First Guide to SQL Anywhere Studio
   PART 1. First Steps
     CHAPTER 1. Introducing SQL Anywhere Studio       

Adaptive Server Anywhere

The Adaptive Server Anywhere relational database management system is at the heart of SQL Anywhere Studio. This section describes the kinds of task for which Adaptive Server Anywhere is designed, describes how Adaptive Server Anywhere fits with other members of the Adaptive Server family of products, and describes the technical hallmarks of the product.

  Intended uses for Adaptive Server Anywhere

Adaptive Server Anywhere is designed for tasks that require a full-featured SQL database. Adaptive Server Anywhere is designed to operate in varied environments. It takes advantage of available memory and CPU resources, providing good performance in environments with ample resources. It also operates well in environments with more limited physical and database administration resources. Restricted resource environments include mobile computing environments, embedded database use, and workgroup servers.

Roles for which Adaptive Server Anywhere is ideally suited include the following:

• An embedded database     Many applications require a database "behind the scenes". Personal Information Managers, document management systems —just about any application that stores information. Adaptive Server Anywhere is intended to be the database for these applications.

• Mobile computing     Laptop and notebook computers are now common in many workplaces. Adaptive Server Anywhere is intended to be the SQL database for these computers. With SQL Remote replication, Adaptive Server Anywhere extends transaction-based computing throughout the enterprise.

• A workgroup server     Workgroups ranging in size from a few people to a few hundred people in an organization may require a database server that they can share. Adaptive Server Anywhere is a multi-user server that can provide a high-performance database for workgroups, well-suited for (but not limited to) environments where administration and hardware resources are limited.

  The Adaptive Server family

The members of the Adaptive Server family share many common features. As the Adaptive Server effort evolves, the Adaptive Servers will share more features, while maintaining their individual design and optimization characteristics.

• Adaptive Server Anywhere     For mobile computing and workgroup use.

• Adaptive Server Enterprise     For high-performance OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) and mixed workload enterprise computing.

• Adaptive Server IQ     For data warehousing and decision support.

Sybase Central provides a common management tool for all Adaptive Servers.

  Technological hallmarks of Adaptive Server Anywhere

Adaptive Server Anywhere 6.0 builds on the technological hallmarks of the previous version of this product:

• Full SQL relational database management system     Adaptive Server Anywhere is a transaction-processing relational database management system (RDBMS), with full recovery capabilities, online backup, referential integrity actions, stored procedures, triggers, row-level concurrency control, a rich SQL language, and all the features you expect in a full SQL DBMS.

• Economical hardware requirements     Adaptive Server Anywhere requires fewer memory and disk resources than other database management systems.

• Easy to use     You can use Adaptive Server Anywhere without the extensive database administration efforts usually associated with relational database management systems.

• Standalone and network use     Adaptive Server Anywhere can be used in a standalone manner, for example as an embedded database in a data-centric application, or as a network server in a multi-user client/server or three-tier environment. As an embedded database system, it can be started automatically by an application when required.

• High performance     While Adaptive Server Anywhere is designed with simple administration and modest resource requirements in mind, it is a scalable, high-performance DBMS. Adaptive Server Anywhere can run on multiple processors, has an advanced query optimizer, and provides performance monitoring and tuning tools.

• Industry standard interfaces     Adaptive Server Anywhere provides a native ODBC 3.0 driver for high performance from ODBC applications. It comes with Sybase jConnect for JDBC, and in addition supports Embedded SQL and Sybase Open Client interfaces.

• A cross-platform solution     Adaptive Server Anywhere can be run on many operating systems, including Windows NT, Windows 95, Windows 3.x, Novell NetWare, Sun Solaris/Sparc, Hewlett Packard HP-UX, IBM AIX, and IBM OS/2.

       The components available on each platform may differ. For information, see Availability of components.

  System requirements

SQL Anywhere Studio requires the following:

• Operating system and CPU     You must have one of the following in order to run the Adaptive Server Anywhere database server:

  • Windows NT (3.51 or later), Windows (3.1 or later), Windows 95, Unix, or OS/2. For these operating systems, an Intel 486 or higher CPU, or compatible CPU, is required.

• Memory     Adaptive Server Anywhere can run in as little as 3 Mb of memory. If you use Java in the database, Adaptive Server Anywhere requires 8 Mb of memory. Your computer must have this much memory in addition to the requirements for the operating system.

  Network software requirements

If you are running an Adaptive Server Anywhere network server, you must have appropriate networking software installed and running.

The Adaptive Server Anywhere network server is available for Windows NT, Windows 95, Novell NetWare, OS/2, and UNIX operating systems. It is not available for Windows 3.x.

Adaptive Server Anywhere supports the following network protocols:

• TCP/IP

• IPX (not UNIX operating systems)

• NetBIOS (not UNIX operating systems)

  The Adaptive Server Anywhere database server

There are two versions of the Adaptive Server Anywhere database server included in the product:

• The personal database server     This server is provided for single-user, same-machine use: for example, as an embedded database server. It is also useful for development work.

  The name of the personal server executable is as follows:

  • On UNIX operating systems, it is dbeng6.

  • On Windows 3.x, it is dbeng6w.exe. The Win32s subsystem (version 1.30 or later) is required to run this executable.

  • On Windows 95 and Windows NT, and on other PC operating systems, it is dbeng6.exe.

• The network database server     In addition to the features of the personal server, the network server supports client/server communications across a network. It is provided for multi-user use.

  The name of the network server executable is as follows:

  • On UNIX operating systems, it is dbsrv6.

  • On Windows 95 and Windows NT, and on other PC operating systems, it is dbsrv6.exe.

  • On Novell NetWare, the server is a NetWare Loadable Module (NLM) called dbsrv6.nlm.

Same SQL features in each version 

The request-processing engine is identical in the two versions of the server. They support exactly the same SQL language, and exactly the same database features. The personal server does not support communications across a network, more than ten concurrent connections, or the use of more than two CPUs. Applications developed against a personal server work unchanged against a network server.

  The Adaptive Server Anywhere administration utilities

In addition to the tools listed in Welcome to SQL Anywhere Studio, Adaptive Server Anywhere includes a set of applications to help you manage databases. These applications can run either on the same machine as your Adaptive Server Anywhere database server, or across a network against a network server.

These utilities are:

• Sybase Central     An application for managing Sybase databases. It helps you manage database objects and perform common administrative tasks such as creating databases, backing up databases, adding users, adding tables, and monitoring database performance.

  Sybase Central requires the Windows NT (3.51 or later) or Windows 95 operating system.

• Interactive SQL     Interactive SQL is an application that allows you to type a SQL statement and send it to a database. Because all interactions with databases use SQL statements, you can carry out any database operation from Interactive SQL.

• Command-line utilities     A set of command-line utilities is provided for carrying out administration tasks such as backing up a database. Command-line utilities are useful for including in batch files for repeated use.

  Availability of components

What components you have installed depends on which operating system you are using, what choices you made when installing the software, and whether you received the Adaptive Server Anywhere product or installed Adaptive Server Anywhere as part of another product.

For example, if you have received Adaptive Server Anywhere as part of another product, you may not have both versions of the database server.

Not all components are available on all operating systems. Here are some limitations:

• There is no personal server for NetWare, only a network server.

• There is no network server for Windows 3.1 or 3.11 (16-bit Windows operating systems), only a personal server. The personal server for Windows 3.x requires the Win32s subsystem, version 1.30 or later.

  The Adaptive Server Anywhere program group

This section does not apply to users of UNIX operating systems. Installing Adaptive Server Anywhere under UNIX does not provide a program group.

For Windows operating systems and OS/2, after the software is installed you will have an Adaptive Server Anywhere program group on your desktop.

Under Windows 95 and NT 4.0, you can reach the program group by opening the Start menu and choosing Programs->Sybase->Adaptive Server Anywhere 6.0. For Windows 3.x, the program group in the Program Manager. For OS/2, the program group is on your desktop.

Program group items 

The program group contains some or all of the following items. The items you see depend on the choices you made when installing the software.

• Adaptive Server Anywhere Manual     Opens the online documentation for Adaptive Server Anywhere.

• Interactive SQL     Starts the Interactive SQL utility for sending SQL statements to a database.

• Server Sample Database     Starts the network database server and loads the sample database.

• ODBC Administrator     Starts the ODBC Administrator program for setting up and editing ODBC data sources.

• Standalone Sample Database     Starts the personal server and loads the sample database.

• Sybase Central     Starts the database administration utility.

• Sybase Web     A Web page with information about Sybase products.