Enterprise Databases

[dave-lew99]

We're on the cusp of expanding our product to include a large database but as developers most people in our office are choosing the engine based on how easy it is to develop for/features.

I have the most admin knowledge and i'm pushing for something which is well recognised/supported - like MSSQL or Oracle.

What DB's do you prefer in your enviroment? if your company decided they wanted to buy 'Application X' would you be happy if it ran on Firebird or another less well known DB?.

 

[dave-lew99]

That's pretty much what i thought.

I'm not directly doing the DB development (yet) but i'm fairly sure the access methods we're using mean we can use any SQL based DB without too much hassle.

MSSQL is a good choice because for a small system the free Express edition will be suitable and can run on the same machine as the application. Oracle also has a free edition but i'm not sure how well it works, it is however, cross platform.

Bigger systems will scale accordingly, the usual way a system is sold is such that we supply a whole system - including pre-configured servers but increasingly customers are asking what DB engine is used and server platforms the app's run on etc.

 

[dave-lew99]

Well i obviously can't go into a huge amount of detail.... but...

Even in the largest of systems, the number of operations will be in the low 100s per minute so it's not a high performance DB, although i think they calculated it at being up to about 1Tb of data...

I don't think i'd be happy with MySQL (although it does have it's advocates), mainly as i see it as a smallish web DB, even though there is a well-scaled enterprise variant.

 

[dave-lew99]

I was meaning more the connection/driver basic connection, obvioiusly it's best to exploit the features of one database than make it general to support more, but not as well.

MSSQL is the route being taken i think with perhaps con-current development on Oracle.

Thanks for your help everyone.