Re: IBM and Oracle - Let's Rrrrrrrrrrrrruuuuuuuuumbbbbbbbbbbleeeeeeee

From: Tool <tool_at_thetool.com>
Date: Sun, 06 May 2007 22:25:53 -0400
Message-ID: <SLy%h.7069$vu1.7042@fe52.usenetserver.com>

Bill Martinez wrote:

> DA Morgan wrote:
>

>> In other words ... we don't know anything more than we did before we
>> read this.
>>
>> But for those who have to pay their mortgage and feed their families
>> the only metrics that matter are those that can be found at:
>> www.dice.com.
>>
>> As of 6 May, 2007:
>> =========================
>> DB2 3,419 8.9%
>> Informix 452 1.2%
>> Oracle 17,861 46.7%
>> SQL Server 14,171 37.0%
>> Sybase 2,355 6.2%
>> =========================
>>
>> If these aren't the numbers you're looking at you aren't paying
>> attention to putting the kids through college and your retirement.

> 
> Are these market share figures?
> 
> Shouldn't people consider things like performance, cost of maintenance, 
> etc... if they want to put their kids through college?
> 
> I notice that Anheisur-Busch has the lion's (clydesdale) share of the 
> beer market here in the US.
> 
> I don't particularly like any of their beers - should I drink them 
> anyway just because their popular?
>

>> Small comfort to remember your product loyalty to a particular brand
>> when living off your Social Security check.

Good points Bill. Microsoft has the lions' share of office software, but like Anheuser, it isn't always the best choice in it's space.

There is also a lot of muddy water with trying to compare Oracle with DB2, at least on an apples-for-apples comparison. At the high 'executive' level it works, but when it gets down to implementation DB2 and Oracle are not exactly comparable products. Oracle is also selling it's db in most cases as a result of selling an application that requires it, but rarely do you really hear about a company outright deciding to buy an Oracle database on its own. I have yet to walk into a shop that has a bunch of Oracle bigots in it, in most cases Oracle is treated as something that was required for an application, not because some database expert said it was the best choice among databases. I do see a lot of shops buying SQL-Server because of the perceived value that it's good for developing applications, and that's of course due to some marketing from Microsoft. You see MySQL being recommended too, because developers love it. Received on Sun May 06 2007 - 21:25:53 CDT