BI Applications: DB links and Getting DDL from sqlplus

BI Applications: DB links and Getting DDL from sqlplus: "DB link create Syntax - CREATE DATABASE LINK dblink_name CONNECT TO user IDENTIFIED BY pwd USING '(DESCRIPTION = (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP..."

BI Applications: UNSPSC

BI Applications: UNSPSC: "To be frank I had thought UNSPSC to be Unspecified. Later I realized its a standard or a convention used to classify all products and servic..."

BI Applications: Overrides in Informatica

BI Applications: Overrides in Informatica: "Few points regarding overrides in INFA - Source Qualifier Override - 1. The number of columns in the SQ query should match with the numbe..."

BI Applications: Configuring INFA Connections in DAC

BI Applications: Configuring INFA Connections in DAC: "Configuring the physical connections can be quiet daunting for Informatica DW server and REP server. First - Provide all the details in Set..."

BI Applications: Privileges within a PLSQL procedure

BI Applications: Privileges within a PLSQL procedure: "Oracle expects that we mention explicitly what kind of privileges the PLSQL procedure has. If we do not specify it properly there are chance..."

BI Applications: Accessing Table Names of other Schemas

BI Applications: Accessing Table Names of other Schemas: "Many times we would want to select the table names from another schema. In such cases below SELECT would help.. select TABLE_NAME FROM ALL_..."

BI Applications: Database Character Set of a DB

BI Applications: Database Character Set of a DB: "This query will help in finding the database character set of an oracle db. Select value from SYS.NLS_DATABASE_PARAMETERS where PARAMETER =..."

BI Applications: Difference Between COALESCE and NVL

BI Applications: Difference Between COALESCE and NVL: "COALESCE and NVL are used to achieve the same functionality of providing a default value in case the column returns a NULL. The differences..."

BI Applications: Rows to columns and Columns to Rows in Oracle

BI Applications: Rows to columns and Columns to Rows in Oracle: "Many a times we need to display data in different ways. Multiple rows in table need to be displayed as columns and vice-verse. The below li..."

BI Applications: TO_CHAR(date column) returns zero

BI Applications: TO_CHAR(date column) returns zero: "In Oracle Database we face this issue sometimes. We see that Date field contains all zeros Example - select to_char(Date_column,'dd-mm-yyyy ..."

BI Applications: Debug the Debugger of INFA

BI Applications: Debug the Debugger of INFA: "Many times we face issues while using the debugger feature of Informatica. We get error saying 'Error connecting to DTM Service' There are..."

BI Applications: Unsupported conversion Error for INFA maps on Orac...

BI Applications: Unsupported conversion Error for INFA maps on Orac...: "If your ETL tasks are failing with error as Unsupported conversion Error and log mentions something like below - ORA-26097: unsupported conv..."

Simple Trick to View .bin log files in INFA

Success and Failures of an Informatica map are part of a developers life and Session log files save a hell lot of time in finding the issues.

However many a times we do not get .log files; rather we get .bin files from QA team which do not open in a text editor. In such cases we usually try connecting to QA's INFA environment to see the log from INFA monitor or ask QA to provide it in .txt format. All these could take time and delay the bug fix.

W can read these .bin files itself easily. There are two options available -

Use this command after copying the .bin file to you local INFA environment --
'infacmd ConvertLogFile -in -lo'. This batch files is present in Informatica\PowerCenter8.6.1\CMD_Utilities\PC\server\bin

However there is a much better and an easier way to read those files -
Copy the .bin files to a folder.
Go to your local Informatica Monitor. Go to Tools --> Import log --> Browse for the .bin file

The log file opens like any other session log on the monitor. Find the issue and fix it. If required, save the log as .txt for future usage.