Re: Benchmarks was Re: Which one is better? Oracel 9i or DB2 7.2??

Pablo Sanchez wrote:

> "Niall Litchfield" <n-litchfield_at_audit-commission.gov.uk> wrote in
> message news:3cd7929e$0$8507$ed9e5944_at_reading.news.pipex.net...
> >
> > What I am saying though is that the systems that get put through
> TPC-C are
> > high end systems that in themselves are unlikely to be (I would say
> cannot
> > be) representative of many shops hardware and software
> configurations. We
> > certainly don't have 3/4 million to spend on the hardware and
> software costs
> > of our database systems. If I did want to compare across systems at
> that
> > level , and I were convinced of the usefulness of benchmarking, then
> TPC
> > would be a good place to look. Unfortunately neither of those two
> conditions
> > is true.
> >
> > The first is obviously just a function of organisation and system
> size.
> >
> > The second however springs from what I believe to be a (common)
> error in
> > creating benchmarks. The argument that shops cannot afford the time
> and
> > resource to bvench their apps on a variety of hardware and software
> is fine.
> > However I fail to see that it follows that a third party
> benchmarking what
> > it considers to be code representative of applications in general is
> an
> > equivalent replacement.If this argument holds then it would follow
> that
> > faced with a choice between say db2 and oracle I could pick the
> hardware
> > that most closely matched mine and pick the fastest/best tpc/$
> result and
> > know that the same would apply to my app.
>
> It doesn't follow because what should dictate a choice in an DBMS is
> not speed but how your shop is tooled as well as, IMHO, market-share
> (for various reasons). Additionally, you point out that there may be
> some features that your site is dependent on. I don't agree with that
> because for the most part, all DBMS' are the same. You can get them
> to do what you want to do and in the end, it's people who matter.
>
> The TPC provide additional data that supports my point: they're all
> the same. <g>
> --
> Pablo Sanchez, High-Performance Database Engineering
> mailto:pablo_at_hpdbe.com
> http://www.hpdbe.com
> Available for short-term and long-term contracts

Now you've got my attention. The statement "I don't agree with that because for the most part, all DBMS' are the same" just isn't valid.

I have worked with applications in the last five years alone that required the DBMS_SQL package: Other that required Native Dynamic SQL. And many with no dynamic SQL whatsoever. I have worked on apps with 10 simultaneous users and with 10,000 simultaneous users. I have worked on a wide variety of platforms from the usual (Windows, Solaris, HP/UX) to the unusual (Amdahl and Teradata) and with various flavors of RAID. Different jobs can have wholly different requirements.

There is not a chance I am going to find a TCP report of any value in 90% of these projects. To me they are just another form of marketing hype.

But I think it is important to remember that speed is largely irrelevant to any rational database choice. Even if the TCP results were perfectly applicable it only takes one piece of bad code to bring any machine to its knees.

Daniel Morgan Received on Tue May 07 2002 - 10:25:31 CDT