DBMS Survey

From: David Roberts <droberts_at_seas.gwu.edu>
Date: 1995/08/17
Message-ID: <4101am$hs2_at_cronkite.seas.gwu.edu>#1/1

I have been working with a large government organization making a strategic decision about database systems, considering these products: Sybase SQL Server, Informix, Microsoft SQL Server, IBMs DB2/2, Oracle. If you have experience with any of these, please help by sending your answers to the questions which follow. We guarantee strict CONFIDENTIALITY and will not release your name to anyone for any purpose.

Many thanks to those who participated in the initial survey. From your comments, we've composed our final survey arranged according to our key requirements. We will tally these results and distribute to interested parties, including everyone who responds to this survey.

For each statement, please edit this note by answering 1 to 4, from Strongly Agree to Strongly Disagree, and email direct to me at: droberts_at_seas.gwu.edu. There is space for comments at the end.

Thanks for participating! I think you'll find the results interesting and informative.

==> First, please identify the product and the release:

SCALE:

1 = Strongly Agree
2 = Agree
3 = Disagree
4 = Strongly Disagree

(Leave undecided or inapplicable questions unanswered)

SOFTWARE QUALITY

1.  We have never had an unexplainable crash.  ANSWER:
2.  The product performs as advertised.  ANSWER:
3.  Our developers have had to compensate for some features which are 

lacking.
ANSWER:
4. The optimizer does its job. It is flexible, yet smart enough to perform without
mandatory manual intervention. ANSWER:

5.  The product is lacking in friendliness.  ANSWER:
6.  It seems this vendor thinks of their customers as beta testers.  ANSWER:
7.  Overall, we have found the quality of the product is high.  ANSWER:  
8.  The product is not stable.  ANSWER:  
9.  Some of the tools which come with this product are buggy.  ANSWER:  

SECURITY
10. The product offers all the access control features we need. ANSWER: ADMINISTRATION
11. We have been able to configure and control our system efficiently. ANSWER:
12. Installation is difficult. ANSWER: 13. Systems administration tools are cumbersome and difficult to use. ANSWER:
DISTRIBUTED DATA
14. Sharing data between network nodes is easily accomplished. ANSWER: REPLICATION
15. The products replication features are very effective. ANSWER: SUPPORT

16.  Technical support seems to have knowledgeable staff available.  ANSWER:
17.  Problems are resolved quickly by technical support.  ANSWER:
18.  Documentation is technically correct and up-to-date. ANSWER:
19.  The vendor delivers product upgrades and bug fixes at reasonable 

intervals. ANSWER:
20. Technical support is structured in a way which makes it quick and easy to report a problem. ANSWER:
21. When reporting a problem, we are able to reach qualified assistance quickly. ANSWER:
22. Overall, product support is very good. ANSWER: 23. The favored response from support is: Restart your server. ANSWER: BACKUP AND RECOVERY
24. We have never lost data because of problems with this product. ANSWER:
25. We have always been able to recover from any crash. ANSWER: TRANSITION
26. There was a steep learning curve when we transitioned to this product. ANSWER:
27. The product is very portable. We switched platforms very easily. ANSWER:
PERFORMANCE
28. We are very satisfied with performance. ANSWER: DECISION SUPPORT
29. The product provides the features we need to build our data warehouse. ANSWER:
NT
30. The vendor shows a commitment to the NT platform. ANSWER: UNIX
31. The vendor is very committed to the UNIX platform. ANSWER: STANDARDS
32. Limitations in the vendors implementation of SQL are a problem. ANSWER: AVAILABLE APPLICATIONS
33. A large number of off-the-shelf applications work well with this product. ANSWER:
TRAINING
34. The vendor offers sufficient training courses and qualified instructors. ANSWER: Received on Thu Aug 17 1995 - 00:00:00 CEST