#Tips & Tricks

InterSystems FAQ rubric

If you need to migrate your server for some reason, you can reduce the setup work by copying configuration information from the pre-migration environment to the post-migration environment.

The following setting information can be migrated.

• iris.cpf
• SQL gateway settings
• web gateway settings *Note 1
• user-created routines etc. stored in the IRISSYS database *Note 2
• security settings
• task settings

Note 1: If a password has been set, only the password needs to be reset manually.
Note 2: Preferred connection server settings such as ^%ZSTART, ^ZMIRROR routines, etc.

What comes to the data platform (not the user facing application) most of the the events of interest/required are available as predefined system audit events in audit log - out of the box. They just need to be enabled.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

This error occurs when an instance of the class is already open at compile time.

There are two ways to deal with this issue:

1. Terminate the process or application that has the instance open
2. Compile options in the studio build menu: Check the compile flag “Compile classes in use” and compile.  

If you want to determine which process is using the class, try the sample routine below.

/// Test.mac

Hi developers!

As you know InterSystems IRIS besides globals, object, document and XML data-models also support relational where SQL is expected as a language to deal with the data.

And as in other relational DBMS InterSystems IRIS has its own dialect.

I start this post to support an SQL cheatsheet and invite you to share your favorites - I'll update the content upon incoming comments.

Here we go!

InterSystems FAQ rubric

If a relationship is set and there is a large number of n in a 1:n ratio, a large amount of memory may be consumed due to sequential processing of the relationship.

After referencing a many-sided object in a program and internally swizzling it, simply releasing the variable containing the OREF (deleting it, setting another value, etc.) will not free the many-sided object and the relationship object. This is the cause.

Now, let’s say you can’t access the terminal or simply you just rather execute it from a web interface. In this article, I will show you how to execute terminal commands from a simple web page.

For example, in the image below you see how we execute $zv on a webpage:

This is mostly possible due to the XECUTE command in Caché ObjectSCript. This command takes a string as a parameter and tries to execute it. This is the command used from the webpage, to execute what is being passed from the left navigation menu.

This article contains three snippets of code.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

There is no need to recompile the routines after the version upgrade, but since the version update overwrites %SYS, user-created INT and OBJ format routines (*.INT,*.OBJ) in %SYS will be deleted. Therefore, you need to be careful. 

MAC, INT and OBJ routines with the following names are not deleted.

%Z*.INT, %z*.INT, Z*.INT,z*.INT
%Z*.OBJ, %z*.OBJ, Z*.OBJ,z*.OBJ

Please note that classes/CSPs need to be compiled after upgrading.

However, if you are upgrading to a maintenance release, no compilation is required. For details, please refer to the document below.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

If multiple InterSystems products are installed on the same system, the latest version of the InterSystems ODBC driver among the installed products will remain registered in the driver manager.

You can change to any driver by changing the registry entry below.

 Please note that running RegFiles.bat does not change the ODBC driver.

The registry entry is as follows.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBCINST.INI\InterSystems ODBC35 key Driver
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBCINST.INI\InterSystems ODBC35 key Setup

Does anyone have an effective tool for anonymizing/deidentifying CCDAs for testing purposes?

InterSystems FAQ rubric

To resolve the error <PROTECT>, remove the read-only attribute of the system-wide library database (IRISLIB for InterSystems IRIS, CACHELIB for Caché/Ensemble/HealthShare (Caché-based))

Once you have finished importing the routine, remember to change it back to read-only.
 

[Version 2013.1 and above]
[Management Portal] > [System Administration] > [Configuration] > [System Configuration] > [Local Database] Uncheck "Mount read-only" from the database name link.

[Version 2011.1 - Version 2012.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

Class definitions created by users are stored in class definition classes. They can be used to obtain a list of class definitions from a program.

Note: Class definition classes refer to all classes contained in the %Dictionary package.

In the sample code below, a list of class definitions is obtained using the query Summary of the class %Dictionary.ClassDefinitionQuery.

ClassClassMethod#dim

An example of execution is as follows.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

When executing OS commands, use $ZF(-100).

do$ZF100

When executing OS shell commands such as mkdir and copy, also specify /SHELL.

Please refer to the following documents for details:

About $ZF(-100) [IRIS]
About $ZF(-100)

There are situations when your only access to a server is using a web browser,
and there is just no chance of a Terminal or Console access.
The Online Demo Server is such a case.

So you have WebTerminal. That's fine for ObjectScript and Embedded Python.

But my demo is straight Java. And is interactive.
$ZF(-100...) is some aproach. But it's rater batch-oriented and not interactive.
@Enrico Parisi  presented a nice extension to WebTerminal recently.
It's close to my own packageWebCommand that I presented a year ago.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

A tool (^GLOBUFF utility) is available to check the database cache usage for each global variable.

You can run the utility directly or programmatically in the %SYS namespace.

Here's how to run the utility directly:

InterSystems FAQ rubric

You can set the maximum size of the IRISTemp database at IRIS startup by setting a configuration parameter called MaxIRISTempSizeAtStart.

After setting, the system will truncate IRISTemp to the set value (MB) at the next IRIS startup. If the current size is less than the specified MaxIRISTempSizeAtStart, no truncation will occur. Also, if 0 is specified, truncation will not be performed, so the size will start without changing. (Default) Settings are made from the menu below.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

To run an online backup from a command you can use the API BACKUP^DBACK routine.
An example of performing a full backup is as follows.

set^DBACK""

The return value is 1 if the backup is successful, and 0 if the backup is unsuccessful. Please refer to the log file for details on failure.

Additionally, you can specify C for the second argument TYPE to specify a cumulative backup, and specify I to specify a differential backup.

An example routine is below.

FULL ()  public  {
    

InterSystems FAQ rubric

To create a user-defined error you need to prepare the XML that describes the error code and corresponding message that you want to use as a user-defined error.

Please set the error code as a negative integer.

<?"1.0""UTF-8" 
<<

Once the XML file is created, load it into the namespace you want to use.

##class

Once loaded, you can retrieve and display user-defined errors with a command like the following:

USER>

We are successfully using System Default Settings to manage differences in settings across environments where the production and underlying code are otherwise identical. However, the TestingEnabled and LogGeneralTraceEvents settings don't appear to be settable via this mechanism. While we appear to be able to set them on the SDS page, they do not show up as selectable when resetting the settings on the Production Settings tab in the management portal - see screenshots below.

I was recently asked whether we have a function to convert LDAP date time stamps into $HOROLOG format or other formats and the answer is not at the moment, but there is a simple method to do the conversion.

Let us look at the facts and figures involved...

InterSystems FAQ rubric

For routines (*.mac)

You can hide the source by exporting/importing only the *.obj that is generated after compiling the source program.

The command execution example specifies EX1Sample.obj and EX2Sample.obj, which are generated by compiling EX1Sample.mac and EX2Sample.mac, as export targets and exports them to the second argument file.

After moving to another namespace, I am using the exported XML file to perform the import.

USER>do$system

For classes (*.cls)

InterSystems FAQ rubric

Information on properties defined in a class can be obtained using the following system classes:

%Dictionary.ClassDefinetion

%Dictionary.PropertyDefinition

The code description example is as follows.

ClassClassMethodAs

An example of execution is as follows.

USER>

Related article: How to get all fields of a specified table with SQL

We are back to %SYS once again! Since we covered managing users and resources in the last two articles, we can finally move on to roles. As you may have guessed, there are a lot of methods of managing them that you have already seen in our previous writings. However, we can still encounter key differences in this particular class.

Before we begin, bear in mind that this is another class that should not be manipulated through direct SQL access. In newer versions of IRIS, you will find a NoSQL trigger that will prevent you from doing that anyway.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

ObjectScript allows you to pass any number of arguments using arrays. Do it by adding ... after the argument name.

An example is as follows. In the example statement, the argument information is set in a global variable (a variable stored in the database) so that it can be easily checked after the method is executed.

ClassExtends%RegisteredObject

The result of running it in the terminal is as follows.

USER>

Hi Community,

In this article, I listed 5 useful SQL functions with explanations and query examples 👇🏻
These 5 functions are

• COALESCE
• RANK
• DENSE_RANK
• ROW_NUMBER
• Function to Get Running Totals

So Let us start with COALESCE function

InterSystems FAQ rubric

In the sample below, an image file is encoded into a Base64 string in a class property, saved, decoded again with Base64, and restored to another file.

【Usage class】

Class User.test Extends %Persistent
{
Property pics As %GlobalBinaryStream;
}

【When importing】

  set x=##class(User.test).%New() // create a new object

  // prepare an image
  set file=##class(%File).%New("c:\temp\Mii.png")
  do file.Open("RUK\BIN\")
  for {
       if file.AtEnd=1 quit
       // Convert image to Base64 format in chunks of 1024 bytes
       set cnt=file.Read(1024)
       set b64=$system.Encryption.Base64Encode(cnt) // b64: 1402byte
       do x.pics.Write(b64)
  }
  do x.%Save()
  do file.Close()

InterSystems FAQ rubric

On Linux, use the iris command to execute a routine or method from a shell and get the return value.

For more information,  please refer to the document "About Instance Connections".

An example of a command is as follows.

iris terminal instname [arguments]

The return value of a shell script can be specified using a special variable using the Terminate() method of the %SYSTEM.Process class when the process ends, rather than by specifying an argument in the QUIT or RETURN command that is specified when a routine or method ends. Use the method of returning a value to $?

InterSystems FAQ rubric

The meaning of each timeout value is as follows.

1. [Server response timeout]

If IRIS/Caché processing (routine or query execution) does not finish within this set time, the browser will return an error.

For example, if this value is 60 seconds and it takes 90 seconds to execute a routine/method/query, an error will occur.

2. [Queued request timeout]

For each IRIS/Caché server configured in CSP/REST, you can limit the number of processes that can run CSP/REST concurrently.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

It can be retrieved using the schema INFORMATION_SCHEMA.

INFORMATION_SCHEMA is a system schema and is not displayed by default in the SQL menu of the Management Portal.

The method to display it is as follows.

1. Open Management Portal → System Explorer → SQL menu.
2. Check "System" on the left of the schema drop-down.
3. Select INFORMATION_SCHEMA from the schema dropdown.

The SQL to get the ID, field name (COLUMN_NAME), data type (DATA_TYPE), description (DESCRIPTION) for the specified table (Sample.Human) is as follows.

InterSystems FAQ rubric

You can avoid the error by specifying a stream object as the argument of %ToJSON() used when generating a JSON string from a dynamic object.

A code example is below.

USER>set##class

See also the documentation for details.

[IRIS] Serializing large dynamic entities to streams

Serializing large dynamic entities to streams

With the world (as well as our own technology) moving to the cloud at such a fast pace it is easy (at least for myself) to get caught up in the little details. One thing I, and some clients of ours, had run into a couple of times was the necessity to specify the version of the images one plans to use with the IKO.

For example, one issue that often gets overlooked is the compatibilityVersion field for the IKO. Depending on which IKO you are using there is a default value (for IKO 3.6 this happens to be 2023.2.0, and for IKO 3.5 this is 2022.3.0).