Re: Sybase vs Oracle

Here goes but you won't like the answer. We have been using Oracle and now need to support Sybase as well. I find Sybase absolutely maddening. Here are the more egregious points:
1. Just 255 characters for a VARCHAR. Oracle 8 has 4K and MS SQL Server 7 has 8K. Text is not very efficient.
2. No user-defined functions in Sybase. Stored procedures are not the answer when you want to write a function that can be used in an SQL statement.
3. Case sensitivity. You can control this to some extent in Sybase but I got used to being able to capitalize just whenever I felt like it. MSS doesn't have this problem either and yet they used to be the same product. I get the feeling Sybase can't keep up with Microsoft. 4. Oracle has the DECODE function which is extremely useful when you have coded data. We are trying to find a way to let our users still have this function on Sybase but it is turning into a major pain. Sybase has several functions that are similar to Oracle but with limited semantics: ltrim, rtrim, substr(ing).
5. There is no doubt that Oracle's runtime interface (OCI) is faster than ODBC. When I asked the people at Sybase if we should use ODBC or DB-Library, they said ODBC. Really? Maybe that means Sybase and ODBC performs well and Oracle with ODBC does not but I'm beginning to think that it means Sybase performance will be slow either way. 6. Sybase forces you into auto-commit mode when use DDL statements like DROP TABLE. Oracle seems to understand what a DDL statement is and handles the auto-commit implicitly.
7. Oracle comes with GUI tools for database administration. Sybase does not but I am told that they are available from other sources. That doesn't fill me with confidence.
8. Sybase has so thoroughly confused the marketplace that it is very difficult to tell what database people are talking about: Sybase SQL Server, Sybase Adaptive Server, SQL Anywhere (the one they got from Watcom), Sybase IQ. Am I really supposed to choose one for my data warehouse and a different one for OLTP? 9. Recently Intersystems (makers of Cache) ran a full page ad in ComputerWorld claiming to be 20 times faster than Sybase. Wouldn't they make the same claim of Oracle if they could.

I'll stop there. If I add one more it will be a Letterman list. Paul K

Steve M. Park <spark_at_ic-usa.com> wrote in article <36236A3F.8F5FBD87_at_ic-usa.com>...
> I am an experienced Sybase DBA and have been
> tasked with putting up a back end. I am trying to be fair & evaluate
> the merits of Oracle vs Sybase. I have installed Oracle 7.2 a few times
>
> several years ago and recall some of the issues in general. I have
> recently browsed the Oracle 8 manuals and it looks to be a real pain to
> get running compared to Sybase. Of course, I can do Sybase more or less
>
> in my sleep. What I'm looking for is concrete reasons to use one
> database over the other. For those of you who have done both, any help
> is greatly appreciated.
>
> steve
>
>
>
>
Received on Wed Oct 14 1998 - 23:38:39 CDT