The Workload Index Advisor recommends new
indexes and changes to existing indexes on tables that are referenced
by SQL statements in query workloads.
About this task
The Workload Index
Advisor can give one of the following reasons for recommending an
index:- The index supports referential integrity.
- The index supports local predicates.
- The index supports join predicates.
- The index prevents sorting.
- The index supports multi-column, foreign-key
index access.
- The index supports index screening.
- The index supports one-fetch index access.
After the Workload Index Advisor generates
recommendations for new indexes and changes to existing indexes, you
can review those recommendations in detail. If you have the appropriate
authorities on the database, you can run the DDL statements to put
into effect the recommendations that you select.
Procedure
To generate and act on recommendations for indexes:
- In the Manage section, open
the Manage and Tune Workloads page.
- Select the query workload and click the Invoke
Advisors and Tools icon, which is on the left end of the
toolbar above the list of query workloads. The Run Workload
Advisors page of the Invoke section
opens.
- Optional: Modify values of the options
for the Workload Index Advisor.
Click Set Advisor
Options under Workload on the left
side of the Invoke section. Then, click the Indexes tab
to display the options that you can modify. For help with the options,
click the ? icon. After you are finished modifying the values for
options, click Run Workload Advisors on the
left side of the Review section.
- Ensure that the Re-explain the
query workload check box is selected, if either or both
of the following conditions are true:
- You are running this advisor after implementing recommendations
from another advisor.
- You want to collect EXPLAIN information that you can compare with
EXPLAIN information taken at a different time for this query workload.
- Click the Select What
to Run button.
- In the Select Activities window,
select the Indexes check box and click OK.
The Review Workload Advisor Recommendations page
of the Review section opens. The Summary section
on this page shows whether there are recommendations for indexes.
- In the Review Workload Advisor Recommendations page,
click the Indexes tab if there are new recommendations
for indexes.
- Review the list of tables that the Workload
Index Advisor has recommendations for.
This information appears for each table.- Cardinality
- The number of rows that are in the table. The value is -1 if the
cardinality is unknown.
- References to Table
- The number of SQL statements in the query workload that reference
the table.
- Cumulative Total Cost
- The cumulative cost to execute all of the SQL statements that
reference the table.
- Recommended Indexes
- The number of indexes that the Workload Index Advisor recommends
for the table.
- IUDM Statements
- The number of INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, and MERGE statements that
reference the table.
- Select the check box next to each table that
you want to review the recommendations for.
- In the Recommendations section,
review the new and changed indexes that the advisor recommends.
This information appears in this section.- Index
- The name of the recommended index. You can change the name.
- Table
- The name of the table that the index is recommended for.
- Action
- The action that is recommended.
- Create
- It is recommended to create the index.
- Drop
- It is recommended to drop the existing index.
Attention: Recommendations
to drop indexes are based on the current query workload. Before implementing
such recommendations, ensure that the indexes are not used by any
statements that are outside of the current query workload.
- Alter
- It is recommended to alter the existing index.
- Key Columns
- The key columns in the recommended index.
- Include Columns
- The columns that are appended to the key columns and that can
allow queries to use index-only access when accessing data. These
columns are not used to enforce uniqueness, but they can be appended
only to unique indexes. Include columns are distinct from key columns.
- Old Key Columns
- If the recommendation alters the current index: The key columns
in the current index.
- Old Include Columns
- If the recommendation alters the current index: The columns that
are appended to the key columns and that can allow queries to use
index-only access when accessing data. These columns are not used
to enforce uniqueness, but they can be appended only to unique indexes.
Include columns are distinct from key columns.
- Estimated Performance Gain
- The percentage by which the recommended index can improve the
speed of the execution of statements against the table.
- Estimated Disk Space
- The amount of space that is required to create the recommended
index.
- Times Used In Workload
- The sum of the execution counts of all SQL statements in the query
workload that reference the table.
- Unique
- Indicates whether or not the index is unique.
- Reason Recommended
- The reason that the advisor is making the recommendation.
- In the Existing Indexes section,
you can find out whether the DB2 optimizer is using existing indexes
and whether the optimizer would continue to use existing indexes after
you followed the recommendations from the advisor.
This information appears in this section.- Index
- The name of the index.
- Table
- The name of the corresponding table.
- Creator
- The qualifier of the index.
- Key Columns
- The key columns in the existing index.
- Include Columns
- The columns that are appended to the key columns and that can
allow queries to use index-only access when accessing data. These
columns are not used to enforce uniqueness, but they can be appended
only to unique indexes. Include columns are distinct from key columns.
- Used Before
- Indicates whether the index is used in the current access plans
for the statements that reference the corresponding table.
- Used After
- Indicates whether the index would be used if the recommended indexes
were created.
- Foreign Key Index
- Indicates whether or not the index is on a foreign key in the
corresponding table.
- Unique
- Indicates whether or not the index is unique.
- Virtually Drop
- Indicates whether the index was virtually dropped before a test
was run from the Workload Test Candidate Indexes page.
- Time Last Used
- Shows when the index was last used in an access plan.
- In the Index Chosen by Optimizer
but Not Recommended section, you can review a list of
indexes that the advisor considered recommending and that the DB2
optimizer would have used, but that the advisor did not recommend
because they violated constraints that you set. If you want to see
the constraints, click the Constraints tab.
This information appears in this section.- Index
- The name of the index.
- Table
- The name of the table that the index was evaluated for.
- Key Columns
- The key columns in the index.
- Estimated Disk Space
- The amount of disk space that the index would require.
- Reason Not Recommended
- The constraint that the index violates.
- If you want to see which SQL statements would
make use of the recommended indexes, in the Recommendations section
select the check box next to each index that you are interested in
and click the Show SQL Affected by the Selected Indexes icon.
- Optional: Change one or two constraints on
the Workload Index Advisor and generate a new set of recommendations. In the Recommendations section, click the Change
Constraints icon. You can change the amount of disk space
to allocate for new indexes and the number of indexes that are allowed
per table.
- If you want to run or save the DDL statements
for the recommendations, click the Run DDL icon.
The Run DDL for Selected Indexes window lets
you run the statements or save them to a file. You can also modify
the statements before running or saving them.
What to do next
After running the DDL, re-run the Workload Statistics Advisor.