
Hungry termites nibbling at Oracle's foundation - mwaci
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/07/26/oracle_threatened_by_database_minnows/
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eftpotrm
Aside from the simple fact that I'm experienced and comfortable with Oracle's
competitor databases and don't need them, you know what keeps me away from
Oracle? Their reputation.

Oracle the company have managed to spend several years convincing me that
their software licencing is expensive and designed to trap me into needing
extra expensive add-ons, and that their management are litigious predators out
to shut down innovation by whatever means.

Quite frankly, why would I build for their platform?

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praptak
What the article misses is a discussion of the core reasons keeping folks with
Oracle. I know a little about that - sometimes eventual consistency is not an
option and you just need to max the performance on an ACID system. Some folks
just need a throat to choke.

But I'd like to know how many other reasons there are.

~~~
Joeri
I work on an oracle-based system with roughly a thousand tables and 200.000
lines of PL/SQL code. What keeps us on oracle is:

1\. We know it well. It is easy to develop for because it's just SQL on a
single server.

2\. In traditional ACID transactional processing, our core business, it
performs quite well. Even mediocre queries often perform well. We've never had
a customer or use case outgrow a single oracle db yet. Part of the reason
oracle is so expensive is that you need very few servers if you properly
design your db architecture.

3\. Our customers already know how to deploy it, which makes rolling out our
product much easier. It is proven and well-understood technology. Often they
already have an oracle server for us to share.

4\. Our product is designed around oracle and ACID. Migrating to an
alternative would be painful (if moving to an ACID alternative like postgres)
or horribly painful (if moving to a BASE database).

I think people often make the mistake of looking at the single license cost of
sql server or oracle and assuming they're more expensive than the <insert
favorite alternative> nosql db of the hour when you add up all the costs. I
used to mock microsoft for bringing up TCO, but i have to admit it's a fair
point. Stackoverflow runs off of a mirrored pair of sql server instances. You
have to wonder how much servers they would need and how much extra development
it would have cost to handle the same load on an eventually consistent
alternative.

My personal opinion is that you have to choose up-front whether to scale up or
scale out. Scaling up means paying for oracle or sql server and having a
simpler development model because you have a single db instance. Scaling out
means going for nosql and taking some of the reliability and synchronization
work into your codebase. I don't think companies like oracle are selling the
development advantages of scaling up very well, probably because they're not
developer-oriented. The strategic mistake oracle continues to make is to
alienate devs. They could build a strong case for oracle over nosql, if they
cared about developer relations.

~~~
dmpk2k
_Scaling up means paying for oracle or sql server and having a simpler
development model because you have a single db instance. Scaling out means
going for nosql and taking some of the reliability and synchronization work
into your codebase._

Ignoring some of the specific details and focusing on the underlying point
here:

Having had to work with both ACID and BASE systems extensively, the above
point strikes a chord with me. Those of you who haven't dealt with both in
anger, take heed of it.

BASE is a lot of code and reasoning to work with properly, and you're
sacrificing the many knobs, tools, and easy ad-hoc queries (read: simpler
debugging) that the common ACID systems have to get it. Common ACID systems
are well understood, so there are many fewer surprises in wait. Furthermore,
those systems are mature and have walked the inescapable trail of tears to get
there; data is the lifeblood of most businesses, so it's not a place to take
risks.

I'd rather work with ACID. BASE is for when you really need it (and when you
really need it, you'll _know_ ).

~~~
jacques_chester
Distributed systems are hard, including for database vendors. So when the
database "doesn't scale", the database gets blamed.

It's a bit like blaming Boeing for gravity, then swearing only to use fleets
of microlights to relocate your shipping containers.

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pstuart
Oracle is not just a database company anymore.

~~~
toyg
This. These days, Database is one of hundreds of products covering every
enterprise market under the sun. Their emphasis is in selling you products for
specific needs, which of course will use the database underneath. In that
sense, developer relations are less important, since

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linuxhansl
I assume all of these companies are moving _some_ of their data off Oracle.

In any event, Oracle is a bully.

I think most of the companies only do business with them, because they have to
(as sometimes there is no alternative). What Oracle will probably learn
painfully in the future, is that folks will be moving away as soon as they get
the chance.

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ExpiredLink
The NoSQL hype currently is in the "Trough of Disillusionment" phase, not?

~~~
guard-of-terra
Actually no, it's in the "we figured it out and use it instead of hyping it"
phase.

~~~
ExpiredLink
This would be "Slope of Enlightenment":
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hype_cycle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hype_cycle)
. I venture to doubt that NoSQL has reached this phase yet.

