) command.


Log

Active log size can go from 4GB now up to 768GB ! Be careful here!


In-Memory bufferpools

by using PAGESTEAL(NONE) keyword.


PARTITIONS

Finally we get the chance to give each partition its own DSSIZE as well as the Partitioning indexes! This is great, but sadly is only available to an existing space once you have reorged the whole tablespace…However, once you are there, you can then have data and index parts up to 1TB in size, plus, when you do an ALTER of the DSSIZE, it does not cause an outage (as long as you make it bigger!). A side effect of this is that the RID is now seven bytes (see REORG mapping table for other changes). You can now also add partitions in the middle of an existing PBR table.


 

 


Data Sharing


Recovery

of retained locks from a failed member can be handled automatically


LPL and GRECP recovery

LPL and GRECP recovery auto retries three times after waiting three minutes


 


Db2 12 Utilities


DSN1COPY

In DB2 11 this utility got a few sanity checks and now the REPAIR CATALOG utility can fix some of these. The REPAIR CATALOG TEST also looks for some problems caused by misuse/abuse of DSN1COPY.


ALTERNATE COPY POOLS

The usage of BACKUP SYTEM is growing. So is the amount of storage required! The idea here, is to define a set of copy pools, but only one for many DB2 subsystems. The alternate copy pool uses as many volumes as it needs and leaves the other volume free for a different subsystem backup. This reduces the amount of space that must be allocated.


Audit

A new Authorization arrived: UNLOADAUTH to “replace” the “Does the user have SELECT auth on the table?” check that has run up to now. UNLOAD is special and should be controlled over this auth and no longer over just SELECT.


REORG

PBG tablespaces get the best news here!

PBG reorgs can now spill over into a new PBG if the row(s) do not fit back into the original partition. Classic case here, is compressed data that no longer fits back. This forced people to use a TS level reorg or not use compression.

If the PBG contains LOB data and it extended to a new partition in the log apply phase, then the LOB space was left in COPY Pending… pretty horrible and that no longer happens in DB2 12.

Another PBG bonus, is the delete of “emptied” Partitions after a REORG has completed.

Improved FlashCopy support – You can now decide to stop the REORG if the flash copy fails.

New Catalog column COMPRESSRATIO for use by utilities that records the compression savings at the record instead of at the page level.

RELOAD phase can now be offloaded to zIIP.

RO tablespaces can now be REORGed at any SHRLEVEL.

The mapping table gets changed again due to the relative page numbering in the new PARTITION support (seven byte RID).


LOAD


PART REPLACE with dummy input against an empty (PBR) partition could be quicker.

LOAD SHRLEVEL CHANGE PARALLEL support for PBG for SHRLEVEL CHANGE.

Additional zIIP offload, like in REORG, in the RELOAD phase, including the data conversion and loading of the record into the page set.

LOAD RESUME BACKOUT YES to avoid RECP on failure. Adds a new option on LOAD RESUME SHRLEVEL NONE to allow LOAD to back out the rows already loaded upon encountering an error (such as conversion, LOB/XML, duplicate key, referential integrity violation) without leaving the page set in RECP.

PREFORMAT support for auxiliary tables. Support is extended to LOB table spaces and auxiliary indexes.

Maintain MAXASSIGNEDVAL for identity columns. LOAD now maintains the MAXASSIGNEDVAL for user-provided input and resets the value if a LOAD REPLACE is run on the table space.

LOAD REPLACE support for the COMPRESSRATIO column for use by utilities that records the compression savings at the record instead of at the page level column.


BACKUP and RECOVERY

Point-in-Time support for PBGs, Flashcopy FLASHCOPY_PPRCP keyword. As mentioned the default is changed to not recover unchanged objects. MODIFY RECOVERY gets two new options: DELETEDS to delete the datasets and NOCOPYPEND to not set COPY pending after doing the MODIFY.


PiT

Has been improved with the ability to skip unnecessary recoveries. SCOPE UPDATE only processes objects that have been updated up to the TOLOGPOINT or TORBA.


RUNSTATS

New CLUSTERRATIO formula which should better reflect dynamic prefetch. Terry Purcell has stated that it is not a huge change and does not require a RUNSTATS of all tablespaces!


FREQVAL COUNT nn

The COUNT nn is now optional and, if not used, then RUNSTATS will work out the best number for you. This is really, really nice and I would recommend this in an instant! It has also been retro fitted to DB2 11.


Autonomic Statistics with PROFILEs

I am no fan of this, as I believe it makes for a pretty nasty feedback loop where anyone’s “dumb” QMF/SAS/DSNTEP2/SPUFI will get inserted as a PROFILE COLGROUP, and then these PROFILEs will get bigger and bigger until no-one knows which are really useful and which are just fluff! I would recommend setting the ZPARMs STATFDBK_SCOPE to ALL (Default) STATFDBK_PROFILE to NO (Default is YES). When YES is used DB2 12 will create and/or maintain a PROFILE for you. Finally, validate that the SYSTABLES column STATS_FEEDBACK is set to “N” (Default is “Y”) for any and all tables where you do *not* want SYSSTATSFEEDBACK data. E.g. All the DSNDB01 tables where a RUNSTATS is not even allowed!


DSC

DSC Invalidation got switched off by default. In the past *any* RUNSTATS flushed the cache. Now you must add the key word INVALIDATECACHE YES to get this to occur. (Unless you use the REPORT NO UPDATE NONE syntax this still just flushes the DSC)


Inline Stats

Inline Stats got a huge boost with PROFILE support, MOST/BOTH/LEAST and LOAD PARALLEL got inline stats.


 

Have you encountered any other Db2 12 changes you’d like to discuss?

As usual, feel free to email me with questions or comments.

TTFN

Roy Boxwell