Using relational databases with BMC Helix Innovation Suite

BMC Helix Innovation Suite can use any of the following database platforms:

  • Microsoft SQL Server
  • Oracle
  • PostgreSQL


Related topics

Data-management-in-the-AR-System-database

Relationship-between-forms-and-database-tables

In general, BMC Helix Innovation Suite hides the underlying database from the user. The AR System server interacts with the database and provides information to the user independent of the underlying database. All access through the API supplied with the product goes through this server and is independent of the database.

Updates to the database

If you upgrade from a previous version of BMC Helix Innovation Suite, the data dictionary is restructured. BMC reserves the right to change the structure of the BMC Helix Innovation Suite database in any release. If the structure is changed, the database version number is updated to indicate a change.

BMC Helix Innovation Suite supports read access directly from the tables but does not support update access to any of the BMC Helix Innovation Suite tables directly through SQL. You must go through the BMC Helix Innovation Suite API for update access.

Other than BMC Helix Innovation Suite data, BMC Helix Innovation Suite and its installation do not interact with or affect other data in the database. The only exception is data referenced by using the Direct SQL capability within workflow or by using a view form. For more information about this function, see the Developing section.

Warning

Because BMC Helix Innovation Suite passes SQL commands to the database without checking the syntax, all commands are submitted to the database. Make sure all submitted commands achieve the desired result. Your SQL commands should comply with ANSI SQL standards so that single quotation marks are reserved for strings and double quotation marks are reserved for use with database object names only.

You can perform any system administrator activity on the database or on any of the tables it contains. This includes performing regular backups, creating more tablespaces to be added to the AR System database, and adding more containers to tablespaces.

After the AR System database is created, BMC Helix Innovation Suite creates a series of tables that form its data dictionary. For more information, see The-AR-System-data-dictionary.

Each type of relational database behaves differently with regard to search qualifications, wildcards, and so forth. The following topics describe these differences:

For information about different behaviors and requirements for installing BMC Helix Innovation Suite with specific databases, see Preparing for installation in BMC Helix Innovation Suite Deployment documentation.

For information about configuration options and parameters associated with specific databases, see ar-cfg-or-ar-conf.

 

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