Embarcadero, a provider of multi-platform database tools, is adding more graphical capabilities to DB Optimizer to make it easier for developers and DBAs to do SQL profiling and tuning. DB Optimizer, which supports IBM DB2 for LUW, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server and Sybase, helps eliminate performance bottlenecks by identifying data-intensive or frequently executed queries, focusing on specific SQL statements through query statistics (CPU, I/O, wait times), and fine-tuning problematic statements.

DB Optimizer 2.0 takes SQL tuning beyond standard hint injections and SQL rewrites by offering advanced features such as Index Analysis and VST diagrams.

With the new DB Optimizer 2.0, "we have improved the indexing analysis, that had existed only for Oracle, and now is cross-platform," Kyle Hailey, program manager for DB Optimizer at Embarcadero Technologies, tells 5 Minute Briefing. The Index Analysis feature has also been enhanced so that DBAs and developers can fully examine SQL execution paths to better understand which indexes are used, not used, or missing. "That is good information to a developer who might have expected a certain index to be used," Hailey points out. Also, if an index is missing, DB Optimizer 2.0 offers indexing recommendations for optimum performance.

The new VST diagram displays indexes and constraints on tables and views, as well as the joins used in a SQL statement. This helps developers and DBAs see potential flaws in the schema design such as Cartesian joins, implied Cartesian joins and many-to-many relationships, accelerating trouble-shooting and analysis.

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