FHG Archives - Page 46 of 144

The DB2 DBA: Identifying Indexes with Shared Access Paths

July 13, 2011 Hey, Mike

The SysIndexStat catalog view has the column Owning_Index_Owner (plus schema, system names, etc.). However, that catalog view does not include constraint-created indexes, nor does it include keyed logical and physical files that share the access path owned by an SQL index. The DSPFD command does show the SQL index that owns the access path for such logical files, but I have not been able to generate this information in an outfile format from that command.

The information must exist somewhere (since it shows on screen) and I would think it would be in one of the file description APIs, but

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How Do I Email a PC5250 Screen Shot?

July 13, 2011 Hey, Joe

I want to email a PC5250 screen shot. But when I press the Print Screen key, nothing happens. It doesn’t copy my screen to the Windows clipboard and I can’t paste it into my email. What am I doing wrong? I’m using the PC5250 product that comes with iSeries Access V5R4M0.

–Jay

By default, most Windows programs capture your entire desktop display image to the Windows clipboard when you press the PRT key (on some keyboards, you press the PrtSc key, instead). PRT copies the entire desktop image to the clipboard, including all visible Windows and the Windows toolbar.

Alternatively,

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SQL Implicit Cast of Character Strings and Numeric Values

June 22, 2011 Skip Marchesani

Awhile back I was teaching an SQL class in Fargo, North Dakota. During one of the afternoon lab sessions, one of the students asked if he could use the CONCAT function on two numbers, or two numeric columns, without first casting them to character values.

I knew the answer was “No”, and that the numeric values had to be cast to character first before the student concatenated them together. Instead of just giving the student the answer, I played good teacher and I told the student to try it and let me know how it worked.

Imaging my surprise when

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Forcing Keyword Parameters

June 22, 2011 Ted Holt

Programming languages use two conventions for passing arguments (commonly referred to as parameters) to a called routine. Some languages use positional parameters. That is, the parameters must be passed to the routine in a certain order. The other (and less error-prone) method is to password parameters in keyword format. IBM i allows you to force callers to use keyword format–to a point–when they use your CL commands. Here’s how.

But first, let’s review the two major problems inherent in positional parameters. First, it is easy to get a parameter value into the wrong position. Take the following OCL command for

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Admin Alert: Things to Think About in a Power i Development Environment

June 22, 2011 Joe Hertvik

Working in both public and private companies during my career, I’ve been subjected to my share of IT audits. My impression is that while auditors are usually very savvy about your production environment, there are other issues that maybe they should be looking at but don’t. If your production environment is in tip-top shape, audit-wise, here are some other things you might consider looking at to avoid trouble.

Why Aren’t Auditors More Interested in Development Environment Infrastructure?

Not to give anyone ideas, but I’ve always wondered why auditors don’t investigate development environments as seriously as they audit production environments. After

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ILE: Decisions, Decisions, Part 1

June 8, 2011 Susan Gantner

I’ve been working with and teaching people about ILE for many years. There are a few questions that come up again and again. So I thought I’d cover my responses in some tips. In this tip, the subject is binding directories.

I’m often asked about the best way to use binding directories and/or how many binding directories I recommend.

My philosophy is to keep things as simple as possible for the developers. I believe that ILE’s value is in making development more efficient by making it easy to develop and use your own application functions that you can use as

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Write PDM Scans to Database Files

June 8, 2011 Ted Holt

Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here.

My shop licenses a documentation package that tells us all sorts of useful information, such as which programs use which files and which programs call which programs. Nevertheless, we still use PDM string searches to search source code. I wrote a utility that makes such searches more powerful. Maybe you’ll find it beneficial.

How To Search Using PDM

You have two ways to search source code with PDM. You can use option 25 from the WRKOBJPDM and WRKMBRPDM displays, or you can use the Find String Using PDM

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Admin Alert: Things I Learned from My Latest Power i Upgrade

June 8, 2011 Joe Hertvik

Over Memorial Day weekend in the U.S.A., we finished completing two Power i 720 hardware upgrades for a regular client. While the machine installation was relatively easy, I thought it would be helpful to discuss some of the problems, opportunities, and general time wasters that accompanied our migration to the latest Power i hardware, hoping that my experience will help others with their own hardware upgrades.

Cutting Hardware and Acquisition Costs

Before you buy your machines, make sure you’re not leaving any money on the table. Check if you are eligible for migration assistance from IBM. For many System

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Finding Duplicate Rows in a Name and Address Table

May 25, 2011 Skip Marchesani

Many companies still use the U.S. Postal Service to mail promotional and marketing materials to existing and potential customers. With rising printing expenses and postal rates, it’s important to minimize waste by identifying and eliminating duplicate rows in name and address tables. However, these tables can present some interesting challenges.

For instance, the following two addresses are duplicates, but how do you identify them as potential duplicate rows?

John Sampson
Dickerson Mutual Ins.
218 Bridge St., Suite 257
New York, NY 12345

John Samson
Dickerson Insurance
218 Bridge Street
NYC, NY 12345

Companies can write their own software, which has

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Asserting the Ostensibly Unassertable

May 25, 2011 Hey, Ted

Assertions are great for validating conditions that can be tested with IF, DOW, SELECT, etc., but what about other types of conditions? For instance, can I use an assertion to test that a variable contains valid decimal data?

–A Nice Lady

(I’m sorry. A nice lady asked me this question in person and I forgot her name.)

Yes, it is possible to check for conditions that one cannot test with conditional OPCODES such as IF, but you must use a different method.

When something goes amiss, the system loads a five-digit, zoned-decimal status code with a non-zero value. You can

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