Tool Support for Open Source Databases Increasing
Support for open source by commercial vendors in the BI/DW space has been accelerating. Supporting the two most popular open source databases (MySQL and PostgreSQL) is the current push, now that many vendors support Linux. Business Objects came in a while back with MySQL support, both on the reporting and ETL fronts. Now MicroStrategy certified the latest version of its software to work with both MySQL and PostgreSQL. (By "now" I mean last month, I'm very behind in writing these days). Other vendors are adding support for open source databases as well: Embarcadero supports both MySQL and PostgreSQL, GoldenGate and iWay are both supporting MySQL, and others are indicating support will be added this year.
We're also seeing open source used inside some of these products, like Tomcat and Jboss being shipped as options for web application servers, or Business Objects' inclusion of MySQL for use storing metadata.
IBM has been a supporter of open source, but the contributions have been calculated to have minimal negative effect on their commercial software revenue. As such, the contributions in areas like databases and BI have been sketchy. Oracle hasn't been sitting back. They bought Sleepycat a while back, and the acquisitions of Jboss and Zend (creators of PHP) have been floated. Most of the acquisitions and contributions by commercial software companies are not in areas that have much impact in the BI/DW world. This will probably change as the market accelerates.
Posted by Mark Monday, March 13, 2006 9:21:00 AM |
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