Setting up Db2 v9 as a Coldfusion Datasource

In the last few weeks I've had the opportunity to get to know Coldfusion just a little bit better. One of the first challenges I faced is getting CF talking to Db2, so I could take advantage of the CF Extensions for Flexbuilder and that funky Wizard. To be precise I used ColdFusion MX 7.02 and DB2 Community Express Edition v9.1

This doesn't just apply to Flex, but maybe others might find this useful. Keep in mind I have only tested this in Windows:

1. Install the db2 client or get access to a machine that does. I installed db2 in the default folder on my dev machine to get this working.
2. Copy C:\Program Files\IBM\SQLLIB\java\db2java.zip to C:\CFusionMX7\lib. Important: Make sure db2jdbc.dll is in the path somewhere or copy it to same folder!
3. Restart Coldfusion MX. Login to CF Admin. Go to Datasources.
4. Add new Datasource:

• driver type Other
• CF DataSource Name: [sourcename]
• JDBC url: jdbc:db2:[dbname]
• Driver Class: COM.ibm.db2.jdbc.app.DB2Driver
• Driver Name: DB2Driver
• username: [name]
• password: [password]
• [Submit]

Couple things to note. Out of the blue the other day suddenly I started getting this db2jdbc not found in java path error... I figure something I installed hooped my system path. Instead of messing around with why, I figured out that just copying the dll into my CF lib folder fixed the problem. The ...app.DB2Driver is specific to Windows OS I believe. The username and password are usually a Windows account... probably best to use the account that has admin rights to db2 at least until you get it working.

I also did spend a good chunk of time trying to get the built in driver to talk to db2... I personally had no luck whatsoever, and I have read in other places that the drivers generally are only backwards compatible... the driver that ships with CF is definitely not v9, I think it might be v7... not sure though. I did test the backward compatibility claim by using the v9.1 jdbc driver against a db2 v8.x datasource and it worked fine.