- Binary Dump and Load
Advantages of binary dump and load:
- Fastest and best way of reorganizing very large databases.
- Easy to choose the order of dumping data.
- Binary dump files are smaller than ASCII ones and are highly portable.
- Supports parallel dump and load sessions on both CPU and disk. This means if you have multiple CPUs and disks, you can perform parallel dump and load sessions on multiple disks and CPUs. Your OS will handle each session on a separate CPU using a separate process, thus optimizing throughput of disks.
- binary-dump and binary-load can be done by storage area, thus enhancing performance.
- Easy to automate and create log files.
Disadvantages of binary dump and load are:
- Create scripts to dump and load need to be created.
- Indexes are deactivated during the load, and may need to be rebuilt afterwards, unless loaded the data using the BUILD INDEXES parameter.
- Must not be used on databases that might be corrupted, because this method dumps and loads corrupted records exactly as they are.
- May not be suitable for small and mid-sized tables or databases. In fact, on small and mid sized tables this method is not efficient because of significant overhead in manipulating binary data.
- Data administration dump and data administration load
Advantages of Data administration dump and data administration load
- Easy to use.
- Works with indexes activated, thus preventing the loading of duplicate data into unique indexes.
- Supports parallel dump and load sessions on both CPU and disk. This means if with multiple CPUs and disks, parallel dump and load sessions can be performed on multiple disks and CPUs. The OS will handle each session on a separate CPU using a separate process, thus optimizing throughput of disks.
- Employs text dump files, making it easier to debug in case of errors or resume in case of interrupted processes.
- Easy to create log files.
- Don’t have to write any scripts or custom programs.
- Easy to automate the dump and load process .
Disadvantages of Data administration dump and data administration load
- Can be slow if strictly use its graphical user interface.
- Load files are limited to 2 GB or OS limit, whichever is lower.
- Subsets of tables cannot be dumped.
- Loading with indexes activated can result in some scattering.
- PROUTIL CONV
Advantages of PROUTIL CONV:
- Don’t have to go through the extensive planning required of dump and load.
- Converting a database is much shorter than dumping and loading it. Thus, it is especially appropriate for databases that must keep up and running 24x7.
Disadvantages of PROUTIL CONV:
- Any record and index fragmentation and scattering that exist in the source
- database still remain in the target database.
- Any unused space on the source database still remains.
- New storage areas and clusters cannot be implemented during the conversion.
- The database block size is still the same in the target database.
- Any corrupted data, if present in the source database, still exists in the target database.
Recommendation on PROUTIL CONV
Even if PROUTIL CONV is used to convert a database, consider performing a complete dump and load of the database at a later time when user can afford the downtime.
