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DB2
version 5.2 is the world's one true universal database.
DB2 UDB is number one in benchmark performance. |
 t wasn't too long ago that databases were just used for routine corporate
record-keeping: maintaining short character fields and numbers, mostly. But not any more, thanks to researchers in Almaden's Exploratory Database Systems Department!
We brought the power of databases to multi-media data types -- such as text, images, video, and voice -- and married the best of the object-oriented and relational models, in an extensible, "object-relational" prototype database system called "Starburst" in the late 1980's and the early 1990's. Then, beginning in 1992, we were responsible for incorporating this leading technology into the SQL query compiler for IBM's world-renowned DB2 product, then called DB2 for Common Servers, Version 2. DB2 supports user-defined types and methods on most Unix and Windows platforms, large objects for multi-media types, triggers and constraints for "active" databases, and sophisticated optimization for complex queries -- even recursive SQL queries! What's more, the plans for executing such sophisticated queries can be examined in detail using an interactive graphical tool called Visual Explain, which was invented at Almaden. Since 1995, Almaden researchers have been incorporating advanced optimization techniques for increasing DB2's parallel processing strategies in both symmetric multi-processors (SMPs), shared-nothing parallel processors (MPPs) such as IBM's SP2 super-computer (dubbed "Deep Blue"), and even clusters of SMPs. At the same time, we've expanded the object-oriented features of DB2 and added support for complex decision support and on-line analytic processing (OLAP) with new functions such as ROLLUP and CUBE. With these changes in Version 5, "DB2 for Common Servers" became "DB2 Universal Data Base (UDB)", because it can efficiently maintain and access any type of data on any platform, from a laptop to a super-computer. |
