SAS Oracle Rdb7 OpenVMS AlphaServer 4x00 DIGITAL

This document serves as a technical guide for the SAS Oracle Rdb7 OpenVMS AlphaServer 4x00 HiTest Suite, a prequalified system for data warehousing and data mining. It targets Oracle Rdb7 customers with large databases (100-500 GB) using SAS for decision support.

The suite's components include the DIGITAL HiTest Foundation (hardware, OpenVMS, middleware, Oracle Rdb7), the HiTest AppSet (SAS application software), and an optional System Management Station. Key characteristics such as availability, installability, interoperability, manageability, scalability, services, and Year 2000 compliance are detailed. Availability features include RAID 5 disk storage, clustering for system failover, and redundant components, ensuring high uptime.

The document provides extensive installation and setup instructions for hardware (AlphaServer 4x00, StorageWorks ESA 10000), OpenVMS, Oracle Rdb7, Oracle SQL/Services, and SAS, with noted installation times of 16 hours for hardware and 48 hours for software in the test environment. It also covers planning for data warehouses, including disk space allocation and RAID array configuration for minimum (86 GB usable) and maximum (258 GB usable) setups.

Interoperability testing confirmed seamless operation among all major components. Performance tests involved loading up to 210 million rows of data using serial and parallel methods, and executing five SQL queries in cold-cache mode. SAS script execution verified connectivity and integration with Oracle Rdb7.

Problems encountered during testing and their solutions are highlighted:

• Simultaneous Queries: Oracle Rdb7 licensing restricted parallel queries on clustered nodes; additional licenses are required.
• SQL/Services IVP Failure: Occurred if the database server was down during installation, requiring the server to be active.
• Insufficient Disk Space: Adequate, dedicated, and contiguous disk space is crucial for load files and sort operations, as the VMS Sort Utility requires contiguous space.
• Date Format Incompatibility: UNIX dates needed conversion to VMS format for Rdb7 loading.
• VMS Dates for Joins: Required casting date fields in SQL queries to omit time components for successful date-based joins, which can impact performance.

The document concludes with recommendations for query optimization, including proper index usage and system parameter tuning to maximize performance.