"Sun DB" The Open Database

Computers

Our President & COO recently talked to the press about our plans regarding Sun's Open Source SQL database (see the link and excerpt below).

I believe "Sun DB" (a generic term for the concept) will provide huge value to our industry. Many will continue to choose to deploy their largest, most active, and most mission critical data stores on technology from traditional database vendors. However, Sun DB will provide a supported open standard and open source SQL data store at an extremely attractive price point (free?). IT Shops, Government Programs, Research Facilities, etc, will find this offering to be technically and financially irresistible for many types of deployments. And, I'm guessing that traditional database vendors will find intensified market pressure to readdress license models increasingly irresistible. It's a win-win for everyone... Well, almost everyone.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/02/16/HNsunpresident_1.html

Sun president talks databases, Sparc, and HP
Jonathan Schwartz talks about Sun's open source plans and offers Fiorina's successor some advice

IDG: Does Sun have a concrete plan to offer an open source database, or was Scott McNealy just being provocative when he suggested that recently?

Schwartz: To be a complete application platform you have to have some form of persistent storage. You can achieve that through a file system, a directory engine, a messaging store, the persistence engine in our application server -- those are all forms of databases. What we haven't done is address the SQL access database, which has been served well in the open source community by MySQL and PostgreSQL. We're committed to filling the hole -- all of the hole, not just the file system. We have to address the requirements of the SQL database, so I think we're quite serious about it.

IDG: Would you use the same model as you did with Linux on the Java Desktop System, i.e. take an existing open source product, tweak it for your needs and put a Sun label on it?

Schwartz: That's to be determined. Customers have said, 'We'd like an alternative to the existing choices we have.' And they are consistently asking Sun to go work on that issue.

IDG: So it's a matter of when and not if?

Schwartz: Absolutely.

March 07, 2005 12:00 PM EST Permalink

Head Start Hare

Puzzles

This isn't really a puzzle... But it makes for an interesting thought exercise for those who look at the trees rather than the forest.

A turtle and a hare decide to have a race. The turtle has finally figured out a way, he thinks, that will guarantee him a win, or at least not a loss. And, if he has figured it correctly, it doesn't matter how fast the hare can run! The only stipulation is that he has to have a head start... Here's his thinking:

Say the turtle gets an X minute head start, and travels at Y miles/hour. Then the hare takes off at Z miles/hour (Z >> Y). Here's the idea... After a few moments, the turtle gets to point "a". The hare, of course, takes some amount of time to catch up to point "a". But by then, the turtle has gone a bit further, to point "b". The hare will take some finite amount of additional time to get to point "b". By then, the turtle will have moved on to point "c". Etc, etc, etc....  It appears, to the turtle, that the hare will never catch up!

Clearly, the turtle is a little "slow". We know the hare will win give reasonable values for speed, race distance, and the head start. Using simple math, we can figure out the point that the hare overtakes the turtle. So, where did the turtle go wrong in his thinking?

March 07, 2005 11:32 AM EST Permalink