Wanted: ISAM file access under SunOS

[Neil Readwin]

Some time ago I asked ...
>Does anyone know of any software that will allow indexed-sequential
>access to files under Unix (in particular SunOS 4.0.%) ?

The suggestions were ...

LPI Cobol :-).


Sun's NetISAM is what we are using at the moment, and my posting arose from
a desire to replace it, after all, how can you take software seriously when
it fails with messages like 'ISAM error 114' :-' It is interesting to note
that Sun expect to have XPG3 conformance this year. This requires ISAM 
support so the question arises ... will they bundle it ? NetISAM provides
a lot more than XPG3 requires (for example, variable length records are
in XPG4 but not XPG3) so if they bundle *anything* it would presumably be
a neutered version.


Informix' C-ISAM runs on all Suns and many other machines. Performance can
be tuned to suit the machine, but Informix tend not to bother unless they
expect a return (in terms of sales) on the time invested in tuning. If you
want a lot of copies on an obscure machine it might be worth pressing them
on the issue of speed. People seem quite happy with this package in general.


>I'm using a package from Byte Designs that supports isam files.  I got it
>indirectly from INFOFLEX, Inc. (415-340-0220) as part of their INFOFLEX
>RDBMS.  Give them a call.  I think that source licenses cost less than $10K


>I've been told that Ingres (I don't know about University Ingres) includes
>support for B-Tree files and for isam files.  I assume it wouldn't be too
>hard to pull the isam code out of the rest of Ingres.  You can pick up 
>University Ingres for free (modulo connect charges :-) from uunet.


C-tree, D-tree, & R-tree from Faircom (314-445-6833) are a complete set of
development tools and libraries written in C (with source). C-tree is the
basic B-tree file-handling package. Older versions were limited to fixed
length records and keys, but newer versions may allow variable lengths.


gdbm 1.3 (GNU database manager) handles single-key indexes. It seems this is
similar to (n)dbm, which (if my reading of the manual pages is correct)
provide indexed access but not sequential access. The most recent version is
on prep.ai.mit.edu (18.71.0.38) under pub/gnu.


Many thanks to 
<jgreely at cis.ohio-state.edu>      C.Elvin at ee.surrey.ac.uk
<ian at ukpoit.uucp>                 <pgd at bbt.se>
<rfinch at locke.water.ca.gov>       benah%adspp at mcsun.UUCP
<guy at auspex.com>                  <breck at aimt.aim.com>
<orona at wiesbadn-emh1.army.mil>    and other (anonymous) contributors

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