Database indexes are data structures that improve the speed of data retrieval operations on a database table by allowing quick access to rows. They relate to the performance of an application by significantly reducing the time required to query and fetch data, thereby enhancing the application's responsiveness and efficiency, especially for large datasets.

Database statistics are metadata that describe the distribution and storage characteristics of the data within a database, such as the number of rows, data distribution, and index usage. They relate to the performance of an application by enabling the database management system to optimize query execution plans, leading to faster and more efficient data retrieval and processing. Statistics should be updated regularly to provide the query optimizer with accurate information.

Database engineers can tweak a wide range of characteristics of a database server. Some examples are the minimal and maximal server configuration, the max degree of parallelism (MAXDOP), processor affinity, tempDB configuration, cache plan optimization, and many more. The database server brand and version also influence performance. A database server can be used by multiple applications/customers or one. The performance of a shared database server can be impacted by the load that is placed on it by other applications or customers. For example, many default Planon SAAS cloud environments share the same database server.

Compression is the process of reducing the size of data by encoding it more efficiently. It relates to the performance of an application by decreasing the amount of data that needs to be stored or transmitted, which can speed up data transfer rates and reduce storage requirements, ultimately enhancing the application's performance.

The operation system that hosts the application impacts performance. For example, Linux is seen as faster and less resource-intensive than Windows. The application and web servers of our SAAS cloud environments run on a Linux distribution. The operating system for our database servers remains Windows.

Other software running on the systems hosting Planon can also influence the performance, such as virus scanners or maintenance tools.

The design and implementation of our software itself play a crucial role. We strive to optimize our performance as much as possible. Many optimizations are continuously considered and applied, such as caching, database indexes, stored procedures, query optimization, and data normalization. See the chapter on this topic for an explanation of how we do this.