Re: What database am I running on AIX 4.2?

Ben Burnett wrote:
>
> Jerry Gitomer <jgitomer_at_erols.com> wrote in message news:<3C8D9522.922C099B_at_erols.com>...
> > Ben Burnett wrote:
> > >
> > > I have inherited an application that was constructed around 20 years
> > > ago to run on an IBM RS6000 machine. The machine is running AIX 4.2.
> > > I'm trying to convert the application to be web based and have made a
> > > lot of progress with the new app. Unfortunately I need to be able to
> > > covert some of the data stored in the old system and import it to the
> > > new system. The application doesn't provide a handy exporting system,
> > > so I'm trying to get at the data by running queries on the underlying
> > > DB. My DB experience is currently limited to MySQL on Linux. I know
> > > the application isn't using a MySQL DB, but I don't know what it is
> > > using.
> > >
> > > Is there anyone out there who can offer me some assistance in

I've deleted some of the useful info (sorry).

If you are finding evidence of COBOL, then almost certainly you are running DB2. (Actually, this would be almost certain even without evidence of COBOL. COBOL+IBM+mid 90's makes DB2 a certainty). And, probably not the DB2 Universal Server.

Also, those are not ISAM files, but VSAM files. This is a bit of a technical quibble; a VSAM file is what IBM calls their updated indexed file organization, their old one they called ISAM. I bring it up because if you say ISAM to a dedicated IBM guy when VSAM is the proper word....you know what will happen.

The problem is that on the AIX at that time (I worked on an AIX in 1994-5) any of the batch applications would be in COBOL. If the version of DB2 is advanced enough, you might also find stored procedures written in COBOL.

The problem with dB2 at that time is that there really was no good user interface. Look for something called 'SPUFI'; if you can find it, it is the programmer's interface. IBM's philosophy at the time was to let 3rd party vendor's write the nice interfaces. Most shops wrote their own (in COBOL).

Forget about trying to hack the data files, unless you first take several months worth of DB2 internal courses. The data organization is much more complicated than Oracles.

IBM didn't have a decent unload utility either.

Your best bet is probably to try to get database modeling tool that can reverse-engineer a DB2 database.

-- 
Phil Singer                |    psinger1_at_chartermi.net
Oracle DBA

Go Wings!!!!!!!