Open source
Discussion of relational database management systems that are offered through some version of open source licensing. Related subjects include:
IBM discontinues the solidDB MySQL engine
Last year, I thought that solidDB could at least potentially be an outstanding MySQL engine. But as per news posted on SourceForge last week, that’s not going to happen. At least, it’s not going to happen via any development efforts from IBM.
| Categories: IBM and DB2, Mid-range, MySQL, Open source, solidDB | 4 Comments |
PostgreSQL can be used in a lot of different ways
The relational DBMS industry is filled with startups. In some way or other, most of them are based on or make use of the open source project PostgreSQL. (Not all, of course; exceptions include DATAllegro and Infobright, which are based on Ingres and MySQL respectively.) But how they use PostgreSQL varies greatly. Read more
| Categories: EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus, Greenplum, Open source, PostgreSQL, Vertica Systems | 10 Comments |
EnterpriseDB on Elastra, early stages
I finally caught up with Bob Zurek about EnterpriseDB’s foray into the Elastra cloud. Here are some highlights:
- There have been dozens of applicants for the EnterpriseDB/Elastra beta program. As is usual in limited beta programs, EnterpriseDB is trying to sort out the ones who’ll make a big commitment from the tire-kickers.
- The main interest in EnterpriseDB/Elastra has come from ISVs, and secondarily from purely online businesses (e.g., SaaS vendors, web businesses, and a large MMO game vendor). There’s been a little interest from enterprises.
- Significant fractions of the EnterpriseDB/Elastra beta applications come from each of the Oracle, PostgreSQL, and MySQL user communities. A few come from SQL Server. None come from DB2.
- Bob praised Elastra for its technology in clustering, starting/stopping instances, etc. He also said that EnterpriseDB had “educated” Elastra on EnterpriseDB internals and/or admin tools, to make the integration work.
- EnterpriseDB will start turning on a few beta Elastra customers any day now (i.e., it may well not take until March, the original target).
| Categories: Cloud computing, Elastra, EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus, Mid-range, OLTP, Open source | Leave a Comment |
PostgreSQL speeds up OLTP
The Register reports on PostgreSQL 8.3, and emphasizes OLTP speedups and reductions in administrative burden:
Among the changes, Heap Only Tuples (HOT) that may cut the maintenance overhead of frequently updated tables by up to 75 per cent, spread checkpoints and background writer autotuning to reduce the impact of check points on response times, and an asynchronous commit option that also speeds the response times of certain transactions.
I wonder how EnterpriseDB compares on these features.
Edit: Slashdot has discussion and links. And here’s a PostgreSQL feature matrix.
| Categories: EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus, Mid-range, OLTP, Open source, PostgreSQL | 1 Comment |
EnterpriseDB joins Elastra in the Amazon cloud
When Elastra announced their service to host MySQL and PostgreSQL in the Amazon S3/EC2 cloud, I immediately told my dear darling clients at EnterpriseDB they should do the same. Whereupon they told me it would happen soon. However, they neglected to tell me when it was actually announced. So I know no more than can be found in this Computerworld article.
But I’ll say this — it’s a very tempting option, both for new web-based applications or businesses, or simply as a development platform pending later redeployment.
| Categories: Amazon and its cloud, Cloud computing, Elastra, EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus, Mid-range, OLTP, Open source, Software as a Service (SaaS) | 2 Comments |
What hard-core transactional applications have actually been built in MySQL, PostgreSQL, EnterpriseDB, or FileMaker?
And here’s the biggie.
Question of the day #3
What complex, high-volume transactional applications have actually been built in mid-range DBMS such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, FileMaker, or EnterpriseDB?
I’ve been flamed for suggesting that MySQL or FileMaker aren’t fully equal to Oracle and DB2 in supporting hard-core transactional applications. (Which is ironic, because I’ve also been flamed for suggesting hard-core transactional support isn’t as big a deal for DBMS selection as some relational purists insist. But I digress …) So I’m putting the question out there — what impressive transactional applications do the stand-alone mid-range DBMS actually support? Read more
| Categories: EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus, FileMaker, Mid-range, MySQL, OLTP, Open source, PostgreSQL | 20 Comments |
14 reasons not to use MySQL or other mid-range database management systems
I may argue for the use of open source and other mid-range database management systems, but a lot of industry sentiment remains on the other side. Vendors of high-end RDBMS naturally advocate enterprise-wide single-vendor adoption. Many CIOs and industry analysts, overwhelmed by product proliferation, think that’s a neat idea as well.
And in fairness, they’re not entirely wrong. Here are 14 reasons for using high-end relational database management systems, even on applications for which mid-range DBMS would suffice. Read more
| Categories: Microsoft and SQL*Server, Mid-range, MySQL, OLTP, Open source, Oracle, PostgreSQL | 25 Comments |
What leading DBMS vendors don’t want you to realize
For very high-end applications, the list of viable database management systems is short. Scalability can be a problem. (The rankings of most scalable alternatives differ in the OLTP and data warehouse realms.) Extreme levels of security can be had from only a few DBMS. (Oracle would have you believe there’s only one choice.) And if you truly need 99.99% uptime, there only are a few DBMS you even should consider.
But for most applications at any enterprise – and for all applications at most enterprises – super high-end DBMS aren’t required. There are relatively few applications that wouldn’t run perfectly well on PostgreSQL or EnterpriseDB today. Ingres and Progress OpenEdge aren’t far behind (they’re a little lacking in datatype support). Ditto Intersystems Cache’, although the nonrelational architecture will be off-putting to many. And to varying degrees, you can also do fine with MySQL, Pervasive PSQL, MaxDB, or a variety of other products – or for that matter with the cheap or free crippled versions of Oracle, SQL Server, DB2, and Informix.
What’s more, these mid-range database management systems can have significant advantages over their high-end brethren. Read more
Open source DBMS as a business model
Sun’s planned acquisition of MySQL is inspiring a lot of discussion about open source business models. Typical is Michael Arrington’s cheerleading for the idea that you can make a lot of money with open source. More interesting is Gordon Haff’s suggestion that it’s a lot easier to make money with open source when you have other things to actually sell to the same customers (e.g., the rest of Sun’s product line). (A similar view can be found here.)
To analyze this more carefully, it helps to distinguish among three different aspects of open source models:
- Open source product packaging
- Open source product development
- Open source pricing
Here’s what I think about each in the case of database management systems. Read more
| Categories: MySQL, Open source | 5 Comments |
The blogosphere writes about Sun buying MySQL
More from me soon, but first here is a survey of what other people are saying about Sun’s billion-dollar deal to acquire MySQL:
- Jeremy Cole, evidently a very experienced high-end MySQL user, itemizes some serious problems with MySQL — optimizer, memory management, replication, and so on. (Uh, Jeremy — what part of the product do you like?) He also echoes a theme I’ve seen elsewhere, and to some extent noticed myself; MySQL has had a lot of management issues as a company.
- Jeffrey McManus calls out Sun’s promise to continue to support non-Java programming languages in MySQL. Kaj Arnö of MySQL makes the point emphatically, reciting a list of operating systems and development environments/languages MySQL will continue to support.
- Matt Asay quite reasonably interprets Sun’s move as a bid for overall leadership and development of the open source software platform industry. I would add that Sun CEO Jonathon Schwartz came up through the software side of the business. I would further add that Sun has a dismal track record with closed-source software acquisitions, including Forte’, NetDynamics, and the enterprise side of Netscape.
- Matt also has selected quotes from the press conference, including Sun saying the coopetitionally obvious “Yeah, we’ll continue serious support for PostgreSQL and Oracle too.” Brian Aker also supports the PostgreSQL point.
- Zack Urlocker of MySQL implies that Jonathon Schwartz was very involved in the deal personally. That makes all kinds of sense.
- 451 Group has some interesting links, and don’t miss the short comment thread.
- The official MySQL and Sun company lines are summarized in this Zack Urlocker post on Infoworld (as well as some of the links above) and this post from Jonathon Schwartz of Sun.
| Categories: MySQL, Open source, PostgreSQL | 2 Comments |