Re: No future for DB2
Not a technical support thread: a poster asks how credible an eWeek article predicting a bleak future for DB2 is. The discussion turns into opinion/flamewar across the Oracle and DB2 groups. Dan Morgan argues DB2's problem is an aging mainframe-era workforce and that universities teach Oracle/SQL Server instead; others counter that retirements mean more DB2 jobs, that Oracle 10g automation cuts DBA demand, that bookshop shelf counts aren't a meaningful metric, and that DB2 scales well but IBM markets it poorly. No conclusion or resolution is reached; it ends as unresolved debate.
Auto-generated by DrWatson from the posts below — may be imperfect; read the full thread.
rkusenet wrote: > This article is very bleak about future of DB2. How credible is the > author. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1839681,00.asp Graph the calendar year vs. the average age of DB2 developers and DBAs. Do the same for the other major commercial RDBMS products. You will have your answer. It is not that DB2 is technically incapable of competing. Rather IBM is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. I left Fortran for a reason. I left COBOL for the same reason. Those working with DB2 should take a serious look at which is more important ... product loyalty or paying the mortgage. -- Daniel A. Morgan http://www.psoug.org damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
"DA Morgan" <damorgan@psoug.org> wrote in message news:1122533361.487428@yasure... > rkusenet wrote: >> This article is very bleak about future of DB2. How credible is the >> author. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1839681,00.asp > > Graph the calendar year vs. the average age of DB2 developers and DBAs. > Do the same for the other major commercial RDBMS products. You will have > your answer. > > It is not that DB2 is technically incapable of competing. Rather IBM > is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my > experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, > including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. > I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. > > I left Fortran for a reason. > I left COBOL for the same reason. > Those working with DB2 should take a serious look at which is more > important ... product loyalty or paying the mortgage. > -- > Daniel A. Morgan Even if your premise is correct (which I believe is greatly exaggerated), your conclusions are backwards. If there are more DB2 DBA's retiring, then there will be a shortage of DB2 talent and more job opportunities. Given the ease of administration improvements in 10g (not to mention the improvements that are no doubt coming in future Oracle releases), as 8i and 9i installations migrate to 10g, that alone will create at least a 30% theoretical reduction in the number of Oracle DBA's needed. I expect this trend to continue as Oracle fends off MS SQL Server.
Mark A wrote: > "DA Morgan" <damorgan@psoug.org> wrote in message > news:1122533361.487428@yasure... > >>rkusenet wrote: >> >>>This article is very bleak about future of DB2. How credible is the >>>author. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1839681,00.asp >> >>Graph the calendar year vs. the average age of DB2 developers and DBAs. >>Do the same for the other major commercial RDBMS products. You will have >>your answer. >> >>It is not that DB2 is technically incapable of competing. Rather IBM >>is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my >>experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, >>including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. >>I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. >> >>I left Fortran for a reason. >>I left COBOL for the same reason. >>Those working with DB2 should take a serious look at which is more >>important ... product loyalty or paying the mortgage. >>-- >>Daniel A. Morgan > > > Even if your premise is correct (which I believe is greatly exaggerated), > your conclusions are backwards. If there are more DB2 DBA's retiring, then > there will be a shortage of DB2 talent and more job opportunities. > > Given the ease of administration improvements in 10g (not to mention the > improvements that are no doubt coming in future Oracle releases), as 8i and > 9i installations migrate to 10g, that alone will create at least a 30% > theoretical reduction in the number of Oracle DBA's needed. I expect this > trend to continue as Oracle fends off MS SQL Server. Even if your statements are correct I don't believe it is going to happen that way. Lets say I have DB2 in my facility ... I was at a major IBM shop in Portland Oregon three weeks ago that is precisely that. And lets say the CTO isn't a software bigot but rather has his corporation's best interests at heart. The CTO has a choice ... hire young inexperienced talent and train them up to the level of those of us in our 50s and 60s on mainframes which means also teaching COBOL, CICS, MVS JCL, OS/390, z/OS, TSO, VSAM, IMS, REXX, ISPF, and CLISTS or get already trained talent straight out of a college program. Lets say the CFO of the firm has a choice of maintaining big iron with attendant costs in infrastructure including power conditioning, air conditioning, etc. or can build a mainframe from 2 proc or 4 proc commodity hardware for a fraction of the cost and get the same computing power at a fraction of the cost. Look at the number of super computers now build from commodity hardware for example. And lets say the Board of Directors is paying attention to the fact that reducing costs increases the value per share of the stock which is their fiduciary responsibility to the stockholders the direction is clear. The number of DBAs required in the future is going down like the value of Sun Microsystems stock. So yes there will be holes in the organization created. But I've yet to meet the CTO whose solution was to incur the cost of training on mainframe technologies. Heck most won't even pay money to train their existing staff and they too need it. It is all about dollars. The C-Level management is looking out for the bottom line. We need to be look out for our mortgage payments. -- Daniel A. Morgan http://www.psoug.org damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
DA Morgan wrote: > Those working with DB2 should take a serious look at which is more > important ... product loyalty or paying the mortgage. You still have a mortgage? Mine was paid off long time ago :) -- Anton Versteeg IBM Netherlands
DA Morgan apparently said,on my timestamp of 28/07/2005 4:49 PM: > is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my > experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, > including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. > I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. Once a year I do a tour of the bookshops around here and see how many books are going for each of the major databases. This year, Oracle: two top-to-bottom bookshelfs. SQL Server: one top-to-bottom bookshelf. MySQL: four shelfs. Postgres: one shelf. DB2: one shelf, with ALL books from IBM Press. UDB: none, not one single book. All others (including Informix): one or two books here and there. This is worse, MUCH worse than last year. And the year before. About time IBM stopped pandering to Gerstner's little hurt ego and just dropped the darn UDB thing once and for all and concentrated on what they do best: hardware and software for mainframes. And just in case I get the usual hate mail: sorry folks, I like DB2 but it's irrelevant. And I don't call UDB the same product: never was, never will be. No amount of underhand marketing from IBM is gonna change that simple fact. So don't bother with the "market positioning", waste of time and the reaction is the same: <yawn> -- Cheers Nuno Souto in sunny Sydney, Australia wizofoz2k@yahoo.com.au.nospam
Noons wrote: > DA Morgan apparently said,on my timestamp of 28/07/2005 4:49 PM: > >> is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my >> experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, >> including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. >> I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. > > Once a year I do a tour of the bookshops around here and see > how many books are going for each of the major databases. > > This year, > Oracle: two top-to-bottom bookshelfs. > SQL Server: one top-to-bottom bookshelf. > MySQL: four shelfs. > Postgres: one shelf. > DB2: one shelf, with ALL books from IBM Press. > UDB: none, not one single book. > All others (including Informix): one or two books > here and there. That's a nice flamewar here. Let's fan it some more... ;-) Your metric doesn't mean anything useful. As you are surely aware, the number of books probably only says samething about the number of *bad* book being available - not about the number of good and useful books, which is undoubtedly rather small for Oracle too. (I'm inclined to agree that there might be more useful Oracle books out there than for DB2.) Another idea is: why are so many books needed for Oracle in the first place? Makes me wonder. ;-) -- Knut Stolze Information Integration Development IBM Germany / University of Jena
DA Morgan wrote: > Mark A wrote: > >> "DA Morgan" <damorgan@psoug.org> wrote in message >> news:1122533361.487428@yasure... >> >>> rkusenet wrote: >>> >>>> This article is very bleak about future of DB2. How credible is the >>>> author. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1839681,00.asp >>> >>> >>> Graph the calendar year vs. the average age of DB2 developers and DBAs. >>> Do the same for the other major commercial RDBMS products. You will have >>> your answer. >>> >>> It is not that DB2 is technically incapable of competing. Rather IBM >>> is presiding over an aging baby-boom workforce. Speaking only from my >>> experience in the US ... a large number of colleges and universities, >>> including mine, have active programs teaching SQL Server and Oracle. >>> I can not think of a single one teaching DB2. >>> >>> I left Fortran for a reason. >>> I left COBOL for the same reason. >>> Those working with DB2 should take a serious look at which is more >>> important ... product loyalty or paying the mortgage. >>> -- >>> Daniel A. Morgan >> >> >> >> Even if your premise is correct (which I believe is greatly >> exaggerated), your conclusions are backwards. If there are more DB2 >> DBA's retiring, then there will be a shortage of DB2 talent and more >> job opportunities. >> >> Given the ease of administration improvements in 10g (not to mention >> the improvements that are no doubt coming in future Oracle releases), >> as 8i and 9i installations migrate to 10g, that alone will create at >> least a 30% theoretical reduction in the number of Oracle DBA's >> needed. I expect this trend to continue as Oracle fends off MS SQL >> Server. > > > Even if your statements are correct I don't believe it is going to > happen that way. > > Lets say I have DB2 in my facility ... I was at a major IBM shop in > Portland Oregon three weeks ago that is precisely that. > > And lets say the CTO isn't a software bigot but rather has his > corporation's best interests at heart. The CTO has a choice ... hire > young inexperienced talent and train them up to the level of those of > us in our 50s and 60s on mainframes which means also teaching COBOL, > CICS, MVS JCL, OS/390, z/OS, TSO, VSAM, IMS, REXX, ISPF, and CLISTS > or get already trained talent straight out of a college program. > > Lets say the CFO of the firm has a choice of maintaining big iron > with attendant costs in infrastructure including power conditioning, > air conditioning, etc. or can build a mainframe from 2 proc or 4 proc > commodity hardware for a fraction of the cost and get the same > computing power at a fraction of the cost. Look at the number of > super computers now build from commodity hardware for example. > > And lets say the Board of Directors is paying attention to the fact > that reducing costs increases the value per share of the stock which > is their fiduciary responsibility to the stockholders the direction > is clear. > > The number of DBAs required in the future is going down like the > value of Sun Microsystems stock. > > So yes there will be holes in the organization created. But I've yet > to meet the CTO whose solution was to incur the cost of training on > mainframe technologies. Heck most won't even pay money to train their > existing staff and they too need it. > > It is all about dollars. > The C-Level management is looking out for the bottom line. > We need to be look out for our mortgage payments. Even if your statements are correct ( following the trend here :-) DB2 scales better than Oracle, or SQL-Server. The big question is why IBM hasn't really done the marketing. The answer is Java. They have put a lot of eggs in the Java basket, but have hardly spoken about DB2 as "da bomb", or the hottest thing. It's not their style to do so, but you do get the impression that IBM will stay the course with its quirky, goofy, self-deprecating commercial ad campaigns. There does appear to be a move to make DB2 ubiquitous in the market silently, as a utilitarian tool, as well as a mainstream database. But marketing is where the action is, and any product, no matter where it comes from won't survive without great marketing. SQL-Server is about to have its big day Q4 2005, but doubtful we'll see any noise from IBM. Oracle will probably have its usual suspects show up in the trades with compelling acrimony why SQL-Server is a bad choice--again--and the cycle will repeat... What is really interesting is the SQL-Server market, and where everyone will be focused for the near term.