# Support for IBM DB2 database in Radiant **URL:** \ **Category:** Radiant CMS\ **Created:** [April 25, 2007, 5:39pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/support-for-ibm-db2-database-in-radiant/92915 "2007-04-25T17:39:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 5:39pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/support-for-ibm-db2-database-in-radiant/92915/1 "2007-04-25T17:39:31Z")
I would be interested in building a Radiant site with the IBM DB2 9.1 database as a back end. Such product is available in a free express edition, and provides native XML data storage, which would be very useful for our site, devoted to XBRL, a language derived from XML used for representing financial documents ([http://xbrl.org](http://xbrl.org)). I have installed the IBM\_DB adapter version 0.4.6 and had it running. The adapter is still limited, since it does not support rename\_column. I was able to create the radiant bootstrap database substituting the final DB schema for the sequence of migrations. I can create smippets and layouts, but cannot create pages. After posting the “create” command, I get an error message of the sort (translated from Italian): Found unforeseen token “)” after “UPDATE pages SET (”. Token may be: “\”. SQLSTATE=42601 SQLCODE=-104’ Before wasting too much time, I would like to know if someone in the Radiant community has considered supporting DB2. In order to support it, what should be needed? Is a compliant ruby db adapter enough, or you have to tweak specific SQL statements somewhere in radiant code? Thanks in advance Luca Luca Erzegovesi University of Trento, Italy removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid ---
**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 5:48pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/support-for-ibm-db2-database-in-radiant/92915/2 "2007-04-25T17:48:32Z")
On Wed, 25 Apr 2007, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid wrote: > Before wasting too much time, I would like to know if someone in the > Radiant community has considered supporting DB2. > In order to support it, what should be needed? Is a compliant ruby db > adapter enough, or you have to tweak specific SQL statements somewhere in > radiant code? Luca, Radiant uses the Rails framework, which is where all the database adapters live… and it seems there are already three projects that are in process or already working. [http://wiki.rubyonrails.com/rails/pages/IBM+DB2](http://wiki.rubyonrails.com/rails/pages/IBM+DB2) But it seems Radiant does have specific code to deal with different DB engines. DB2 is on the list of engines to support, but no one is testing it yet… except you! [http://radiantcms.org/blog/2006/05/09/improved-database-support/](http://radiantcms.org/blog/2006/05/09/improved-database-support/) I would think your testing will help this effort along. Chris ---
**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 5:57pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/support-for-ibm-db2-database-in-radiant/92915/3 "2007-04-25T17:57:32Z")
Radiant uses Rails’ database adapters with very little modification (I think there was a sqlite patch in there somewhere). Traditionally, Rails has not supported DB2 well. Anything you could contribute to improve the adapter would be appreciated in the Rails community at large, I imagine. Sean ---
**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 6:00pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/support-for-ibm-db2-database-in-radiant/92915/4 "2007-04-25T18:00:32Z")
removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid wrote: > Before wasting too much time, I would like to know if someone in the > Radiant community has considered supporting DB2. > In order to support it, what should be needed? Is a compliant ruby db > adapter enough, or you have to tweak specific SQL statements somewhere in > radiant code? I’m happy to apply any patches to Radiant that allow it to support other databases, but Radiant mostly relies on Rails to write the SQL. Getting Radiant to run on another database has been relatively straightforward. Databases occasionally seem to have problems with one of the ArchiveIndexPages, but that is mostly a matter of updating the way Radiant extracts date parts (month, day, year) from a date field. I’d suggest that you do the following: 1. Get Radiant’s test suite to pass on DB2 2. Get migrations running on DB2 3. Contribute changes to the DB2 database adapter back to Rails (if you have any) 4. Send me a patch for Radiant (if it turns out that it needs one) – John L. [http://wiseheartdesign.com](http://wiseheartdesign.com)