Overview of the db2dart tool

The db2dart command can be used to verify the architectural correctness of databases and the objects within them. It can also be used to display the contents of database control files in order to extract data from tables that might otherwise be inaccessible.

To display all of the possible options, issue the db2dart command without any parameters. Some options that require parameters, such as the table space ID, are prompted for if they are not explicitly specified on the command line.

By default, the db2dart utility will create a report file with the name databaseName.RPT. For single-partition database partition environments, the file is created in the current directory. For multiple-partition database partition environments, the file is created under a subdirectory in the diagnostic directory. The subdirectory is called DART####, where #### is the database partition number.

In a DB2® pureScale® environment, some metadata files (such as bufferpool configuration files) exist for each member and are validated or updated on a per-member basis (rather than per-database).

The db2dart utility accesses the data and metadata in a database by reading them directly from disk. Because of that, you should never run the tool against a database that still has active connections. If there are connections, the tool will not know about pages in the buffer pool or control structures in memory, for example, and might report false errors as a result. Similarly, if you run db2dart against a database that requires crash recovery or that has not completed rollforward recovery, similar inconsistencies might result due to the inconsistent nature of the data on disk.