SAIL is moving to a brand new DB2 implementation on new hardware. We're also making use of new functionality availabe within DB2 tailored to analytics environments that IBM calls BLU Acceleration.
What this means for you
Speed
BLU does a lot of the optimistaion work that would previously have to be done by hand for you. Our tests suggest that well writen SQL qerys perform significaly better on the new system, with 10x to 5000x reductions in query run time compared to the current system.
BLU does 5 main things.
- Organise the data in columbs on disk (rather that in rows)
- Automaticly indexs everything
- Automaticly distrubtues eveything across the partitions
- Does much more in memory
- Improves the query prarrelism
This means that on the new system you dont need to create indexes. When you create tables you dont need to
Changes you should be aware of
DB2 itself
DB2 server and clients have been upgraded to 11.1 from 9.7.
Creating tables
You no longer need (or are able) to create indexes. This is because the system does this automaticaly.
You no longer need to specify a columb to "DISTRIBUTE BY" when creating tables as the system does this automaticaly.
You no longer need to explicitly specify "COMPRESS YES" when creating tables as this is the defualt.
Altering tables
There are restrictions around altering tables with BLU. Columns in a table cannot be dropped or altered but can be added too. If you want to drop or alter a
Data Changes
The codepage has changed to "UTF-8".