Comments for RW_Jordan@Cork.Ireland

Comment on The Tao of IT problem solving by Vladimir

Vladimir — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:44:49 +0000

Very well said Randy

Comment on Sybase vs Oracle by rwjordan

rwjordan — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 07:43:50 +0000

Your story reminded me of a Sun system with a fiber optic array. Someone working on an adjacent system knocked the array connector loose, but the Sybase instance operating on that array didn’t stop working for hours until it couldn’t write any more to it’s cache. And while it would allow you to log in, it wasn’t working. Before we tried a shutdown, we discovered the loose connection, and once we reseated it, Sybase wrote all it’s buffers and continued on as if nothing had happened. Not even a reboot or restart was required.

Comment on Sybase vs Oracle by N.T.Moorthy

N.T.Moorthy — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 05:07:32 +0000

We are software development company, using all 3 popular RDBMSs, namely, Sybase, Oracle and MS SQL Server. Sybase’s ASA is the preferred one to bundle with our ERP and Financial products and Sybase ASE, etc. provided for custom-built medium and large scale software solutions.
In our observation, we find that Sybase’s products, both ASE and ASA are the most stable and cost effective RDBMSs we have worked with. We have provided few enterprise systems such as SCM, on ASE, after carful evaluaion of all 3 technologies, because, once installed Sybase products simply work, 24×7x365.
Especially, even if, due to any human errors the hardware fails, ASE will still continue to serve the users, until we shut it down properly. Oracle will not only go down, but also will require to set it up again, going thru the tedious process of installation and configurations.
An example, might prove the point. Recently, one of our large installations, running on ASE 12.5.2, on SUN Solaris (multi-processor SUN Server), faced a Hardware problem. A junior IT guy from the client’s IT department, pulled a night data-back up tape before the job was over. That made the OS to hang. Panicking, he’d tried to reboot Solaris. Solaris wanted the backup process to be properly closed before shutting down. This went into a loop. Until the follwoing morning, we were not informed. But, all that time, this 24 hour system was accessed by hundreds of users, without anyone knowing that that their DB Server Computer was having problem, because, Sybase ASE was continuing to serve them. We solved the problem by physically rebooting the Server computer and Sybase ASE simply continued as if nothing happened. Entire operation was over within 30 minutes, max.
This is in total contrast to a fiasco we faced with another customer, using Orcale, (I do not remember the exact version now, could have been 7) of a similar nature, where after rebooting, Oracle has to be re-installed and re-configured. It took nearly 5-6 hours.
Though there are ‘Pundits’ who talk big about big ‘brand’ names, and feeling safe by ‘recommending’ them, it is the end-customer who is going to suffer, expecially, the costs of initial and coninuous running of Oracle based systems.
We, however, coninute to provide our application software for both types of customers, Pundits and Real-Benefit- Seekers.
Our cautionary note would be:
A user-company, after installing a RDBMS, need not bother whether the supplier is there or not, Instead they should concentrate mainly on enhacing the Application softare to suit their changing business-needs and getting more performance out of the database, thru Performance Tuning using Professionals.
Rather than wasting time trying to keep on ‘upgrading’ technologies, try to use all the advanced feaures available in the existing technology version, which will take lot of time to learn, understand, harness and utilise.
Please, be truthful and loyal to the organisation where u work. Give them the low costing solutions which are also fast performing and low resource consuming, if necessary after evaluting all 3 RDBMSs truthfully. Getting the company reps to demo the performance on a ‘Proof of Concept’ (POC) basis, will definitely show the benefits before the company invests.

Comment on Sybase vs Oracle by PAULF

PAULF — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 11:38:47 +0000

I have been using ASE for 8 years and ave seen mayor imporvements and have also suffered form erarly release buggy software. I would say thatASE 12.5.4 ESD 4 is the mose relaible, ESD 5 introduced new bugs re VIEWS and wait until ASE 15.0.1 ESD 5 gets released before upgrading!

Comment on Sybase vs Oracle by Kiriakos Georgiou

Kiriakos Georgiou — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 19:20:31 +0000

Sybase ASE is the Ferrari of databases.

Let the masses use overpriced junk, I’ll take superior technology anytime.

Comment on Row level Locking by rwjordan

rwjordan — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 10:12:29 +0000

Sybase is a true client/server database with it’s origins AS an operating system, hence it’s native user login methods. These methods can be configured in much the same way as any OS. At AT&T we had servers with only a few dozen OS logins, and 15,000 user logins to the databases. Try and admin that many users at the OS level and you will really have fun. However we used Kerberos to manage them, but you can use LDAP, or external OS authentications (now) or a number of other security profiles.

Comment on Row level Locking by Jon Allen

Jon Allen — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 04:51:31 +0000

I just found your blog through a search on sybase + wordpress.
I have a similar background to you 20 years in IT. Most of it with Sybase these days , plenty of Oracle in the old days. I agree with a lot of your points on the Sybase / Oracle debate. I still prefer Oracle though!

One thing that really bugs me in Sybase is the lack of O/S authenticated logins. In Oracle you just use sqlplus /
and your “OPS$” logins remove all the complexity required with having userids and passwords for the database as well as the O/S.

Particulary with batch programs and SOX compliance for Sybase dbs messing around keeping track of the batch userids and logins a real PITA.

Comment on Outsourcing IT? by omaniblog

omaniblog — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 06:52:22 +0000

I’ve come to this post while scanning over the more technical ones, like oracle versus … And I’ve stopped and read. Why? Because it is good to read your views on something I can relate to. Outsourcing and the influence it has on staff motivation… The whisper of impending redundancy… the prospect of uprooting…
It strikes me that you might be v well placed to write an awful lot about how IT staff have coped with the permanent revolution in software, systems, fashions in company structure, cultural upheaval etc etc.
After 25 years in the business you have forgotten so much (says he teasingly) that there must be so many stories lingering under the surface of memory.
I find IT people live in a world of their own and occasionally come out into the plain speak of everyday dialogue. This is an outsider’s perspective and does not reflect the deep vein of emotion experienced by IT workers.
Maybe i should simply read on, or go back through your blog to find the writing I’m grappling to grasp.

Comment on Technorati Profile by Jackson

Jackson — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 13:23:30 +0000

\”Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training.\” – Anna Freud

It flashed in my mind when i looked at this blog.

Comment on Sybase vs Oracle by rwjordan

rwjordan — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:38:19 +0000

11 Years means you were using Sybase-11 not the best series, but only a fool uses version 1 or any release. You wouldn’t install version 1 of Microsoft OS would you? Why would you trust a Production server with a first release of Sybase, or Oracle for that matter. not 12, but 12.1 not 12.5, but 12.5.1 knowing that, I have always had a quick response from Sybase about EBF’s and they always work and easy and safe to apply.