It is extremely important that you understand and plan resource usage in advance. In the case of disk resources, for example, after you initialize and allocate a device to Adaptive Server, that device cannot be used for any other purpose (even if Adaptive Server never fills the device with data). Likewise, Adaptive Server automatically reserves the memory for which it is configured, and this memory cannot be used by any other application.
The following suggestions can help you plan resource usage:
For recovery purposes, it is always best to place a database’s transaction log on a separate physical device from its data. See Chapter 21, “Creating and Managing User Databases.”
Consider mirroring devices that store mission-critical data. See Chapter 17, “Mirroring Database Devices.” You may also consider using disk arrays and disk mirroring for Adaptive Server data if your operating system supports these features.
If you are working with a test Adaptive Server, it is sometimes easier to initialize database devices as operating system files, rather than raw devices, for convenience. Adaptive Server supports either raw partitions or certified file systems for its devices.
Keep in mind that changing configuration options can affect the way Adaptive Server consumes physical resources. This is especially true of memory resources. See Chapter 4, “Setting Configuration Parameters,” for details about the amount of memory used by individual parameters.