Oracle Acquires Innobase

Posted on October 10, 2005 by Doug Porter

Though it didn’t seem to get noticed much in the main technical press, the acquisition of Innobase by Oracle is big news in the open source database market. Many of you may recognize Innobase as the company that produced and supports InnoDB (one of the underlying database engines used by MySQL).

This could have dire consequences for the business model of MySQL AB. MySQL AB sells commercial licenses for their MySQL database product along with services and support. The contract regarding inclusion of InnoDB with MySQL is up for renewal next year and with Oracle holding the reigns now the negotiations could be difficult (and costly) for MySQL AB.

The press release by Oracle says they are committed to expanding the product and contributing to the open source community, but if you have seen what is to become of the PeopleSoft and JD Edwards products Oracle recently acquired, you may not be so convinced of their noble intentions.

For the open source crowd, we can take solace in the fact that InnoDB is GPL software, but with Oracle now “owning” the main developers on the product, new features and maintenance could dry up considerably. We’ll just have to wait and see what Oracle’s plans are for the newly acquired company.

In addition to MySQL, there are other alternatives to the high cost databases out there. Some of these are: PostgreSQL, Sybase ASE on Linux (Free for one CPU box, 5 GB max data storage, and 2 GB max RAM), Apache Derby, and FireBird

Here are some of the reactions and reporting from the Blogosphere:
KasLog – Oracle’s Innobase Acquisition; Open Source is Not Necessarily “Free”

Oracle’s Open Source

IT Toolbox – InnoDB and the Compromise of Dual Licensing

SAP Ventures – Oracle’s Open Source Database Endorsement

CIO Weblog – Oracle adds open source to the shopping cart

Posted in MySQL, Oracle, Technology | Leave a comment

LANUG Meeting One Recap

Posted on October 3, 2005 by Doug Porter

The first meeting of LANUG (the moniker given to the Lower Alabama .Net Users Group) was a great success with around 27 in attendance. There were some new faces and quite a few friends and acquaintances I have met over the years. Some of the companies that had employees in attendance were: ACO, STI, Morrison’s, Dawson Engineering, and of course yours truly from DailyAccess Corporation.

Microsoft’s Developer Evangelist for the South East region, Joe Healy, was on hand to give a presentation of some of the new features in Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005. I must say that the upcoming features are very exciting. ASP.Net 2.0 is an incredible language and platform and definitely is well ahead of the other technologies out there.

Visual Studio 2005 brings some great new features for VB.Net and C# developers including Edit and Continue (allows one to alter variables and add code during execution in Debug mode), incredible refactoring support (very similar to what exists for Java in Eclipse), and Click Once deployment (adds smart client capabilities to apps to allow them to update themselves to the latest version via the internet seamlessly for the user).

SQL Server 2005 has an incredible number of new features, we were able to only cover a few but they were awesome. The new version adds incredible XML support right into the database (very similar to what Oracle 9i and up have with SQLX and the XML SDK’s in PL/SQL). There is also the ability to call .Net managed code functions inside stored procedures and standard SQL queries. This allows one to have the option of writing functions in a .Net language versus T-SQL which depending on what is needed can make things much easier (have you tried to split a string in T-SQL based on a delimiter??? It’s one line in C#). The example that Joe gave of this feature was the Great Circle algorithm with GPS coordinates. (Something I also saw this week, is that IBM’s DB2 and Oracle’s 10gR2 on Windows have support for this type of functionality)

I have to say that Joe Healy is one of the best presenters I have seen in awhile. He had great energy, was comfortable in front of a crowd, and had great contents (more code than powerpoint which is a big plus). I would highly recommend checking him out if you have the opportunity to hear him speak. He also gave out some great books as door prizes (unfortunately I was not a winner of any of the texts, but Casey won a VB.Net book)

Here are links to the code samples that Joe used from his site DevFish.Net.

What’s new and cool in VS2005 – Powerpoint, SQL2005 GPS functions for bearing and Great Circle Distance, stored procedure and view definitions. Visual Studio 2005 Beta2 project using Virtual Earth.

Upcoming .Net Events
October 29, 2005 – Birmingham, AL – Alabama Code Camp 2005

November 25, 2005 – Atlanta, GA – Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 Launch Event

November 25, 2005 – Mobile, AL – LANUG Meeting Two – Speakers TBD

December 13, 2005 – Birmingham, AL – Satellite Launch Event for Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005

Posted in .Net, MS SQL Server, Technology | Leave a comment

Lower Alabama .Net User Group Meeting One

Posted on September 25, 2005 by Doug Porter

From the reminder message I received
—————————————

The Lower Alabama Dot Net User Group’s first meeting is next Tuesday evening (September 27th) from 6:00 PM to 8:30 PM CST. We are really excited to have Joe Healy come and talk to us about Visual Studio 2005.

Guest speaker
Joe Healy, Microsoft’s .Net Developer Evangelist for the Gulf Coast.

Topic
Visual Studio .Net 2005

Refreshments & Door Prizes
We will have pizza and drinks at 6:00 PM, and the meeting will start around 6:30. We will also give away several door prizes throughout the evening.

Location
SouthEast Technical (SET) Solutions
273 Azalea Rd.
Office Park Three
Suite 200
Mobile, Alabama 36609
NOTE: A map to the location can be found here. SET is behind the Red Lobster at Airport & Azalea.

Contact
If you are planning on attending, please contact Matthew Hughes (mat_hues AT hotmail DOT com) so we can get an estimate of how much pizza to order. Thanks!

http://www.loweraldotnet.org

—————————————

If you are available, please send Matt an e-mail and come out and support the user group. These kinds of things tend to last and succeed much better if there is community support. Plus, don’t forget how great a networking opportunity these types of events are. I hope to see you there.

If you need more info, feel free to call me (my number is listed at the top of my blog web page).

Posted in Misc | Leave a comment

DataWindow.Net 2.0 Sneak Peek Webcast

Posted on September 20, 2005 by Doug Porter

From the TeamSybase blog, there is a DataWindow.Net 2.0 sneak peek webcast happening on September 29, 2005.

If you currently use the PowerBuilder DataWindow (or have used it in the past) and are interested in seeing how it fits into the .Net environment then I highly recommend checking it out. Us PowerBuilder users have known about the DataWindow for years and it is truly amazing (and getting better all the time). Definitely worth spending a little time checking it out. Sybase’s DataWindow.Net Product Page

Posted in Misc | 1 Comment

OpenOffice Ready For Prime Time?

Posted on September 18, 2005 by Doug Porter

I have been using the latest builds of OpenOffice as they have become available over the past 9 months or so. I have to admit I am quite impressed with how mature this product has become. I would have to say that this suite could be ready to replace Microsoft Office for the vast majority of users out there.

We all know that most of the features in the Microsoft Office suite sit unused for all eternity never to be touched by end users. Also if you have ever taken a look at MS’s balance sheet, you will see that the Office suite is the big cash cow in their product line.

There is a nice article over on Oreillynet.com talking about the importance of OpenOffice and the need for more developers to get involved.

I would ask you to give it a try if it has been a while since you looked at OpenOffice. I am fully convinced my company could get by using this suite, but I think the level of resistance from end users and upper management would prevent this from ever happening. But think of all of the licensing costs that could be saved.

I have been eagerly watching the case regarding the state of Massachusetts giving closed document formats the boot. I wonder if there is any way I could push for something like this in my own city. Probably would have to run for city council before I could make this kind of change a reality, but you have to admit that the fact that a taxpayer funded government produces public documents in a format that requires the purchase of proprietary software seems a bit off.

If I had to gaze into my crystal ball, I would have to guess that Microsoft will be forced to create converters to and from the Open Document Format put together by OASIS. The question will be how long they will be able to hold out.

Here are some screenshots of OpenOffice opening some of Microsoft’s template files available from their website. I especially like the presentation I pulled up in Impress (the PowerPoint equivalent). You can click the pictures for larger versions.

OpenOffice Writer (Word Processor)
OpenOffice Writer

OpenOffice Calc (Spreadsheet Application)
OpenOffice Calc

OpenOffice Impress (Presentation Software)
OpenOffice Impress

Update: Added Screenshots for OpenOffice Writer, Calc, and Impress

Posted in Misc | Leave a comment