RE: Why is Oracle unaffordable?
- From: D'Hooge Freek <Freek.DHooge@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "cicciuxdba@xxxxxxxxx" <cicciuxdba@xxxxxxxxx>, "oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2010 15:17:35 +0100
Just as quick addition to the licensing cost for small companies.
If you look at the cost for a standard edition one edition with named user
licenses, then you see you would pay less then € 900 for 5 named users (the
minimum number of NUP licenses). I don't think this is expensive for enterprise
software.
Of course, when you want a 5 node cluster replicating to another 5 node
cluster, the cost is a little bit higher.
Freek D'Hooge
Uptime
Oracle Database Administrator
email: freek.dhooge@xxxxxxxxx
tel +32(0)3 451 23 82
http://www.uptime.be
disclaimer: www.uptime.be/disclaimer
From: oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Guillermo Alan Bort [cicciuxdba@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: 09 November 2010 14:57
To: oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Why is Oracle unaffordable?
OP,
I think you are not expressing yourself clearly. What is "USER FRIENDLY"?
something that someone with no experience (or very little at that) can use?
like say Windows? a point-and-shoot camera? I guess that's one way of looking
at it. But if you are a professional photographer you will want a camera that
allows you to change the lenses, set the focus manually, regulate the delay in
the flash, have multiple flashes, remote triggering, shutter and sensitivity
settings, etc. Right now automated cameras are way cheaper than professional
cameras. It's the same with the database. If you just want a place to dump
data, then perhaps a well written SQLite code is your answer, however if you
want the flexibility that comes with Oracle, then I guess you should pay for it.
Oracle's Licenses cost a lot of money, but I don't think they are
'expensive'. You are getting a very good product for what you pay and
developing a similar product in-house or overhauling an already existing
product (and I'm thinking only of Postgre here, the rest are far more
expensive) would certainly cost more than the Oracle License.
As to ease of administration, you have amazing tools out there (TOAD, for
instance) and Oracle provides an administration interface (that used to be
somewhat unstable but got better over the years) called Enterprise Manager
Database Control (or a centralized version for multiple databases called Grid
Control). The latest versions of EM are VERY complete and you can do almost
everything from there. Why would you need a GUI? Oracle 9i has a java
console... not exactly a GUI but close enough. That eventually evolved into
DBControl.
Now, DBAs... most managers and several developers don't really understand the
need for a DBA. I can tell you from experience, developers can make good DBAs
(i've met a couple over the yeras), but they usually don't. That's why DB
Consultants make so much money. When all goes to hell, managers call a very
expensive consultant to fix the problems that could have been averted by having
an in-house DBA or a remote DBA service.
All that being said, Oracle isn't and doesn't want to be targeted for small
companies. So, small companies should not even look at Oracle. There are
alternatives that can store data efficiently and are fully functional RDBMS,
some with no or very low licensing costs.
Anyway, you sound very frustrated when you wrote that e-mail and like you
were looking for people to tell you "you're right, Oracle sucks" but most of us
can put food in our tables (which we bought thanks to our high DBA pay) thanks
to Oracle being what it is... so we won't say that.
Oh, and this is where I get to rant... DBA Pays are NOT HIGH. Granted, we
live in a capitalist world so the people that make money are the sellers (and
owners), DBAs may have a slightly better pay than say developers, but that's
because for one thing there aren't as many DBAs as there are developers (let's
not get into Good vs Bad dba/developer) and a new application being delayed for
a few weeks because of a lazy or bad programmer (except for software factories,
but they have other ways to deal with that) is not as expensive as having a
production line stopped for two days because the DB went down unexpectedly and
the backups are done through exports because the developer that configured the
DB had absolutely no idea that RMAN even existed (and this is a true story,
yes)... By the way... do you think that a DBA gets a bonus for the DB no
crashing (which is to say, for doing a good job) anywhere near what a salesman
gets for making a sale? Or a SAP basis for just... I don't know what they do.
Just as a side note, if you are developing a product for selling to other
companies, I think there is a developer license or something like that. You
should read the license agreement thoroughly or contact an Oracle rep.
cheers.
Alan.-
On Tue, Nov 9, 2010 at 9:59 AM, Michael McMullen <ganstadba@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
#2 is true, I took over the management of two db’s that unskilled users
installed and managed themselves to the point the db was inoperable.
From: oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Stefan Knecht
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 2010 7:42 AM
To: passionate_programmer@xxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: oracle-l-freelists
Subject: Re: Why is Oracle unaffordable?
There's 2 possible answers to that, from my personal opinion:
1) I think Oracle is *extremely* user friendly even if you're not using the GUI
(see #2) , because if you know how to query the database the right way, it
shows you soooooooo much information and detail about what's going on under the
hood. It's not "click .. hmm nothing happens.. now what ?!" - that just
doesn't happen (well.... :-) but you get the idea )
2) Oracle has had for many years, and still has, a GUI. It's called Database
Control, or Grid Control.--
//www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l
Other related posts:
