Migration Guide to FB 3

Why a Migration Guide?

Note: If you intend to move to Firebird 4, check the Migration Guide to Firebird 4 page.

Firebird 3 brings numerous innovations, such as the long-awaited full SuperServer’s SMP support, network and database encryption, local user authentication in the database, improvements in the communication protocol, in addition to several new features in different areas of the DBMS. All this made the migration process from an older Firebird version a bit more complicated than it was in previous versions, where, basically, all you had to do was replace the server with the new Firebird version or, at worst, a backup and restore of the database.

With Firebird 3, you have different user management plugins allowing the same user to exist in several different plug-ins, with different passwords. The SYSDBA is now optional, as well the use of the security database (you can use any existing database as the security database). You can do this short test and see if you are prepared for Firebird 3.

This Guide will help you in the process of migrating your existing databases and servers to Firebird 3, avoiding headaches and bad surprises!

The guide is now available both in PDF format (128 pages) and printed. The table of contents can be seen in the end of this page.

See what some readers are saying about the Guide:

The migration guide has been VERY helpful and saved me a lot of time. I have been making changes to our product and its installation. Your guide made it very easy to understand what changes were needed to transition to FB 3.

Thanks for putting this eBook together! It is certainly well worth the money I paid for it.

Best, Mike Simmons

I appreciate your book. It is very informative and well written. I review almost all of it yesterday evening. I hope you have more books in your Firebird 3 future. Thank you very much. Sincerely, Robert Firl

Though called a migration guide, this well designed manual provides far more information than simply being relegated to how to move between earlier versions of the Firebird Database Engine and the most recent version of this highly capable database system…It is by far one of the superior manuals I have read over the years on the subject of database systems. [Read full review]
Steve Naidamast

About the author

Carlos H. Cantu is the maintainer of the FirebirdNews site, FireBase (biggest portal dedicated to Firebird in Portuguese language, with + 70,000 registered users) and author of four Firebird books (Firebird Essencial, Firebird 2, both available only in Brazil, and the Migration Guide to Firebird 3 and Migration Guide to Firebird 4 – available in English and Portuguese). He also organizes the biggest Firebird Conference in the world (Firebird Developers Day), with an average of 450 attendees each year, and currently in its 18^th year.

Buy it now

The book is available either in PDF format and in printed format. For the PDF version, buy it using the PayPro link below. You will receive your copy in the email informed in the order form, usually in 24h after the payment is confirmed (make sure to check your antispam folder).

PS: Brazilians must buy the PT-BR version of the book at FireBase. For Portuguese speakers living outside Brazil, buy the book here and write a note in the comment field asking for the PT-BR version of the guide.

Price (PDF version): USD 16

[Buy the eBook at Paypro]

The PRINTED version is available at Amazon (USD 23.50):

Amazon US – Amazon UK – Amazon DE – Amazon FR – Amazon ES – Amazon IT – Amazon JP

Doubts? Email the author: livro -at- firebase.com.br

Table of Contents

Index
Dedication
Thanks
About the author
Preface by Ann Harrison
Introduction
Icons used
Basic but essential concepts!
1. SuperServer vs. Classic vs. SuperClassic
  1. Classic (CS)
  2. SuperServer (SS)
  3. SuperClassic (SC)
  4. Embedded
2. What architecture to choose?
3. 32 vs. 64 bits
Installing Firebird 3
1. Installing Firebird 3 on Linux
2. Installing Firebird on Windows®
  1. Server architecture
  2. Service or Application?
  3. Start automatically
  4. Client library (fbclient.dll)
  5. gds32.dll
  6. Authorization for legacy Firebird clients
  7. Checking whether Firebird is running
  8. Installing Firebird using the “Zip Kit”
  9. INSTSVC
  10. INSTREG
  11. INSTCLIENT
Migrating Existing Databases to Firebird 3
1. Why Migration?
2. ODS (On Disk Structure)
3. Test the database integrity with gbak
4. Problems with character encoding
5. Validating the metadata
6. Recommended steps for migrating a database to Firebird 3
7. Migrating 24×7 servers
8. Tips to speed up the backup/restore process
Users in Firebird 3
1. Local users
2. Passwords
3. Initializing the security database
4. Managing users using SQL
  1. Creating users
  2. Modifying users
  3. Deleting users
5. Sec$users and sec$user_attributes virtual tables
6. Preparing a script to insert users into the new server
Protecting your data
1. Creating a secure environment
2. Encrypting the database file
3. Conclusion
Wire Protocol Enhancements
1. Traffic encryption
2. Traffic compression
3. Enhancements for usage in high latency networks
Connection strings
1. Legacy syntax
2. URL based syntax
3. IPv6 support
Firebird 3 and legacy applications
1. .NET applications
2. Jaybird applications
3. Logical data type (Boolean)
4. Connecting to Firebird 3 with an old client library (fbclient)
5. Query performance
6. Reserved words
7. Manipulating the System tables (RDB$…)
8. Testing application’s queries
9. Using mon$attachments to get the number of active connections
10. Default cache size for Classic/SuperClassic
11. Mixing implicit and explicit joins
12. Count() now returns a BIGINT
13. Permission for creating databases
14. Permissions for generators and exceptions
Appendix
1. Macros
2. Configuration entries
Glossary