06
Sun, Oct
2 New Articles

Revolution in IBM DB2 Performance: IBM DB2 Analytics Accelerator

Typography
  • Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
  • Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times

Editor's Note: This article is an excerpt from The Business Value of DB2 for z/OS: IBM DB2 Analytics Accelerator and Optimizer.

 

Business analytics plays a crucial role in today's workplace. The performance and cost of the DB2 Analytics Accelerator opens up unprecedented opportunities for enterprises to make use of the data on the IBM System z platform. Customers have seen dramatic improvement in the response times of qualifying queries in some real, production-sized benchmarks. Running DB2 Analytics Accelerator on System z can result in some significant reductions in CPU usage. Of course, individual results will vary and depend on many other factors.

What Is Business Analytics? Timely, Accurate, and Secure Access to Business Information

Since the early days of data warehousing, the common statement from every vendor and pundit was that decision systems and transactional systems were vastly different and required separate platforms. Those days are over!

 

With the wealth of data available today, organizations are no longer willing to relegate information to the back office. Modern organizations are demanding access to customer purchase histories, customer behaviors, and trends of product sales at the time of contact—at the time of sale. This creates new challenges, because it is not enough for an enterprise to capture this data; the enterprise must also process and transform these massive amounts of data into actionable knowledge. And this needs to be done quickly while the information is still relevant.

 

Data transformed into intelligence gives you more than a window into your current operations. It provides a likely view of the future—what is just around the corner and even further down the road. It helps leaders know with confidence all that has happened, is happening, and might happen to every aspect of the enterprise. Spotting the key patterns, extracting critical insights from data, and taking latency and cost out of making and implementing the right decision is what is defining industry leaders.

 

The world we live in today is increasingly instrumented, interconnected, and intelligent. We are experiencing a revolution, and information is at the heart of it. Businesses that are taking advantage of this new wealth of information are able to make more intelligent decisions and are rising to the top. They're managing large volumes of information in real time, incorporating analytics and predictive modeling, pervasively collecting and sharing information across the entire value chain, and speeding time to value by delivering trusted, accurate, and timely information to the right decision-makers.

 

A company's survival can depend on the age of the data used to obtain an answer to critical business questions. With slow sales cycles, cutbacks, reluctant clients, and intense competition, business leaders are really feeling the heat to act and act fast, but a single bad decision today can be disastrous.

 

So what is the key to working smarter? It is having the right information and insight at the right time to drive smarter business outcomes. Working smarter means that your front-line business leaders receive timely information to uncover the new revenue opportunities and identify which product or service offerings are most likely to address the market requirement. It means business analysts can quickly access the right data points to evaluate key performance and revenue indicators in order to build successful corporate growth strategies. And it means corporate risk and compliance units can recognize potential regulatory, reputational, and operational risks before they become realities.

 

The DB2 Analytics Accelerator (Figure 1) gives your organization the speed to create the insights it needs to work smarter in this challenging environment. By putting the right answers in the hands of your decision-makers immediately, DB2 Analytics Accelerator puts your business in the best position to quickly adapt and grow to answer the questions of tomorrow.

 

051313RuipingFig01                

Figure 1: IBM DB2 Analytics Accelerator

How Business Analytics Can Help Your Organization

Many organizations realize the benefits of improving business outcomes and improving decision-making. The use of business intelligence and analytic applications is well understood to help make smarter decisions, achieve better results, and gain a deeper understanding of trends, opportunities, weaknesses, and threats. Organizations want to further analyze their data to gain additional insights into their business.

 

Today, however, the enterprise warehouse environment of an organization is facing many challenges. One such challenge is that the amount of data being stored in a typical warehouse environment is increasing. As the amount of data increases and sometimes the format of this data changes, the warehouse and end-user experience can be affected. It can become challenging for an organization to see the right information in an appropriate format and in the right timeframe for use in its analysis and decision-making process. Moving large amounts of data from disparate source systems to a warehouse can be a resource-intensive task. The increasing amount of data in some warehouses can also further affect any longer-running queries and reports that might exist in an organization. These slow-running queries, when executed with other mixed online transaction processing (OLTP) and online analytical processing (OLAP) workloads, can negatively affect the experience of existing users and cause further lack of acceptance for potential new users. Combine this with typical corporate priorities to become more productive, agile, and innovative, and it becomes more challenging to deliver on the promises of data warehousing and business analytics.

 

For many organizations, the concept that some of their longer-running DB2 for z/OS queries can be routed to an accelerator for processing is a plus. These queries may be in the form of batch SQL jobs or may be generated by means of corporate analytic and business intelligence (BI) tools—for example, ad hoc reporting from IBM Cognos BI. The query accelerator available for DB2 for z/OS, which makes use of IBM Netezza technology, can make a big difference in the execution time of an analytic and warehouse type of workload. Combining the benefits of both DB2 for z/OS (for OLTP-type queries) and DB2 Analytics Accelerator (for longer-running analysis queries) ensures that resources are shared appropriately for all warehouse users.

 

The DB2 Analytics Accelerator would likely benefit an organization that fits one of the following profiles:

  • Wants to undertake a new reporting initiative on IBM System z to gain more insights
  • Wants to consolidate disparate data to its existing System z platform while benefiting from integrated operational BI
  • Wants to modernize an existing data warehouse and BI workload on System z

 

These types of organizations, with the appropriate workload, would likely see their elapsed time for longer-running queries being significantly reduced. They would also likely see their CPU usage on the mainframe being reduced, allowing DB2 for z/OS to focus on efficiently running their OLTP queries.

 

       

Ruiping Li

Ruiping Li is a senior engineer in DB2 for z/OS development at IBM Silicon Valley Lab. She is the technical lead responsible for the DB2 query acceleration support for the IBM DB2 Analytics Accelerator. She has been the development lead for DB2 9 for z/OS new feature optimistic locking support and DB2 10 for z/OS new feature timestamp with time zone data type support and has also been the key developer for some other important functionality, including pureXML index exploitation, complex queries, MQTs, and multiple CCSID features in DB2 for z/OS.


MC Press books written by Ruiping Li available now on the MC Press Bookstore.

The Business Value of DB2 for z/OS The Business Value of DB2 for z/OS
Find out why DB2 is still going strong and how it is helping businesses to reduce costs and grow.
List Price $17.95

Now On Sale

BLOG COMMENTS POWERED BY DISQUS

LATEST COMMENTS

Support MC Press Online

$

Book Reviews

Resource Center

  • SB Profound WC 5536 Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application. You can find Part 1 here. In Part 2 of our free Node.js Webinar Series, Brian May teaches you the different tooling options available for writing code, debugging, and using Git for version control. Brian will briefly discuss the different tools available, and demonstrate his preferred setup for Node development on IBM i or any platform. Attend this webinar to learn:

  • SB Profound WP 5539More than ever, there is a demand for IT to deliver innovation. Your IBM i has been an essential part of your business operations for years. However, your organization may struggle to maintain the current system and implement new projects. The thousands of customers we've worked with and surveyed state that expectations regarding the digital footprint and vision of the company are not aligned with the current IT environment.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT Generic IBM announced the E1080 servers using the latest Power10 processor in September 2021. The most powerful processor from IBM to date, Power10 is designed to handle the demands of doing business in today’s high-tech atmosphere, including running cloud applications, supporting big data, and managing AI workloads. But what does Power10 mean for your data center? In this recorded webinar, IBMers Dan Sundt and Dylan Boday join IBM Power Champion Tom Huntington for a discussion on why Power10 technology is the right strategic investment if you run IBM i, AIX, or Linux. In this action-packed hour, Tom will share trends from the IBM i and AIX user communities while Dan and Dylan dive into the tech specs for key hardware, including:

  • Magic MarkTRY the one package that solves all your document design and printing challenges on all your platforms. Produce bar code labels, electronic forms, ad hoc reports, and RFID tags – without programming! MarkMagic is the only document design and print solution that combines report writing, WYSIWYG label and forms design, and conditional printing in one integrated product. Make sure your data survives when catastrophe hits. Request your trial now!  Request Now.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericForms of ransomware has been around for over 30 years, and with more and more organizations suffering attacks each year, it continues to endure. What has made ransomware such a durable threat and what is the best way to combat it? In order to prevent ransomware, organizations must first understand how it works.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericIT security is a top priority for businesses around the world, but most IBM i pros don’t know where to begin—and most cybersecurity experts don’t know IBM i. In this session, Robin Tatam explores the business impact of lax IBM i security, the top vulnerabilities putting IBM i at risk, and the steps you can take to protect your organization. If you’re looking to avoid unexpected downtime or corrupted data, you don’t want to miss this session.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericCan you trust all of your users all of the time? A typical end user receives 16 malicious emails each month, but only 17 percent of these phishing campaigns are reported to IT. Once an attack is underway, most organizations won’t discover the breach until six months later. A staggering amount of damage can occur in that time. Despite these risks, 93 percent of organizations are leaving their IBM i systems vulnerable to cybercrime. In this on-demand webinar, IBM i security experts Robin Tatam and Sandi Moore will reveal:

  • FORTRA Disaster protection is vital to every business. Yet, it often consists of patched together procedures that are prone to error. From automatic backups to data encryption to media management, Robot automates the routine (yet often complex) tasks of iSeries backup and recovery, saving you time and money and making the process safer and more reliable. Automate your backups with the Robot Backup and Recovery Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAManaging messages on your IBM i can be more than a full-time job if you have to do it manually. Messages need a response and resources must be monitored—often over multiple systems and across platforms. How can you be sure you won’t miss important system events? Automate your message center with the Robot Message Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAThe thought of printing, distributing, and storing iSeries reports manually may reduce you to tears. Paper and labor costs associated with report generation can spiral out of control. Mountains of paper threaten to swamp your files. Robot automates report bursting, distribution, bundling, and archiving, and offers secure, selective online report viewing. Manage your reports with the Robot Report Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAFor over 30 years, Robot has been a leader in systems management for IBM i. With batch job creation and scheduling at its core, the Robot Job Scheduling Solution reduces the opportunity for human error and helps you maintain service levels, automating even the biggest, most complex runbooks. Manage your job schedule with the Robot Job Scheduling Solution. Key features include:

  • LANSA Business users want new applications now. Market and regulatory pressures require faster application updates and delivery into production. Your IBM i developers may be approaching retirement, and you see no sure way to fill their positions with experienced developers. In addition, you may be caught between maintaining your existing applications and the uncertainty of moving to something new.

  • LANSAWhen it comes to creating your business applications, there are hundreds of coding platforms and programming languages to choose from. These options range from very complex traditional programming languages to Low-Code platforms where sometimes no traditional coding experience is needed. Download our whitepaper, The Power of Writing Code in a Low-Code Solution, and:

  • LANSASupply Chain is becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable. From raw materials for manufacturing to food supply chains, the journey from source to production to delivery to consumers is marred with inefficiencies, manual processes, shortages, recalls, counterfeits, and scandals. In this webinar, we discuss how:

  • The MC Resource Centers bring you the widest selection of white papers, trial software, and on-demand webcasts for you to choose from. >> Review the list of White Papers, Trial Software or On-Demand Webcast at the MC Press Resource Center. >> Add the items to yru Cart and complet he checkout process and submit

  • Profound Logic Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application.

  • SB Profound WC 5536Join us for this hour-long webcast that will explore:

  • Fortra IT managers hoping to find new IBM i talent are discovering that the pool of experienced RPG programmers and operators or administrators with intimate knowledge of the operating system and the applications that run on it is small. This begs the question: How will you manage the platform that supports such a big part of your business? This guide offers strategies and software suggestions to help you plan IT staffing and resources and smooth the transition after your AS/400 talent retires. Read on to learn: