Re: informix market share
Not a technical support thread — it's an off-topic marketing/licensing debate spun out of a discussion about Informix market share. Participants (DB2, Oracle and community figures) argue about how database vendors report new license revenue in SEC filings, whether migrating from a Sun SMP box to a Linux cluster counts as new licence revenue, and whether SMP or Oracle RAC is cheaper/scales better, with RAC defended mainly as a failover rather than scalability solution. One poster asks which vendor is actually being discussed, and no clear answer or resolution is recorded.
Auto-generated by DrWatson from the posts below — may be imperfect; read the full thread.
Serge Rielau wrote: > > So, if said vendor would e.g. convert a customer's Sun SMP box into a > cluster of Linux boxes. Would that be counted as new license revenue? > Only if there was a positive difference in the cost between the license on the Sun box and the new license on the cluster of Linux boxes.
Mark Townsend wrote: > Serge Rielau wrote: > >> >> So, if said vendor would e.g. convert a customer's Sun SMP box into a >> cluster of Linux boxes. Would that be counted as new license revenue? >> > > Only if there was a positive difference in the cost between the license > on the Sun box and the new license on the cluster of Linux boxes. *chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC (more CPUs needed) and RAC is cited as a major contributer to Linux licenses... it ain't free. To quote the Oracle ad's fineprint freely "DBMS software and switches not included ..." ;-) All open to interpretation... always. Cheers Serge -- Serge Rielau DB2 SQL Compiler Development IBM Toronto Lab
Serge Rielau wrote: > > *chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC > (more CPUs needed) Not necessarily - as people move of their older SMPs they can find that the new CPUs in the smaller blades of their new Linux clusters are much more powerful than what they had before, and that they have a lot more memory, L2 cache etc. Does depend on how old the SMP is.
On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 11:52:32 -0500, Serge Rielau wrote: > > *chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC > (more CPUs needed) and RAC is cited as a major contributer to Linux > licenses... it ain't free. To quote the Oracle ad's fineprint freely > "DBMS software and switches not included ..." ;-) Pot <-> Kettle? From the IBM site, when I looked at DB2 under Linux <g> https://www-112.ibm.com/software/howtobuy/buyingtools/paexpress/Express?P0=E1&part_number=D518GLL,D518JLL,D53Y2LL,D56CILL&catalogLocale=en_CA&Locale=en_US&country=CAN&PT=html&S_TACT=none&S_CMP=none -- Hans Forbrich Canada-wide Oracle training and consulting mailto: Fuzzy.GreyBeard_at_gmail.com *** Top posting [replies] guarantees I won't respond. ***
Mark Townsend wrote: > Serge Rielau wrote: > >> >> *chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC >> (more CPUs needed) > > > Not necessarily - as people move of their older SMPs they can find that > the new CPUs in the smaller blades of their new Linux clusters are much > more powerful than what they had before, and that they have a lot more > memory, L2 cache etc. Does depend on how old the SMP is. > ..and how expensive it would be to upgrade that SMP box instead. I'm not an accountant, but can't hardware be written of better than software in the US? Just some non obvious impact thought.... Cheers Serge -- Serge Rielau DB2 SQL Compiler Development IBM Toronto Lab
HansF wrote: > On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 11:52:32 -0500, Serge Rielau wrote: > > >>*chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC >>(more CPUs needed) and RAC is cited as a major contributer to Linux >>licenses... it ain't free. To quote the Oracle ad's fineprint freely >>"DBMS software and switches not included ..." ;-) > > > Pot <-> Kettle? From the IBM site, when I looked at DB2 under Linux <g> > > https://www-112.ibm.com/software/howtobuy/buyingtools/paexpress/Express?P0=E1&part_number=D518GLL,D518JLL,D53Y2LL,D56CILL&catalogLocale=en_CA&Locale=en_US&country=CAN&PT=html&S_TACT=none&S_CMP=none > Nope, not Pot <-> Kettle. IBM isn't actively hunting down SMP boxes to turn hardware $ into software $. Also IBM is not running that SMP vs "cheap linux cluster" add. I find it funny how a software company can run an add on price and then exclude the very product they are selling from the pricing. That is quite creative. Cheers Serge -- Serge Rielau DB2 SQL Compiler Development IBM Toronto Lab
Mark Townsend wrote: > Serge Rielau wrote: > > > > > So, if said vendor would e.g. convert a customer's Sun SMP box into a > > cluster of Linux boxes. Would that be counted as new license revenue? > > > > Only if there was a positive difference in the cost between the license > on the Sun box and the new license on the cluster of Linux boxes. You guys have lost me in this discussion. Someone said that only 1 vendor reports in the SEC filings accurately new license revenue versus support revenue. Do you mean to say oracle reports this accurately, IBM reports this accurately, or some other vendor reports this accurately? Then you or someone is talking about "if said vendor". Which vendor are you referring to?
Serge Rielau wrote: > *chuckle*And there always will be because SMP scales better than RAC > (more CPUs needed) and RAC is cited as a major contributer to Linux > licenses... it ain't free. Of course if you also want transparent failover with that big SMP box you get to buy at least one more of them. From my experience only a small percentage of Oracle customers buy RAC for scalability. The vast majority for transparent failover. Want to cost it out against alternative technologies with equivalent features? Oh and without having to manually federate the data? Wouldn't want you to forget that part. -- Daniel A. Morgan http://www.psoug.org damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)