RE: RAC on linux?

Back when I was in discussions about becoming a beta site for Oracle Financials I visisted Oracle HQ at 20 Davis Drive in Belmont, CA. When asked why we should believe that Oracle was really committed to this new "Financials" product we were told that Oracle Corp. was anticipating the time when relational database servers would be more of a commodity and they needed to diversify into the applications market to maintain revenues. Well since then: a lot of competition fell by the wayside; Oracle kept improving the database; and they gained/maintained market share. Despite the threat of commodity pricing Oracle managed to leverage its customer base and technology to maintain healthy margins on the database engine. Nevertheless, if Oracle anticipated commodity database server prices back then I would think we're finally getting closer to that eventuality with the advent of open source.

If the systems I administer cost less does that make me less valuable? I don't think so because the real value is in the data.

Still dreaming,
Steve

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Friday, February 07, 2003 9:15 AM
To: ORACLE-L_at_fatcity.com; Orr, Steve

This is probably more realistic than many of us realize.

Linux and open source in general is seriously threatening MS.

PostGreSQL has been around for awhile, but mySql has much more momentum than PGS ever had. I look for it to seriously threaten Oracle in the future.

Maybe not at the high end, but definitely in the small to medium ranges of database sizes, availability.

Jared

On Thursday 06 February 2003 14:58, Orr, Steve wrote:
> Uncle Larry is probably thinking, "Since you're saving so much money on
the
> O/S and the hardware you have more to spend on Oracle so don't complain."
>
> I'm actually hoping open source PostgreSQL/MySQL start to compete and
force
> Oracle to lower their pricing... I can dream can't I. :-)
>
> -----Original Message-----
> Sent: Thursday, February 06, 2003 3:19 PM
> To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
>
> I'm a bitter, old, twisted man. And I feel like it when I read this
thread.
>
> Here's why.
>
> A lot of good people are celebrating the fact that Oracle RAC can run on
> a two-node Intel cluster with Linux on top. Very cost-efficient, they say.
>
> Well, here's my small calculation:
>
> 1. Two 4-cpu Intel boxes: $8.000,-
> 2. Linux: 50 cents
> 3. Oracle RAC for 8 CPUs: $480.000,-
>
> So that's 60 dollars to Oracle for every dollar to Dell/HP/whatever.
>
> Here's a really bad picture, which I apologise for. It's not good. But I
> cannot come up with a better, so please help me...
>
> Imagine buying a car which can run, has seats, a roof, four wheels,
> brakes, the ability to turn and go backwards, built-in radio, etc. Price
> $8.000,-
>
> Imagine that ABS brakes, airbags, anti-skid stuff and such cost $480.000,-
> It's not that you don't appreciate ABS, airbags, etc. It's not that you
> think it's expensive to get such fantastic devices. But it's a lot
> compared to the basic price of the car.
>
> Now, excuse me for being old and bitter: What exactly is the reason for
> going RAC in the first place? And why would you buy into something which
> is really expensive ($60.000,- per cpu) running on platforms that are -
> well - not as well-defined as the old (and dying) UNIXes?
>
> Why are you so fascinated by the fact that Intel is cheap and Linux is
> cheap when Oracle is so expensive?!?
>
> How can we talk about cheap Linxu clusters with RAC, when the pricing is
> as it is? I'd say it sounds a bit like an oxymoron :)
>
> Mogens

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Author: Orr, Steve
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