Chapter 7. The Graphical Client Utilities on Windows

Another option for managing remote Informix systems is to use client/server utilities that can operate on the distant servers. This is the approach that Informix is taking for its NT products. This is a good solution, provided that you can do all of the functions you need to do remotely through the client/server GUIs. Informix is providing their first cut at providing this functionality with the release of their Relational Object Manager (ROM) and Informix Enterprise Control Center(IECC) software. This software will make the job of remotely administering both NT and UNIX servers much easier.

The target for most of these Informix utilities was Microsoft SQL Server. You'll see an immediate resemblance to the graphical programs used to administer the SQL Server products. Although SQL Server has long been considered a "lightweight" player in the database power wars, almost everyone who has used it has developed a somewhat grudging admiration for its graphical user interface.

The new utilities are actually targeted to two separate groups of Informix users. The end user has the ability to create queries in a very nice graphical editor and run them against remote databases, receiving the results in a nicely formatted graphical screen. The administrator can monitor and administer some aspects of the database, such as disk layout, table and index structures, constraints and stored procedures. The DBA can also administer the backup and archiving utilities via the remote GUIs.

These utilities are still lacking in some areas such as monitoring of threads and other internal database processes. They also do not monitor database performance in any but a trivial manner.