Running queries directly on DB2 databases Just have a general query, if it is really fine or safe to run long select queries on RDBMS production Databases specifically DB2? If NO, what are the major risks and issues in executing select queries directly on the backend production DB2 database?

Regards
Muddu
There are two major concerns here.  First you are using significant server resource (memory, CPU, disk) on a produciton box which, presumably, is busy.  This will be delaying other work.  In the extreme, your huge query may fully consume some shared resource and cause other work to fail.  Second, your query may be locking data others are trying to use.  There are ways around this which either compromise the integrity of your results or use further server resources.

Mitigations include


cut the job into smaller sub-jobs.  If you're processing data for a year, for example, submit 12 separate monthly jobs sequentially and combine these results afterwards.  Your elapsed time will be longer but your impact will be less.
run during slack times, after-hours or weekends.
copy the data to another server and run the job there.
ensure the SQL is efficient and the DB adequately indexed for this task.


If this work needs to be done, and it needs to be done on this box, then you don't have much choice.  Inform your management of the risks and good luck.