Exadata X3 In-Memory Database Machine: To be or not to be
- by Luis Moreno Campos
Since Larry Ellison announced Oracle Exadata X3 as the new generation of the Database Machine, he established the product in the In-Memory Database arena. And that annoyed some people.
We all know that In-Memory Databases are the ones that *only* execute in memory and use the other layers of storage for persistency (mainly disk). Oracle database has always been a technology that uses memory as a caching mechanism and that hasn't change nor it will change with Oracle Database 12c.
So this is the central point of fuss when it comes to announcing an Engineered Systems as In-Memory Database, when in fact it still runs Oracle Database, not vanilla but still the same product.
Let me tell you purist people out there: when you find no new ground breaking point to get all excited about you decide to bash it, and go against its claims. It's not like a car manufacturer that launches a mini-van in the market and calls it a Sports Car, we are talking about a fundamental change in the ILM stack: level 2 of caching is now self sufficient. It's not DRAM? Who cares, still let's you put in flash amounts of data not done up until now, so I guess Oracle can name it whatever Larry wants because in the end it's something never done before.
Now let's imagine that you hop on the pure In-Memory Database bandwagon. You would be stuck with a database technology that lags behind the Oracle Database hundreds of light years in man/hours innovations and features. Do you really want to travel back in time? Remember, the first rule about time travelling is that "Security is not Guaranteed".
Your choice.
LMC
