Foreword

An ongoing challenge for today's computer professionals is reserving the time to develop new skills to keep up with changes in technology. Our value as technology professionals is increased as we learn and develop new skills with industry leading products. One of the most technologically advanced products in the industry is DB2 Universal Database, which is also the market leader on popular environments such as Linux.

More than 20 years ago, Relational database technology was invented in IBM Research delivering the first commercially available database in the early 1980s. This invention created the unique ability to represent data in a simple tabular form, access it through the powerful SQL query language, and make it readily available to the business community. Today, tens of thousands of businesses all over the world rely on DB2 databases to store key corporate data assets and run their business both traditionally and over the Web.

DB2 provides virtually unlimited scalability, industry leading performance, reliability, and availability. DB2 continues to lead the industry by focusing on autonomic computing that will make DBAs more productive and allow our customers without a DBA staff to manage their database environments effectively with a minimum of effort.

The demand for DB2 skills continues to grow. Certifications were awarded in over 60 countries around the world, more than 3000 institutions worldwide are teaching DB2-related courses, and over 100,000 download requests have been made from DBAs and Developers who have wanted to extend their skills from Microsoft, Sybase, and Oracle to DB2 UDB.

This Certification Guide is an excellent way to learn about DB2, to develop new skills, and to provide new opportunities for yourself in the computer industry. This book includes a trial copy of DB2 that will give you an opportunity to develop skills using hands-on experience, as well as a set of scripts to help you monitor and tune your databases. I hope you use this Certification Guide in advancing your skills and enjoy the benefits of being a certified DB2 professional.

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