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March 31, 2005
on a buying frenzy
There was plenty of drama, and excitement around Oracle's bid, and eventual purchase of Peoplesoft for $10 billion last year. Now they're in the news again, and Larry has his hands full. Recent purchase of security software firm Oblix for an undisclosed amount, and Retek for $631 million have add the the list. Not bad for a couple of weeks work.
For sure there has never been a better time to be an Oracle integrator. The Oracle landscape just got that much more complex, and will keep us all busy for years to come.
Update: Just found another blogger's analysis. Among other things he discusses the complexity of managing four codebases. Busy indeed.
Posted by admin at 04:03 PM | Comments (0)
March 29, 2005
What's happening in Brazil?
On the Open Source in government topic, one of the biggest Open Source fans is Brazillian president President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. He has embarked on a new program "PC Conectado" to help low-income Brazillians get their first computer.
Thanks to Peter Norton, for the link.
Brazil appeared in the news last year when Microsoft threatened a defamation suit because of statements made by Sergio Amadeu, President of the National Institute of Information Technology for statements he made .
"accusing the company of a 'drug-dealer practice' for offering the operational system Windows to some governments and city administration for digital inclusion programs. 'This is a trojan horse, a form of securing critical mass to continue constraining the country'." Additionally, "To Amadeu, this will be a decisive year to win the 'strategy of fear, uncertainty and doubt', as he classifies the business model of Microsoft." Microsoft's complaint claims that this is "an excess in freedom of speech and freedom of thought, by means of the dissemination of information."
Indeed. Read details, and find additional links in this Slashdot article.
Posted by admin at 04:16 PM | Comments (0)
Microsoft's shared source initiative
Microsoft has it's own version of Open Source called Shared Source. Microsoft has also released Open Source such as the WiX Toolset. In particular, in the embedded OS market, Microsoft has experienced fierce competition from the likes of Linux, and has eased licensing restrictions on it's Windows CE OS to counter that threat. Slashdot pointed to an interesting article by Stephen R. Walli which discusses Microsoft's Shared Source initiative and what Open Source might mean for them.
Posted by admin at 04:00 PM | Comments (0)
March 26, 2005
OSS in Japanese Government
From the Open Source in Government dapartment, the Japanese Information Promotion Agency is encouraging the use of Open Source software in government projects such as the Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry.
Government projects, where tax dollars are being used to build software that solves a specific problem, seem to be the very best examples where Open Source software really makes a lot of sense. Since tax dollars finance the project in the first place, the fruit of that labor should be returned to the public domain. Open Source licenses, not only for the newly developed software, but for the software building blocks on which they are based eliminate most if not all barriers to doing just that.
Posted by admin at 01:00 PM | Comments (0)
March 24, 2005
Novell Linux extravaganza
We've mentioned Novell's Linux push before. Their new Novell Linux Desktop 10 is out, with sights set on competing with the Windows desktop.
To be fair, whenever I've been asked by the casual user whether Linux was a viable option for them, I've declined. Despite my appreciation for the technology and performance, it's desktop has remained cludgy at best. As I am at home at the command line, this hasn't been a stumbling block for me. At Linux World in Boston last month, I was able to check out Novell's new desktop, and I was thoroughly shocked. Not only was drag and drop working, and things like the file dialog working consistently, but the speed was amazing. And applications like Office were there, and working well. Good font support was there as well.
For enterprises, the applications that their client machines run are rigidly controlled, and standardized now. In these environments, chances are most application functionality is now there on Linux. The business case for a Linux desktop is beginning to bloom where the license cost savings, remote management, and stability are the obvious pluses.
As with Oracle Novell is clearly practicing what they preach.
Posted by admin at 06:27 PM | Comments (0)
March 22, 2005
open source in court
For those of you business owners wondering how the GNU General Public License and Open Source in general might affect their business in the case of a legal tussle, read closely. A recent Groklaw article discusses an interesting case Drew Technologies vs the Society of Automotive Engineers. An interesting read, discussing the dangers of car manufacturers trying to keep proprietary, information about software in new cars, information that could make those cars a safety & environmental hazard, among other things. Of particular interest in the article is how the Open Source GPL license came into play, and what impact that could have for other businesses.
Posted by admin at 12:49 AM | Comments (0)
March 20, 2005
understanding the tipping point
In this Newsfactor article, Paul Murphy discusses the computing tipping point that Linux is fast approaching."most of those who did replace a few Windows servers with Linux soon found that the software's quality led to much bigger benefits in terms of operational stability, support staffing and the overall integrity of their information systems."
He adds insightfully, that it is not just, or not necessarily technology advantages that leads a revolution of change, but rather a social shift. Interesting reading...
Posted by admin at 06:38 PM | Comments (0)
DBAs - take heart
For those who are worried about self-managing databases, and the potential of outsourcing the displace jobs, take heart. According to this IDC report the worldwide database market grew by a whopping 11% last year. Considering the rising online presence of many businesses, and datawarehousing of medical, retail, and other data, it's not surprising.
Posted by admin at 03:58 PM | Comments (0)
EDS - a glowing Open Source testimonial
EDS, worldwide IT consultancy, speaks of it's soft spot for Linux and how it has solved real world problems for them in record time, and cost savings. Hard to argue with that. Though in some cases there are contradictory statements it illustrates the point that sometimes politics & marketing speaks one message, and down to earth technology solutions speak another message entirely.
Posted by admin at 01:31 AM | Comments (0)
March 16, 2005
Oracle Resources - Part III
Scripts scripts and more scripts. That's what we bring you in this installment of Oracle Resources. Some of the best include sites by Steve Adams where you can find scripts, tips, and other Oracle docs on little known or undocumented features. And then there's Jonathan Lewis whose site has plenty of scripts, and articles and Jared Still a Perl afficionado, and Oracle expert. Also you'll find a lot of useful information and scripts at Stephane Faroult's site, a treasure chest of scripts and papers presented in an anecdotal format. And finally one of the true jewels on the net is Tom Kyte's site part of oracle.com.
All of these folks are regular contributers to the Oracle-L email list, and authors of various high-profile books on our favorite relational database, Oracle.
Posted by admin at 09:14 PM | Comments (0)
March 13, 2005
Oracle + Open Source sandwich
A funny title perhaps, until you look at all the details. An interesting piece was published a few months ago about Oracle + MySQL putting the squeeze on SQL Server. With the new announcement of Yukon scheduled for release this summer it will be interesting to watch it play out. I still maintain that MySQL, and other Open Source databases such as Postgres pose little threat to Oracle because they target different markets, Oracle is starting to make moves toward this entry-level market with it's new pricing scheme for 10g.
Posted by admin at 05:37 PM | Comments (1)
March 12, 2005
some anecdotal history
Open Source, and computing in general have a long, and sometimes forgotten history, but some of it can be quite interesting, and revealing for understanding where things are today.For anyone trying to understand technological diversity I would heartily recommend Neal Stephenson's free In the Beginning was the Command Line. Stephenson weaves the story so well, and so clearly, that it feels more clear than having watched it all happen then. A choice quote:
About twenty years ago Jobs and Wozniak, the founders of Apple, came up with the very strange idea of selling information processing machines for use in the home. The business took off, and its founders made a lot of money and received the credit they deserved for being daring visionaries. But around the same time, Bill Gates and Paul Allen came up with an idea even stranger and more fantastical: selling computer operating systems. This was much weirder than the idea of Jobs and Wozniak. A computer at least had some sort of physical reality to it. It came in a box, you could open it up and plug it in and watch lights blink. An operating system had no tangible incarnation at all. It arrived on a disk, of course, but the disk was, in effect, nothing more than the box that the OS came in. The product itself was a very long string of ones and zeroes that, when properly installed and coddled, gave you the ability to manipulate other very long strings of ones and zeroes. Even those few who actually understood what a computer operating system was were apt to think of it as a fantastically arcane engineering prodigy, like a breeder reactor or a U-2 spy plane, and not something that could ever be (in the parlance of high-tech) "productized."
I would also take a look at this page covering more specifically the history of Open Source beginning at various computer science labs, and universities.
Posted by admin at 02:26 AM | Comments (0)
more linux heat
Of course we know Oracle's push has been huge, according to Gartner 360% huge and a new four processor TPC benchmark record to boot. But also the likes of IBM and Novell's latest offering are heating up the push for Linux in the Enterprise.
There are also some interesting new startups namely Spike Source, Source Labs, and Optaros who just received 7 million financing.
As a counterpoint, however, you can see some problems starting to emerge with Mozilla Firefox development.
Quick plug, our sponsor Heavyweight Internet Group also provides Oracle + Open Source integration and professional services.
Posted by admin at 01:56 AM | Comments (0)
March 11, 2005
Oracle Resources - Part II
Continuing on in this series I'd like to hit on some sites which specialize in Oracle Security. Once an area of interest mostly to Unix Administrators, and Cisco engineers, it is more and more a concern for the DBA.
One of the best sites around is Pete Finnigan's. He covers all aspects of security and his site includes a great weblog, a huge list of default Oracle passwords which can come in quite handy, lots of useful scripts and other technical whitepapers to keep you busy at all hours.
Another excellent site is Security Focus which covers latest vulnerabilities, and exploits and has a lot of database coverage including Oracle. Also, Oracle has their own security alerts page which you should keep an eye on regularly.
Posted by admin at 02:56 AM | Comments (0)
March 03, 2005
technological diversity
Diversity is often applied to the racial equation, but it can be very important in technology too. One of the original reasons I was attracted to Oracle technology was because it ran on so many Unix platforms, as well as windows. Now it runs on Macintosh too. Dan over at IP Inferno wrote an excellent piece called Monoglot World on why it's important to be a polyglot especially in todays computing environment. He's right, Linux and Mac folks are extra sensitive to this.But there's another really important reason why everyone should try to use different software + technology. Many of the viruses, trojans, and other malware infecting computers on the internet, take advantage of the fact that so many users are using Outlook, or IE. They spread like wildfire, and leave a mess in their tracks.
Download a copy of Firefox, Opera, pick up a Mac Mini or even if you're really ambitious, install a copy of Linux on your PC. You'll learn a lot, sometimes the hard way, about why standards are important, and why Tim-Berners-Lee still uses a Mac.
Posted by admin at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)