On Mon, Sep 15, 2008 at 09:31:14AM -0500, Roberts, Jon wrote: > > Roberts, Jon wrote: > > > My top 10 reasons why companies pick Oracle. > > > > Do you mean they actually get these things, or they imagine they do? > > > Huh? Companies buy Oracle all of the time. They don't get stuff promised in the "top 10 reasons" by any stretch of the imagination. > > There certainly are a lot of false perceptions out in the world > > about Oracle, and about proprietary software in general. > > > > > 1. 24x7 Support > > > > At several different places over the years, I've seen their > > top-tier support simply not respond. > > > That is highly unusual. I've always had excellent experience with > Oracle's support especially their top tier support. Try calling them when you've hit one of their many un-fixed-for-years bugs. > > > 2. Security: Patches, > > > > When they get good and ready. There are outstanding security > > issues in Oracle that have been there for years. > > I'm not saying Oracle is more or less secure. I think people feel > better about security from a company like Oracle rather than a bunch > of hackers on an email list. People may well feel that monkeys are going to fly out of Larry Ellison's butt, but that does not make it true. > It is perceived as more secure by many, especially large companies. Large companies, as you put it, have a lousy track record on access control, which is what you appear to mean by security. > > > encryption, > > > > We have it. > > > PG can't encrypt code. What makes you think this would improve access control or anything related to security? I'd submit that encrypting stored procedures produces a false sense of security by giving people the impression that they've done something when they have really not. > > > protection of database code, etc. > > > > Are you saying that the fact that the source isn't legally > > available to the population at large is a feature? If you are, > > it's an argument for security by obscurity, a system with a lot of > > deep known flaws. > > > No, I'm saying that if I create a function in PG, ANYONE with access > to the database can see my code. That is not secure. It is a > security hole for the database. This is precisely an argument for security by obscurity. Feel free to educate us all on why this suddenly became a good idea. > > > 3. Software indemnification (which is open source's biggest > > > problem) > > > > Are you kidding?!? Read the EULA for Oracle or any other > > proprietary software package and then read the BSD license. They > > both indemnify about the same thing, i.e. nothing. If you have > > any examples in case law that show otherwise, they'd be a great > > thing to bring forth. > > The contracts you sign when you buy Oracle indemnify you from > lawsuits. Feel free to cite one single case where this has actually worked. Federal or state court, either one. > > > 4. Scalability of shared disk (Oracle RAC) > > > > RAC doesn't scale outside Oracle's sales literature, as far as > > I've seen. > > I have. We only have your word on that because Oracle's EULA expressly forbids you from ever publishing such a thing. Throwing more hardware at a single-image system is much cheaper and more reliable in my experience. > > > 6. Best, oldest, and most proven concurrency model for any > > > commercial database product > > > > It's none of those things. > > > Which commercial database is better? MS SQL Server, Sybase, DB2, > what? Depends what you're doing. DB2 consistently beats Oracle for giant transaction processing loads. MS-SQL Server has way better end-user OLAP tools. > > > 7. Runs great on various platforms not just Linux or just > > > Windows > > > > Is this different from some other RDBMS(s) out there, and if so, > > which one(s)? The only "just Windows" RDBMS I've ever heard of is > > MS SQL Server, and I know of no "just Linux" ones. > > > PG doesn't scale well on Windows. DB2 seems to work best on a > mainframe. Sybase works best on Unix. MS SQL Server only runs on > Windows. This is pretty specious. *Nothing* scales well on Windows, and when you get into RDBMSs that run on actual server OSs, they all do a pretty creditable job. > > > 8. Recruiting a senior level Oracle professional with over 10 > > > years of experience is not very difficult > > > > Finding somebody with 10 years' experience is no problem. Finding > > somebody half-way competent is a different story. *crickets* > > > 9. Deep, deep discounts. I've never seen any company pay list > > > price for Oracle products. It has always been at least 50% off > > > if not more. > > > > 50% off a price that's bloated by 1000% or more isn't much of a > > muchness. > > > It is only the perception of a good deal. So what? For 90% off of your next 5 years of Oracle licenses and HR, I'll get you converted to PostgreSQL. The difference is that I can actually do that, and you'll actually save money. > > > 10. Sales employees that will do anything to retain or grow > > > your business. > > > > That's just great if you prefer hookers and blow to a working > > RDBMS. > > > LOL. That is pretty funny. I'm talking about doing free work like > a proof of concepts, demonstrations of products, etc. I've even > seen technical sales guys help out onsite for free for performance > tuning an application. You're being astoundingly naïf if you imagine that the hookers and blow thing is a joke. > > > The initial price of the product factors into the equation for > > > big companies but when you look at all the value add of Oracle, > > > it is very tempting. > > > > Their sales and marketing people have certainly done an excellent > > job creating the perceptions above, among others, and spreading > > them around the industry. > > Perception = sales. So basically lying is a legitimate tactic. This tells a lot about you. Cheers, David. -- David Fetter <david@xxxxxxxxxx> http://fetter.org/ Phone: +1 415 235 3778 AIM: dfetter666 Yahoo!: dfetter Skype: davidfetter XMPP: david.fetter@xxxxxxxxx Remember to vote! Consider donating to Postgres: http://www.postgresql.org/about/donate
