Larry Ellison reveals shared Oracle database | Hacker News Reader

Larry Ellison reveals shared Oracle database

theregister.co.uk

31 pointsesalazar15 comments

Having read the article it refers to how Oracle in the early days of Cloud said it was was crap in far different words and now offer a cloud solution.

"Ellison has come a long way in a short time on cloud computing. In 2008, when cloud hype was rapidly inflating, Oracle's chief rightly highlighted the term's relativity and meaninglessness, skewering Silicon Valley's mindless recategorising of everything as "cloud".

Saliant part being: "At that time, Ellison reckoned he couldn't see how Oracle could change what it was making or selling in order to capitalise on cloud: "I don't understand what we have to do different, other than change the wording on some our ads," he said (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FacYAI6DY0)."

Having heard that original insight on youtube I don't blame him/Oracle, he does make some good points back then and now for a `database` vendors perspective. Now they have got the head around there hardware Sun purchase things have changed.

This is the right direction for Oracle. Kudos to Larry for doing a Jobs-esque 180.

Remember, Oracle is the master at trying to charge everyone the most that they will bear. If Oracle is managing your database, I guarantee that they will use the data they collect in doing so to attempt to figure out how much they can charge you. I would not touch this offer with a 10' pole.

You're defining capitalism, charging what the market will bear is basis of the western economy.

Using the data stored in a cloud database as you suggest would be illegal.

It's only illegal if you get convicted seems to be the current thinking.

As far as using that data is concerned, that's not a god given right, you could easily write terms-of-service that allow just that. See Gmail.

No, not charging what the market will bear. Charging each customer what that customer will bear.

Before claiming that it would be illegal for Oracle to use the information that it collects while running a database to figure out how much that customer can afford, I would like you to specify what exactly you consider illegal about it. If you're basing that on a vague notion that discrimination is illegal, then you're wrong. Businesses, by law, are not allowed to discriminate directly or indirectly on a set of protected classes. The standard list is race, gender, religion, national origin, and age. ANYTHING ELSE (eg evidence that you have oodles and oodles of money) is fair game.

I don't like the title. I realise it hasn't been editorialised, I don't like the original. There is nothing wrong about doing a u-turn.

It depends on the style really. It's one thing to say: "We've improved on what's already available, solved problems A, B, C and can demonstrate how. Previous solutions were lacking, but we're giving you something new now".

It's another one to go from: "This just doesn't work" to "This is the first solution that works. Because we've done it this time and we're that good." I know they don't have to respect their competition... and it probably doesn't matter for them what people like me think. But that doesn't mean we can't disagree with the way they're phrasing their announcement (especially when it's incorrect - there were many shared solutions before theirs)

After using Oracle 15 years ago, then mostly using mysql, I had to use Oracle again last year and you know what? It's crap! OCI is a ridiculous, error-prone API that takes a bunch of code to do anything at all.

"takes a bunch of code to do anything at all."

I presume you mean the boilerplate code to bind variables and such. If you're not a fan of OCI why not use JDBC, ODBC, cx_Oracle etc, you don't need to use OCI, there are many other interfaces that make life easier. OCI is the low level interface for programmers not scared of a few lines of code. You'll find that you quickly abstract away the boilerplate in your application, and it's really not that hard. OCI has been around for a long time...

Oh, if you knew me you'd know that I'm not afraid of a few lines of code, and I'm not afraid of low-level stuff :)

My point is that when you compare OCI to the C API for mysql, it takes a lot less code to use the mysql C API, and it is much less error prone. And it doesn't make sense to either use a wrapper or figure out some framework when it's a one-time project that I'm charging at an hour or two of my time.

"We own it. We manage it. We upgrade it. You only pay for what you use"

That might actually be a pretty good model for organisations who have a limited requirement to run the Oracle DB internally (for Oracle applications) without investing in specialized support teams just for that one technology.

We are talking about Oracle here, so chances are it's going to cost the same or more than the traditional on-site db server and admins.

I'm sure it's not cheap (I haven't been able to find the details yet), but you might be underestimating the cost of operating a large database. Even if we get to amortize and capitalize the expense, there's still a ton of cash that needs to go out the door today. Today, I can license and operate Oracle by the hour with AWS, and I don't need any staff. That's been huge for me. No financing, no cashflow worries.

On Larry's about-face: Oracle's been in SaaS for a while. Now they're getting into IaaS. He's right, though. When it comes to SaaS, going "cloud" meant changing the ad copy. IaaS means self-provisioning and metered billing. That took a little doing. It's a step forward. It may not be compelling for everyone, but there's a market.

FWIW, amazon's RDS supports Oracle already, also allowing you to reuse existing licenses

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