A little knowledge can lead to some poor decisions. It is definitely worth understanding how the database engine executes the SQL because this can then affect how you tune the SQL.

Standard courses are good to explain the standard database tools that are available to identify and tune SQL statements.

Standard SQL performance tuning courses can assume that the attendee has complete control over the SQL.

Maximo administrators rarely have full control over the SQL because a lot of the SQL is built up by Maximo based on user’s behaviour and code.

Standard courses can recommend changes that can’t be implemented easily in Maximo:

• Change select * to select column1 – Maximo needs select * to populate the MBOs
• Deploy specialist indexes - Complex/additional non-standard practices need to be implemented as explained in this article
• Change SQL statements that use Like – the SQL can’t be changed directly but the Maximo attribute configuration can be changed to minimise use of the wildcard search type
• Switch on SQL logging for an individual user session/connection – I explained in this article why this is often ineffective

I’m booked on a standard SQL optimisation course - any tips on how to prepare?

Before you go get copies of slow SQL statements reported in the logs and the associated table structures/indexes so you can look at them and see how they can be tuned

Pay particular attention to the sections on:

• Evaluating the costs of SQL statements
• How the database engine selects the indexes to use and how to influence it
• Join types
• The different types of indexes