RE: I need faster SQL

In this case I think that a user space might be overkill. 

Alan Campin said:

You will note I said "if you are reading in a lot of records". If the
average read only gave you a few records, yes user space is an overkill.

If a single read is going to give dozens or hundreds of records or you
simply don't know what is being returned, the user space makes a lot of
sense because you don't have to manage the storage. The operating system
takes care of it for you and the performance is superb. The IBM manuals
make it clear that whenever possible do a multiple record fetch. 

Kim says:

In this application, the most records (open orders for a product number)
that I would be returning from this funtion would be about a dozen.  I
am almost sure that it is the open and closing of the data path that is
consuming most of the processing time.

However, the more I run this thing the faster it is getting.  The OS
must be learning something about my needs as I repeatedly run the
application.