Starting servers with the startup utility

Sybase recommends that you use the startup utility, start_iq or Sybase Central to start servers. This command-line utility runs on all platforms, and ensures that all required parameters are set correctly, except in special situations described later in this chapter.

The general form for the startup utility is as follows:

start_iq [ server-options ] [ database-file 
[ database-options ], ...]

The elements of this command line are as follows:

In examples throughout this chapter where there are several command-line options, we show them for clarity on separate lines, as they could be written in a configuration file. If you enter them directly on a command line, you must enter them all on one line (that is, without any carriage returns).

See “Using command-line switches” for a descriptions of configuration files and commonly used options.

You can choose from many command-line switches to specify such features as permissions required to start a database or stop the server, and the network protocols to use. The command-line options are one means of tuning Sybase IQ behavior and performance.

NoteFor ease of use, start the database and server together, by specifying the database name when you start the server. The server takes its name from the database name by default, or you can specify a different name for the server. See “Naming the server and databases” for more information on server and database names.

To start the server without starting any database, omit the database file from the start_iq command and specify a servername. If you omit the database name, you must name the server explicitly using the -n server switch. Use this method when you create or restore a database, or when you only want to control starting and stopping the server, leaving database use to client software.

StepsStarting the server using the startup utility

  1. Change to a writable directory.

  2. At the system prompt, enter:

    start_iq servernamedatabase ]
    

If you do not specify the database, you must use -n <server name> or the server will not start. In the preceding example, the server starts on the default port 2638.

The start_iq command starts the named server as a background process, starts the named database if you specify it, and sets all required startup options. Once the server starts, it sends a message to the window or console where you started the server indicating that the server is running. It also displays other information about your server environment, as well as “possible problems” messages on failure to start. For an example of the version string and other startup messages, see “Message logging”.

All server messages are written to the server log. By default, %IQLOGDIR15% is set by the installation on Windows platforms, and the server log is in %IQLOGDIR15%\servername.nnnn.srvlog, where nnnn is the number of times the server has been started. You can also use the -o startup option to name the server log.