The Mark Scranton Group: All Informix ... all the time.

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HomeAll Informix ... all the time.The Mark Scranton Informix StorySince joining Informix Software in 1995, Mark Scranton has focused exclusively on the Informix database engines - IDS and XPS. With his passionate, technically pure and "brutally honest" approach to teaching and consulting, he has built up a large client base and following. Clients have found great benefit to Mark's knowledge, whether it be in the "engine internals", or a "high-level overview" for crowds new to Informix. Mark has spoken, taught, or consulted in nearly every active Informix User Group in the US and numerous events all over the world. What We OfferCore ServicesEducation Consulting Technical Account Management"The Constant Client Contact" ModelNo "fix-and-run" work here. We'll keep in touch by including the following, free-of-charge services: quarterly conference callsupdate announcements - patches, releases, fix-packs, bugsannual "Mini-Health Check" You can always "opt-out" of these services, but we doubt that you would. The Informix database product gets updated often, so why not be "in the know" on what technical changes mean to you? TechnicalUpdatesQuarterCallsAnnual Mini Health CheckGet the FREE "IDS Mini Health Check" - find out how stable your engine is in just a couple of hours![ more info ]WebinarsEducationA Passion for EducationEducation MethodsMark Scranton's Teaching Absolutes "Passion" - to be a good teacher, you must have patience. To be a great teacher, you must have passion - not just for the product, but for the teaching. "I Don't Know" - is a good thing for a teacher to say. Students will push you to that point anyway. The first time a teacher says "I don't know", it actually builds trust. (If "I don't know" is the answer to about every third question, that's a different issue.) "Rockets" - each student must approach the class "as if we were flying rockets" - meaning, that formal training cannot be replaced with "on the job training", or OJT. Once the formal training/foundation is in place, then of course, OJT is a part of the learning. "Fishing" - a great teacher is constantly "fishing his students", meaning he's always watching for the numerous signs that tells how the topic is going, who's confused, who's got a question, and more. This can all be discerned by very subtle gestures, postures, and can change the course of - or even save - a learning experience. ConsultingThe Mix - Education + Consulting

The Sanity Kit

The Sanity Kit

Overview

Mini Health Check

Full Sanity Check

The Watcher

OverviewWe've all heard of "Health Checks", right? Initially, the "Sanity Kit" was an IDS/XPS "health check." Over the years it has evolved into a comprehensive "kit" to do numerous DBA-related tasks on an Informix engine. The 2 core functions of the Sanity Kit are:The Full Sanity CheckThe WatcherThese two features complement each other, and provide the client both real-time time data as well as planning data. The Sanity Check helps identify immediate-, near-, and long-term configuration changes and tuning needed. The Watcher focuses on peak timeframes and identifies trends and cycles of performance impact to the engine. Keep in mind - IDS 11 brings a great deal of "data gathering & monitoring" functionaility that is built-in to the engine via the admin tasks and the "performance history (ph) tables." The Sanity Kit is being overhauled to utilize this functionality and some of the Sanity Kit functions - the Watcher core for example - will be replaced by the built-in functions of Informix 11.x. Mini Health CheckThe Informix Mini Health CheckObjectives: to quickly and easily alert a client to "engine red flags" - immediate, near-term, or long-term. to give a consistent, repeatable baseline measure of engine stability, performance, configuration, and many other areas. to generate future business for me! Full Sanity CheckThe Full Sanity CheckThe "core" of the product, it's a "health check on steroids." Some health checks for IDS tell you just a few items - too many extents, long checkpoint durations, etc. The Sanity Check gives you that ... and much more. Device contention, most used/least used indexes, UPD STATS "health", and an overall "Sanity Score", rating your engine from 1 to 10 and allowing comparisons to follow any tuning changes. A critical part of the Sanity Check is the "Ordered Changes" section - showing you which parameters should be changed in what order, the impact of the change, and much more. 70+ functional areas are monitored and reported on for a total performance picture. The WatcherThe WatcherReal-time monitoring and data collection"Way back in the day" (circa IDS 7.3) a client posed the question ... "OK - performance was really bad last Tuesday. What was going on in the engine? Does IDS have historical data gathering?" Of course, the answer was "no" - and this was true up until IDS 11 was released. So I started developing "The Watcher" to simply gather data in real-time, and give the ability to produce reports/output that will help a client to know "what was going on during the bad performance" timeframe(s). The product has grown significantly over the years and includes the functionality to:monitor a production engine remotely without any impact to that box.generate "peak performance indicator" charts/graphs to help clients see trending of performance over time. gather targeted data sets and make comparisons of key metrics. and much more...The Watcher has minimal impact on the engine, is non-intrusive, makes no changes to the engine or it's structures, and can be throttled to run during certain periods or on a pre-defined cycle. SupportSupportIIUG ConferenceCurrent WorkContact1-855-GET-IFMXinfo_markscranton.comQuestions/Comments/Feedback? Feel free to email us anytime, with any content. The Mark Scranton Group, LLC855-GET-IFMX (438-4369)765-729-2601ResumeMark Scranton765-729-26011-855-GET-IFMX (438-4369)email mewww.markscranton.comYahoo Messenger: mark.scrantonPublications"The Informix Handbook" - contributor"Transitioning from IDS to DB2" - IBM Redbook"Bringing IDS Internals to the Surface" - IBM DeveloperWorksIDS CBT’s (DSA; v7)AwardsIIUG Directors Award (2003)CertificationsIDS System Administration v11.5IDS Systems Admin v9.2DB2 Systems Admin v8PartnersHelixstormIBMKazer CorporationOne Point SolutionsCompany The Mark Scranton Group, LLC, 2010 - 1-855-GET-IFMX (438-4369)www.markscranton.cominfo_markscranton.com
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