Re: Pro's & Con's on Oracle & SQL Svr?

To me the biggest downer for SQL Server is the fact that it only runs on one platform (NT/2000)... This is getting to be less and less of a pain because Windows is getting more and more reliable. If you throw in the fact that you can set up (rather easily) a cluster of win2k machines with SQL server clustered, then the reliability issues are much controled, provided you monitor the cluster and take timely action (ie, do not let a cluster node be down for a week!).

I do like the ability, however, to switch from any O/S to any other O/S as transparently as Oracle allows.

On any advanced facilities, Oracle is much more advanced and time-tested (ie: DB replication, etc...).

I do not know what the pricing is for SQL server, but Oracle is not cheap.

Also, Oracle has rough edges, but the fact that you are dealing so close to the hardware/software (ie, being able to adjust so many Oracle server parameters, being able to deal with the rough data so easily, being able to tweak so many things) gives you a lot of power, not only to squeeze every bit of performance if you want, but more importantly: being able to recover from data corruption in the vast majority of the cases.

You might want to take a deep look at database backup capabilities of SQL Server, I know Oracle's are very advanced.

In the end you also have to look at the philosophies of the developers: MS has a very strong tendency to "dumb down" their products... Almost to the point that you can use it without reading any literature. Their tools are very easy to use, everything has a GUI interface, the settings and adjustments are few.

Oracle, on the other hand, comes from a UNIX point of view, exposing almost every possible setting: internal block sizes, archivelog settings, internal memory allocation sizes, almost every possible data file, storage, and allocation setting, extensive realtime performance monitoring information, and a ton of other things.

Having said that, it is easy to see why you can buy Oracle books on at least 25 different topics, while you may get along with the "SQL Server Bible" book and not need anything else.

So then you must look at the long term view of what you want to do: If it is something that will grow a lot and may require you to go into bigger and bigger servers, then get Oracle. If you are running a small-time shop that will never grow and you just need something better and more secure than MS Access, then SQL server may work out for you.

I guess you should post what is your situation and how much data you need to store in this thing before we can give you better advice.

HTH "Dr. Mueller" <nospam_at_nospam.com> wrote in message news:fVgw6.8310$IA1.662172_at_bgtnsc06-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
> Does anyone know of any articles on the internet that list the pro's and
> con's of Oracle and SQL Server 2000? It would be good to see a bullet
 point
> list of the good and bad on each. I am considering starting a database
> driven web-site and am quite frankly un-certain on which database would be
> best for the job.
>
> Thank you.
>
>
>
Received on Wed Mar 28 2001 - 22:30:02 CST