6 ms·

I've worked with databases for a while now and I've never advocated for moving to Oracle (I have advocated for postgres though). The long term organizational c

by munk-a 5y ago

I've worked with databases for a while now and I've never advocated for moving to Oracle (I have advocated for postgres though). The long term organizational costs is a big factor - but an almost equally large factor is the fact that 1. I have never actually used their dialect and have heard absolutely terrible things about it 2. There is no non-enterprise DBMS available that uses something close to their dialect so I figure actually hiring Oracle DBAs would be a nightmare. These two factors combine to make me absolutely baffled at how completely Oracle has seemed to dominate every market but the private one (i.e. government, especially defense and educational). Have I been missing something about ways to actually get real world experience with Oracle?

ericbarrett 5y ago
Oracle sells to executives, not technical staff. Training on Oracle tech is via certified classes, provided “free” by your employer as part of their licensing deal; not online discovery. Source: sold to and worked with Oracle Inc. for several years, got a front row seat at the sausage factory.
- oldsecondhand 5y ago
  I've got to attend some free Oracle classes at uni (taught by Oracle employees), they were horribly boring. I don't think they'd have any chance at selling to technical staff even if they tried.
- laumars 5y ago
  It’s more than that. Oracle is sold off the back of its middleware applications. Which equally suck too…but at least they’re solving difficult problems that most other database vendors don’t both with.
  - revscat 5y ago
    Such as?
    - chasil 5y ago
      All the apps they bought. Siebel, PeopleSoft, BEA Weblogic. I was the DBA for a Siebel instance for ten years. I would say J.D. Edwards, but that's AS400/DB2. SAP is also a big driver, although they don't want to be (so much so that they bought Sybase).
      - peapicker 5y ago
        J.D.Edwards old World product was AS400, but EnterpriseOne (formerly OneWorld) is also Linux, Windows, AIX, Solaris, HPUX, and IBMi and is still very much alive. Runs on Oracle DB, MS SQL Server, and DB2.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - p_l 5y ago
      In addition to Oracle owned middleware, it's common to end up running Oracle because your vendor supports only it. Sometimes with somewhat sensible reasons, like Oracle combining clustering and in-memory encryption, but it still means you don't get to choose...
    - laumars 5y ago
      Such as enterprise level accountancy solutions, human resource packages, payroll solutions (which is the where I worked with Oracle) and so on and so forth. A lot of the time when businesses by Oracle, they’re buying into the middleware rather than the RDBMS.
- MangoCoffee 5y ago
  >Oracle sells to executives, not technical staff. agree. i have a year or two with Oracle Apex. at a pervious job, we were using Java to develop a web app but a executive saw how fast you can create a web page/app with Oracle Apex. we switch over since we already using Oracle for database. Enterprise software is not targeting you (techies). its for CxOs.
  - piyh 5y ago
    We kludged together an apex reporting solution to replace an old payroll UI. It was quick to work with in relation to the number of reports we were able to publish.
- gvenzl 5y ago
  Besides training for Oracle University, Oracle has a couple of free learning and training resources out there on the web too. https://livesql.oracle.com https://livesql.oracle.com --> A SQL scratchpad that also includes scripts and tutorials. Oracle Live Labs (https://apexapps.oracle.com/pls/apex/dbpm/r/livelabs/home https://apexapps.oracle.com/pls/apex/dbpm/r/livelabs/home) --> Granted, while it's easier googled as "Oracle Live Labs" than to remember that URL, it does, however, provide free Hands-On Labs for users. https://oracle.github.io/learning-library/ https://oracle.github.io/learning-library/ --> The instructions for the Hands-On Labs above and more can be found in the learning-library asktom.oracle.com --> I fully free Q&A portal where you can ask Oracle Database employees for help. Furthermore, it offers regular "Office Hours" live webinars and an entire course of learning Oracle Database: https://asktom.oracle.com/databases-for-developers.htm https://asktom.oracle.com/databases-for-developers.htm
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
vbezhenar 5y ago
Back in the day MS SQL was Windows-only and Postgres was not mature, so the choice was Oracle or DB2. And Oracle was more popular, because it used more progressive model (versions vs DB2 locks). Plenty of people who don't closely follow recent trends associate database with Oracle, so when they have a word, they'll choose it. Oracle it not that bad anyway, it's just stupidly expensive. I'd choose Postgres any day, but I worked with Oracle a lot and it never was a main culprit in my work. It has its issues, sure, but they're solvable.
- zabzonk 5y ago
  > so the choice was Oracle or DB2 Sybase, Ingres
  - myohmy 5y ago
    Potato Patahto
  - icedchai 5y ago
    Don't forget about Informix. Early 2000's had several commercial databases. I worked at both a Sybase shop and an Oracle shop. I far preferred Sybase.
  - tracker1 5y ago
    Worth noting, that Microsoft SQL Server started life as a Sybase fork.
    - johnthescott 5y ago
      not so sure that is correct. ms sql WAS sybase from 1989 until the fork in 1993 and i have been told that substantial changes to the codebase did not occur until years after the 1993, during the jim gray tenure.
  - briffle 5y ago
    Our Vendor offered Sybase in the mid 200x's as a choice for our college middleware, but they used 'case-insensitive' sort, which the linux version of Sybase did not work with.
indigo945 5y ago
Point 2 is no longer true. MariaDB has an Oracle compatibility layer now.
metadata 5y ago
Postgres has Oracle layer, available as a commercial variant by EnterpriseDB. I don't think MariaDB implementation can compete, but EDB Postgres is solid. Basically a native implementation of Oracle in Postgres.
- garenp 5y ago
  Does it replicate the same kind of "evil" bugs as in the article, or does it provide an improvement?
  - metadata 5y ago
    AFAIK it works exactly as Oracle. Doing something barely similar would probably introduce some very expensive bugs in production.
- chasil 5y ago
  The Oracle layer was also added to IBM DB2. Which one? Good question. The mainframe, as/400, and Windows versions are all on separate source code last I heard. https://www.enterprisedb.com/news/enterprisedb-and-ibmr-collaborate-integrate-technology-new-version-db2 https://www.enterprisedb.com/news/enterprisedb-and-ibmr-coll...
  - metadata 5y ago
    DB2 LUW (Linux/Unix/Windows), DB2 iSeries, and DB2 z/OS are three different databases. With the same name - I guess for branding.
namdnay 5y ago
> but the private on Oracle was massive in the private sector 10 years ago, and it probably still is once you dig past the surface layer of nosql Don’t forget that for a long term it was either Oracle or DB2
- munk-a 5y ago
  I haven't ever worked at a giganto company myself - even though I've worked with largeish amounts of data... from multi-teribyte pyradmically stored JPEG2000s to 50GB tables of raw rows parsed from ridiculously long documents. I suspect some big places are indeed using Oracle - but notably large companies are still using MySQL or Postgres to great effect (i.e. Facebook).
irrational 5y ago
The problem is the Oracle dialect was created BEFORE the SQL standard was written. For backwards compatibility they never changed it after the SQL standard was written. Personally, I think they should have had a flag so you could choose whether to use standard SQL or Oracle SQL.
- thornygreb 5y ago
  Exactly, and many features that are in the standard now and we take for granted were invented by Oracle in the first place.
- chasil 5y ago
  It would be ever so nice if Microsoft SQL Server supported JOIN USING in addition to JOIN ON. Everybody has problems.
- peapicker 5y ago
  ANSI SQL is a supported option in Oracle since 9i. Not that most Oracle DB ppl use it anyway.
Joeri 5y ago
Oracle is free to download and try out. It’s only when you want to use it in production that you get to know the heart of their business: the oracle sales team. They are pushy, and devious, and they never give up. I spent about a decade working on a large system built on top of oracle. Once you get used to its idiosyncracies it is not actually that bad. It has a good query optimizer, so even badly written queries tend to perform ok. And if there is any DB feature you want, it probably has it. Whether you can afford that feature is a different matter.
zip1234 5y ago
Oracle is a decent product with all the features that you could want if you are an Enterprise and in addition they have the support for all that. Postgres has most if not all of them at this point, but if you want support you have to pick from one of many vendors. Having used many RDBMS, one thing I very much liked about Oracle was the bitmap index. Very very useful for some performance issues that a b-tree cannot solve.

by munk-a 5y ago

ericbarrett 5y ago

Oracle sells to executives, not technical staff. Training on Oracle tech is via certified classes, provided “free” by your employer as part of their licensing deal; not online discovery. Source: sold to and worked with Oracle Inc. for several years, got a front row seat at the sausage factory.

oldsecondhand 5y ago
I've got to attend some free Oracle classes at uni (taught by Oracle employees), they were horribly boring. I don't think they'd have any chance at selling to technical staff even if they tried.
laumars 5y ago
It’s more than that. Oracle is sold off the back of its middleware applications. Which equally suck too…but at least they’re solving difficult problems that most other database vendors don’t both with.
- revscat 5y ago
  Such as?
  - chasil 5y ago
    All the apps they bought. Siebel, PeopleSoft, BEA Weblogic. I was the DBA for a Siebel instance for ten years. I would say J.D. Edwards, but that's AS400/DB2. SAP is also a big driver, although they don't want to be (so much so that they bought Sybase).
    - peapicker 5y ago
      J.D.Edwards old World product was AS400, but EnterpriseOne (formerly OneWorld) is also Linux, Windows, AIX, Solaris, HPUX, and IBMi and is still very much alive. Runs on Oracle DB, MS SQL Server, and DB2.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - p_l 5y ago
    In addition to Oracle owned middleware, it's common to end up running Oracle because your vendor supports only it. Sometimes with somewhat sensible reasons, like Oracle combining clustering and in-memory encryption, but it still means you don't get to choose...
  - laumars 5y ago
    Such as enterprise level accountancy solutions, human resource packages, payroll solutions (which is the where I worked with Oracle) and so on and so forth. A lot of the time when businesses by Oracle, they’re buying into the middleware rather than the RDBMS.
MangoCoffee 5y ago
>Oracle sells to executives, not technical staff. agree. i have a year or two with Oracle Apex. at a pervious job, we were using Java to develop a web app but a executive saw how fast you can create a web page/app with Oracle Apex. we switch over since we already using Oracle for database. Enterprise software is not targeting you (techies). its for CxOs.
- piyh 5y ago
  We kludged together an apex reporting solution to replace an old payroll UI. It was quick to work with in relation to the number of reports we were able to publish.
gvenzl 5y ago
Besides training for Oracle University, Oracle has a couple of free learning and training resources out there on the web too. https://livesql.oracle.com https://livesql.oracle.com --> A SQL scratchpad that also includes scripts and tutorials. Oracle Live Labs (https://apexapps.oracle.com/pls/apex/dbpm/r/livelabs/home https://apexapps.oracle.com/pls/apex/dbpm/r/livelabs/home) --> Granted, while it's easier googled as "Oracle Live Labs" than to remember that URL, it does, however, provide free Hands-On Labs for users. https://oracle.github.io/learning-library/ https://oracle.github.io/learning-library/ --> The instructions for the Hands-On Labs above and more can be found in the learning-library asktom.oracle.com --> I fully free Q&A portal where you can ask Oracle Database employees for help. Furthermore, it offers regular "Office Hours" live webinars and an entire course of learning Oracle Database: https://asktom.oracle.com/databases-for-developers.htm https://asktom.oracle.com/databases-for-developers.htm

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

vbezhenar 5y ago

Back in the day MS SQL was Windows-only and Postgres was not mature, so the choice was Oracle or DB2. And Oracle was more popular, because it used more progressive model (versions vs DB2 locks). Plenty of people who don't closely follow recent trends associate database with Oracle, so when they have a word, they'll choose it. Oracle it not that bad anyway, it's just stupidly expensive. I'd choose Postgres any day, but I worked with Oracle a lot and it never was a main culprit in my work. It has its issues, sure, but they're solvable.

zabzonk 5y ago
> so the choice was Oracle or DB2 Sybase, Ingres
- myohmy 5y ago
  Potato Patahto
- icedchai 5y ago
  Don't forget about Informix. Early 2000's had several commercial databases. I worked at both a Sybase shop and an Oracle shop. I far preferred Sybase.
- tracker1 5y ago
  Worth noting, that Microsoft SQL Server started life as a Sybase fork.
  - johnthescott 5y ago
    not so sure that is correct. ms sql WAS sybase from 1989 until the fork in 1993 and i have been told that substantial changes to the codebase did not occur until years after the 1993, during the jim gray tenure.
- briffle 5y ago
  Our Vendor offered Sybase in the mid 200x's as a choice for our college middleware, but they used 'case-insensitive' sort, which the linux version of Sybase did not work with.

indigo945 5y ago

Point 2 is no longer true. MariaDB has an Oracle compatibility layer now.

metadata 5y ago

Postgres has Oracle layer, available as a commercial variant by EnterpriseDB. I don't think MariaDB implementation can compete, but EDB Postgres is solid. Basically a native implementation of Oracle in Postgres.

garenp 5y ago
Does it replicate the same kind of "evil" bugs as in the article, or does it provide an improvement?
- metadata 5y ago
  AFAIK it works exactly as Oracle. Doing something barely similar would probably introduce some very expensive bugs in production.
chasil 5y ago
The Oracle layer was also added to IBM DB2. Which one? Good question. The mainframe, as/400, and Windows versions are all on separate source code last I heard. https://www.enterprisedb.com/news/enterprisedb-and-ibmr-collaborate-integrate-technology-new-version-db2 https://www.enterprisedb.com/news/enterprisedb-and-ibmr-coll...
- metadata 5y ago
  DB2 LUW (Linux/Unix/Windows), DB2 iSeries, and DB2 z/OS are three different databases. With the same name - I guess for branding.

namdnay 5y ago

> but the private on Oracle was massive in the private sector 10 years ago, and it probably still is once you dig past the surface layer of nosql Don’t forget that for a long term it was either Oracle or DB2

munk-a 5y ago
I haven't ever worked at a giganto company myself - even though I've worked with largeish amounts of data... from multi-teribyte pyradmically stored JPEG2000s to 50GB tables of raw rows parsed from ridiculously long documents. I suspect some big places are indeed using Oracle - but notably large companies are still using MySQL or Postgres to great effect (i.e. Facebook).

irrational 5y ago

The problem is the Oracle dialect was created BEFORE the SQL standard was written. For backwards compatibility they never changed it after the SQL standard was written. Personally, I think they should have had a flag so you could choose whether to use standard SQL or Oracle SQL.

thornygreb 5y ago
Exactly, and many features that are in the standard now and we take for granted were invented by Oracle in the first place.
chasil 5y ago
It would be ever so nice if Microsoft SQL Server supported JOIN USING in addition to JOIN ON. Everybody has problems.
peapicker 5y ago
ANSI SQL is a supported option in Oracle since 9i. Not that most Oracle DB ppl use it anyway.

Joeri 5y ago

Oracle is free to download and try out. It’s only when you want to use it in production that you get to know the heart of their business: the oracle sales team. They are pushy, and devious, and they never give up. I spent about a decade working on a large system built on top of oracle. Once you get used to its idiosyncracies it is not actually that bad. It has a good query optimizer, so even badly written queries tend to perform ok. And if there is any DB feature you want, it probably has it. Whether you can afford that feature is a different matter.

zip1234 5y ago

Oracle is a decent product with all the features that you could want if you are an Enterprise and in addition they have the support for all that. Postgres has most if not all of them at this point, but if you want support you have to pick from one of many vendors. Having used many RDBMS, one thing I very much liked about Oracle was the bitmap index. Very very useful for some performance issues that a b-tree cannot solve.