MySQL to Optimize for SAP, SAP to Support MaxDB
At SAP TechEd '07. MySQL AB announced plans to optimize MySQL Enterprise Server for the SAP NetWeaver® platform. MySQL and SAP also announced SAP will assume responsibility for sales and support of MaxDB, the database engine used by the SAP on-demand business suite (SAP® Business ByDesign™).
Sybase Q3 Earnings Exceed Forecasts
Sybase quarterly revenues have increased to $255.3 million, up 22% from the same quarter last year. Sybase's three business units experienced strong growth, with license revenue increasing to $85.1 million. The messaging software business unit had revenues of $34.3 million. Sybase IQ recently set a new price/performance record on the Transaction Processing Council's TPC-H decision-support benchmark.
Enterprise DB Announces New Version of EnterpriseDB Postgres
EnterpriseDB Corporation announced a new version of EnterpriseDB Postgres, a pre-configured version of the PostgreSQL distribution. The new release includes a Procedural Language developer and a
MySQL-to-PostgreSQL Migration Toolkit. EnterpriseDB Advanced Server is an Oracle-compatible server targeted for high-volume, mission-critical enterprise applications.
REAL Software Announces REAL SQL Server 2007
REAL Software announced REAL SQL Server 2007, a cross-platform SQL server for REALbasic users. REAL SQL Server 2007 supports AES256 encryption for databases and support for multi-core processors. Options for client connectivity include ODBC, PHP and C. The REAL SQL Server Developer Edition is available at no cost to application developers. REALbasic is a cross-platform language for Windows, Macintosh and Linux developers.
OpenAjax Alliance Announces OpenAjax Hub to Support Secure Mashups
The OpenAjax Alliance has announced OpenAjax Hub 1.1 will add support for secure mashups. Developers looking to create enterprise applications with persistent information from SQL databases and XML data sources have been concerned about security with Web 2.0 mashups. OpenAjax Hub 1.1 will isolate mashup components using a secure sandbox security model and the OpenAjax Hub's publish/subscribe features for mediated cross-component messaging.
Advanced Data Access Releases Beta Version of SQLfX XML Integration Middleware
Advanced Data Access Technologies, Inc. has released a beta version of its SQLfX XML integration middleware. The SQLfX® product uses standard SQL as its hierarchical structure engine. It provides transparent and seamless integration of native XML by ISO standard SQL. SQLfX provides non-procedural, navigation-free operation and dynamic hierarchy optimization to allow processing of multi-leg queries using global SQL hierarchical views. SQLfX is Java code that's compatible with any Java Standard Edition (JSE) including JDK 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, 1.6 and later. (Free download).
Apache Derby 10.3.1.4 Released
The Apache Derby Project released Apache Derby 10.3.1.4 with a variety of new features, including SSL encryption and a security manager for the Network Server. The SQL grammar has been updated to add the TRIM function and drop or rename columns. JDBC support has been enhanced to include all JDBC methods for operating on BLOBs and CLOBs. There is also an enhancement to reduce CPU use when Derby is operating in embedded mode.
Australian Software Company Announces SQL Delta Upgrade
The Australian Software Company announced the release of SQL Delta version 4.1, a tool for comparing SQL database schemas and data. The data comparison tool works with Microsoft SQL Server 7, 2000 and 2005 databases. It supports a project metaphor and structure searches using keywords. It provides reports on schema and data differences in HTML, PDF and text formats.
McObject Announces eXtremeDB ODBC Support
McObject, a company founded by embedded database specialists, announced support for Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) in the newest update to its flagship database product. McObject eXtremeDB is an in-memory embedded database system that's available in five editions (Standard, High Availability, Transaction Logging, and 64-bit). Support for ODBC was added to eXtremeSQL 3.1 and it's available with all editions of the product and eXtremeDB Fusion, which is a hybrid disk-based/in-memory database manager.
Chicago Business Intelligence Group Releases Frogpoint 2.3
Chicago Business Intelligence Group announced the release of Frogpoint® version 2.3. Frogpoint is an integrated suite of tools for business intelligence projects. Frogpoint project management capabilities help organizations plan, manage and execute successful data warehouse and business intelligence programs.
Remote Command Execution and SQL Injection Vulnerabilities Uncovered in Oracle Products
FrSIRT reports several high-risk security vulnerabilities in Oracle software, including Oracle 9i, Oracle 10g, Oracle Application Server and suite products. Exploiting the vulnerabilities could enable an attacker to execute arbitrary commands, alter sensitive data and launch cross-site scripting or denial-of-service attacks. The solution is to apply the July 2007 Oracle Critical Patch Update.
Sybase Announces Security Upgrade for Information Anywhere Suite
Sybase iAnywhere announced collaboration and security enhancements in an update to the Information Anywhere® suite. It includes a secure instant messaging capability that works with Jabber, Microsoft Office Live, Google Talk and other enterprise IM systems, with support for Blackberry, Palm, Nokia and other mobile devices. The suite also includes a laptop security solution that supports encryption of removable media and two-factor authentication. More than 20,000 customers are using iAnywhere solutions for millions of mobile devices.
Oracle Releases Critical Patch Updates
Oracle has released a Critical Patch Update that includes 45 new patches for multiple Oracle product lines. The update includes 19 fixes for Oracle 9i and 10g database products, including two vulnerabilities that are exploitable without authentication. There are four new patches for Oracle Application Server, one critical patch for Oracle Collaboration Suite and 14 for Oracle E-Business Suite.
Actual Releases ODBC Pack 2.7 for Mac OS X
Actual Technologies has released a set of database drivers for Mac OS X. The Actual ODBC Pack version 2.7 drivers are tailored for use with FileMaker Pro 9's External SQL Source (ESS) feature. Actual ODBC enables FileMaker Pro to access Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and MySQL databases without writing SQL code. (Download an evaluation copy.)
McObject Perst Adds Lucene for Text Indexing and Searching
McObject announced Perst for Java 2.71 has integrated the Apache Lucene information retrieval software and provides Perst functions that encapsulate Lucene indexing and searching APIs. When a Perst developer designates an object class as full-text searchable, Lucene will automatically add it to its index. The Lucene library includes features such as single- and multi-term keywords, proximity queries, phrase queries, relevance ranking and wildcards. Perst also provides multi-version concurrency control and it supports ACID transactions for updating the full-text index.
SQL Power Group Releases Power*Architect Modeling Tool as Open Source
The consulting portfolio at SQL Group includes business intelligence and data warehousing projects, but the firm is making a foray into the world of open source software providers. SQL Power released the source code to its Power*Architect data modeler software under a BSD license. Power*Architect is a Java-based tool that enables users to reverse-engineer databases, profile source databases and
generate extract, transform and load (ETL) data. Download.
SQL Script Builder Version 1.6.0.20 Announced
David Birebent announced the release of SQL Script Builder Version 1.6.0.20. It creates SQL scripts and dump files from any SQL data source for which there is an ODBC driver. The script supports migration of a single table or multiple tables to Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, Pervasive SQL and PostgreSQL databases. The latest version handles batch conversions and date formatting.
SQL Farms Announces One-Click Technology for Restarting Microsoft SQL Server
SQL Farms, Inc. announced SQL Farm Combine will offer one-click restart of SQL Server services on all network machines. This will assist database administrators (DBAs) in handling automated SQL patches and multi-server configuration changes.
Zmanda Announces Recovery Manager for MySQL
Zmanda™ announced the Zamanda Recovery Manager for MySQL is available with the Zmanda Management Console, a set of tools for simplifying MySQL database backup and recovery. Zmanda ZRM for MySQL is an open source solution that offers storage engine awareness and support for multiple MySQL database storage engines. Zmanda Management Console for MySQL Backup is available to subscribers to the Zmanda Network.
dbaDIRECT Announces Remote Database Administration Support Services for IBM DB2 z/OS
dbaDirect, a managed service provider of remote database administration capabilities, announced it will offer support for the IBM z/OS mainframe environment. dbaDirect currently manages thousands of databases globally. It provides DBA support for major SQL platforms, including Oracle, IBM DB2 UDB, DB2 z/OS, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL and Sybase. In making the announcement dbaDirect CEO John Bostick cited a shrinking pool of mainframe talent amidst a "continuing renaissance for 'Big Iron' computing".
DBA at Fidelity National Subsidiary Sells Info on 8.5 Million Consumers
A recent SEC filing by Fidelity National disclosed a senior database administrator (DBA) at its Certegy Check Services subsidiary stole data belonging to 8.5 million consumers. The database administrator illegally downloaded and sold customer information to a data broker, which sold the information to direct marketing companies. The stolen data includes name and address information, birth dates and bank account and credit card information. Of the 8.5 million records, approximately 5.7 million contain checking account data and 1.5 million include credit card information.
PASS Summit 2007 for SQL Server Community Closes
The Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS), a global association of 25,000 SQL Server professionals, announced its annual user group conference ran 18-21 September 2007. The keynote presentation about PerformancePoint was by Bill Baker, General Manager of Business Intelligence at Microsoft. The conference offered a hands-on lab that enabled comparisons between SQL Server Analysis Services 2005 and SQL Server Analysis Services 2008. The 2007 PASS Community Summit ran at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver, Colorado.
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Predictive Analytics Seminars
The Predictive Analytics for Business, Marketing and Web seminar ran 18-19 October 2007 in Washington, DC. The October seminar followed the eMetrics Summit, 14-17 October in Washington, D.C. The instructor was Eric Siegel, PhD, a former professor of computer science at Columbia and a consultant in data mining and analytics. The September 2007 seminar was at the AMA Executive Conference Center in the San Francisco Marriott. |
Texas Memory Systems Unveils Oracle Accelerator Kit with Supercomputer-Class Hardware
Texas Memory Systems introduced a new Oracle Accelerator Kit for Infiniband-based Oracle grid computing environments. The Oracle Accelerator Kit includes Texas Memory Systems RamSan solid state disks with switches and host channel adaptors from QLogic. The new accelerator kit uses supercomputer-class hardware that's expected to deliver as much as a 2500% increase in Oracle database performance. It is available in three different configurations: a Small Business Kit, Medium Business Kit and Enterprise
Business Kit.
Workday Challenges Oracle and SAP with SaaS
Entrepreneur David Duffield, who founded and built PeopleSoft into a powerhouse, is putting his energy today into 2-year old Workday. The new venture is challenging established software suite vendors by offering on-demand software, also known as software as a service (SaaS). To provide integration in a hosted, on-demand SOA, Workday is using Cape Clear Software's ESB. Workday is currently embedding the Cape Clear ESB in SaaS-based human resources applications for a dozen customers. Besides Workday, companies such as Salesforce.com, NetSuite and RightNow Technologies are promoting a migration to SaaS and on-demand software.
Oracle Acquisitions Boost 4Q Profit to 23%
Oracle acquisitions contributed to stellar performance during the company's fiscal fourth quarter. Oracle's profits increased 23% to $1.6 billion. Since beginning a wave of acquisitions in 2004, Oracle market value has grown by $30 billion. Oracle has invested $25 billion for acquisitions, beginning with PeopleSoft in 2004. IDC estimates Oracle's share of the $81 billion business applications market is $5.6 billion and Gartner recently reported Oracle owns 47% of the database market.
Quest Software to Acquire Script Logic
Quest Software announced the acquisition of ScriptLogic Corporation for approximately $90 million in cash. Privately-held ScriptLogic is a provider of systems lifecycle management solutions for Windows networks. ScriptLogic has more than 19,000 customers using its products on 4.75 million desktops and 110,000 servers. Quest Software is a provider of database, applications and Windows solutions
with more than 50,000 customers. The acquisition will increase Quest's portfolio of client-side and server-side Windows solutions. It is expected to complete in Q3 2007 and ScriptLogic will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Quest Software.
Gartner Reports Oracle is the Leader in Growing Relational Database Market
In its 2006 database market report, Gartner Research reported Oracle remains the leader in a relational database market that has grown to $15.2 billion from $13.3 billion in 2005.. In 2006 Oracle database license revenue grew 14.9% to $7.2 billion and Oracle's market share increased from 46.8% in 2005 to 47.1% in 2006. IBM relational revenues increased 8.8% in 2006 to $3.2 billion, giving IBM 21.1% of the market. IBM's market shared dropped a point from 2005. Microsoft's database license revenues grew by 28% to $2.7 billion, giving Microsoft a 17.4% market share. NCR Teradata and Sybase each had a 3.2% market share.
The top three best-selling database products comprise 85.6 percent of the business. Unix remained the leading operating system for running database servers (34.8%). Windows is close behind at 34.5% and Linux is third at 15.5%, although it grew 67% in 2006.
Misuse of Object-Relational Mapping
In this editorial, Shahid N. Shah discusses the current state of data modeling and object-relational mapping. The subject is information technology in the healthcare industry, but the commentary is valid in other contexts. Shah writes "Even though data are so important, we in health-IT don’t seem to spend the quality time necessary to structure our schemas and databases in such a way as to make it easier to maintain in the future." The author expresses concerns about using object-relational mapping to generate a database schema, instead of designing the database before using a mapping tool to generate application objects.
IBM Opens Beta Testing of DB2 9 Version 2
IBM announced an open public beta test program for DB2 Viper 2 for Linux, UNIX and Windows.
DB2 Viper 2 provides workload management functions integrated into the database engine and other enhancements for data warehousing. It provides check constraints and triggers on XML and an SQL function to transform XML documents using an XSL stylesheet. DB2 Viper 2 also offers improved data compression, more scalar functions and ARRAY objects for stored procedures.
Microsoft Building Chinese R&D Center for SQL Server
Microsoft China is setting up an SQL Server R&D Center to speed up research and development in China. Prakash Sundaresan will be the director of the SQL Server R&D Center, which will focus on developing core technology and products for the global market. Microsoft China Research and Development Group will expand R&D centers in Beijing and Shanghai to a total staff of 100 developers within three years. According to a recent report by Gartner Research, Microsoft's database license revenues grew by 28% last year.
Mainsoft Releases Three Editions of Visual Studio Tools for Java
Mainsoft has announced a suite of tools that enable developers to use for Visual Studio 2005 for Java development. Three editions of Mainsoft Java EE 2.0 are available. The free Developer Edition supports building applications for the Apache Tomcat application server. The Enterprise Edition adds support for IBM WebSphere, JBoss and BEA WebLogic. The Portal Edition supports SOA development and integration of Java EE portals with ASP.NET 2.0, SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services and other services.
Microsoft Releases SQL Server 2008 Community Technology Preview
Microsoft has released a preview of its flagship database product. Microsoft SQL Server 2008 adds a vector-based spatial solution, a policy-based management framework, transparent encryption, support for external encryption hardware support, a resource governor, Language Integrated Query, and several new non-relational data types. SQL Server 2008 Community Technology Preview download.
Business Objects Acquires Inxight Software to Enhance Search Capabilities
Leading BI vendor Business Objects has acquired Inxight Software in a transaction expected to close in July 2007. Inxight provides tools for operations with unstructured information, including data visualization, federated search and text analytics. Business Objects will provide information discovery capabilities for BusinessObjects XI. Inxight is a member of the Business Objects Technology Partner and it has more than 300 OEM license agreements with companies such as IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and SAS. Unstructured information includes text documents, e-mails, web pages and other data sources not formatted for database queries. Business Objects estimates unstructured information comprises 80 per cent of corporate data.
Gartner Recognizes IBM as the Top ECM Vendor for 2006
A recent report by Gartner Research recognizes IBM as the leading enterprise content management (ECM) vendor in revenue for 2006. Gartner also reported the ECM market expanded 12 percent between 2005 and 2006, with increased interest in content archiving, web content management and records management. More than 17,000 customers use the IBM ECM portfolio, which includes FileNet and IBM content management software. IBM's portfolio supports SOA with platforms from HP, Microsoft, Oracle and Sun Microsystems, in addition to IBM DB2 and WebSphere.
DataArchitect 4.0 Release Supports Multiple Platforms
The release of database design tool DataArchitect 4.0 has been announced by theKompany.com. Users can design and reverse engineer databases using DataArchitect entity-relationship diagram (ERD) capabilities. The product is available for HP-UX, Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris and Windows platforms. It supports database design for DB2, Firebird/InterBase, Gupta SQLBase, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, and PostgreSQL. It also supports generic database design using ODBC.
McObject Announces eXtremeDB™ 3.1 for High-Availability Applications
McObject® announced an upgrade to its eXtremeDB real-time in-memory embedded database system. eXtremeDB version 3.1 includes enhancements to hot synchronization, schema evolution and indexing functions. eXtremeDB supports transactions, concurrent access and a high-level data definition language, but its memory footprint is as little as 50K. New index types in eXtremeDB 3.1 are the R-Tree index and Patricia Trie index. The R-Tree index is typically used for spatial data access and searching multi-dimensional data. he Patricia Trie index is a longest match index used for network and telecommunications applications.
Symbian OS for Smartphones Adds SQL Database
Symbian Ltd. announced an upgrade to the Symbian OS for smartphones. Symbian OS v9.5 introduces performance and hardware cost-containment features, using less memory, processor and battery resources than earlier versions. It offers improved connectivity to personal computers and an SQL database for storing thousands of contacts. Symbian licenses Symbian OS to leading handset manufacturers and the operating system has shipped with 110 million phones sold worldwide.
IBM Announces Next-Generation Business Intelligence with Dynamic Warehousing
IBM announced a new business intelligence initiative with a Dynamic Warehousing strategy that supports analytics as part of real-time business processes. Dynamic Warehousing will integrate technologies from IBM research and development with technology obtained by IBM acquisitions. It will marry enterprise data modeling, information integration, master data management, and search and text analytics. The new strategy will provide information on demand to call centers, field workers and to mobile computing users. To support the new initiative, IBM has released a new version of the DB2 Warehouse.
Quest Toad for SQL Server 2.0 Arrives
Quest Software announced a new version of the Toad database management product line. Toad for SQL Server 2.0 includes SQL optimization, integrated debugging, and integrated comparison and synchronization with SQL Server 2005 databases. The comparison and synchronization feature will work with the schema, data and server settings of different SQL Servers. Toad for SQL Server 2.0 also includes a database backup indicator that advises of the need to perform a a backup. It integrates with LifeSpeed for SQL Server.
MySQL Single Row Subselect Security Vulnerability Uncovered
Researchers have uncovered a MySQL security flaw that is exploitable to launch a denial of service. An error has been found in the filesort routine when processing a single-row subselect query using an ORDER BY clause. Malicious users can use a specially-formulated SQL query to launch an attack. The flaw exists in versions prior to MySQL 5.0.37.
Roth Capital Muddies Waters of Hyperion Acquisition by Oracle
Oracle announced the acquisition of Hyperion Solutions to boost its business intelligence product line, but at least one stock advisor disagrees with the acquisition. Nathan Schneiderman of Roth Capital advises Hyperion stockholders to vote against the sales to Oracle. Hyperion's performance management software is in use by 12,000 customers, including more than 90 of the Fortune 100. Oracle will roll out a new product family, Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition, that will work with heterogeneous data sources. The transaction will close in April 2007.
SoftTree Technologies Releases Database Auditing Libraries
SoftTree Technologies, maker of the DB Audit Expert tool, has announced the release of cross-platform libraries for database auditing. The Java-based libraries enable developers to include auditing and compliance reporting features in applications. Several SoftTree business partners contributed to the development of the new database auditing APIs, which are usable with IBM DB2, Oracle, Sybase ASE and Microsoft SQL Server. The Database Auditing API supports monitoring of database access, compliance auditing and reporting, auditing multiple database systems, and e-mail alerts.
Oracle 10g Sets New TPC-H 10 Terabyte Record
Oracle announced world record performance on the 10 Terabyte benchmark by Oracle Database 10g Release 2. The latest benchmark result is the best price-performance overall on TPC-H 10 TB and the fastest performance for a non-clustered configuration. The Oracle DBMS was running on an HP Integrity Superdome server with 64 Dual-Core Intel Itanium 1.6 GHz processors using the HP-UX 11i operating system. Oracle Database 10g Release 2 achieved a non-clustered performance of 171,380 QphH@10000GB with a price-performance ratio of $38.98/QphH@10000GB.
ColdFusion Cross-Site Scripting Security Vulnerability
Brent Moore reports an Adobe ColdFusion MX security vulnerability enables malicious users to launch cross-site scripting attacks. The problem is due to an error when cross-site scripting protection filters malicious tags. Developers are encourage to use a web proxy to filter malicious characters and character sequences.
Microsoft SQL Server is First in Market Share Among Wireless Developers
Evans Data released results of a wireless developer survey that showed their database of choice is Microsoft SQL Server. Fore developing wireless applications, MySQL was the second choice of developers, followed by Oracle. Evans Data surveyed more than 380 wireless developers and found 47% are targeting smart phones and more than 40% are working with location-based services, such as Google Maps. Among wireless developers surveyed, 30% use Microsoft SQL Server and 20% use MySQL.
Rogue Wave Announces New HydraSDO Components
Rogue Wave Software, a division of Quovadx, Inc., announced an early access version of HydraSDO™ for Databases and an update to HydraSDO for XML. HydraSDO for XML 1.1 offers Distributed SDO, which provides a standards-based architecture for sharing XML documents between applications without reparsing. Distributed SDO supports streaming data objects between machines using XML as a messaging format without reparsing data as it travels throughout a SOA environment. HydraSDO for Databases provides relational data access for traditional application architectures and SOA using the SDO Application Programming Interface (API). HydraSDO for Databases provides access to Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Sybase, MySQL, and DB2.
Apple Leopard Server to Bundle MySQL and Apache Server
Apple's next-generation server operating system, Mac OS X Server 10.5 (code-named Leopard), is a 64-bit operating system that will run 32-bit applications. Leopard will run any Unix-certified application and it will include versions of MySQL and Apache web server. It will include an adaptive firewall, a Dashboard widget for server monitoring, Open Directory, Darwin Calendar Server, Ruby on Rails and a 64-bit version of QuickTime.
Dell Introduces Direct Attached Storage Array
Dell has introduced the PowerVault™ MD3000, a direct-attached storage array for critical applications requiring performance and high availability. The PowerVault MD3000 is an external RAID SAS array that uses dual active/active RAID controllers that produce throughput up to 1,400 MB per second. Performance levels are suitable for video services and transaction processing with clustered applications such as Microsoft SQL Server 2005 and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. Maximum capacity is 4.5 terabytes per system.
IBM Announces Free DB2 Server for Vista
IBM has announced the DB2 9 Express-C data server is available for the Microsoft Vista operating system. DB2 Express-C for Vista runs on AMD or Intel x86 with up to 2 dual cores. It supports a maximum memory size of 4GB and there is no limit to database size. Besides Windows platforms, DB2 Express-C has also been validated with several Linux distributions, including Novell Open Enterprise Server, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Mandriva and Ubuntu.
DataDirect and ZapThink Offer Seminars for Software Architects
In May 2007, DataDirect Technologies and ZapThink presented a series of software architecture seminars titled "Innovation for Software Architects: Successful Strategies for SOA Enablement & Data Connectivity". Seminar attendees learned the state of the art in data access, mainframe integration, and XML query technology. Speakers included John Goodson and Rob Steward of DataDirect and Jason Bloomberg and Ronald Schmelzer of ZapThink. The seminars ran in London (1 May 2007), Amsterdam (3 May), Chicago (15 May), New York (16 May), Washington, DC (17 May), San Francisco (22 May), and Dallas (24 May).
Microsoft Releases Visual Studio Edition for Database Professionals
Recognizing that database professionals face different testing and lifecycle issues than application programmers, Microsoft has released Visual Studio 2005 for Database Professionals. It enables database developers to create a baseline version of a database, track changes to the schema and automatically cascade schema changes. It includes features to compare different schemas, to compare different databases and to generate scripts for schema or database synchronization. Another feature, the DataGenerator, creates data generation plans for use with database unit tests.
Oracle Releases Identity Management Solution
Oracle announced the general availability of Oracle Enterprise Single Sign-on Suite. A component of Oracle Identity Management, the Suite provides password management and access control using a single sign-on for a variety of Oracle products, including Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise, Oracle Siebel applications, Oracle E-Business Suite and Oracle Database. It provides an security infrastructure for Oracle Fusion Middleware and supports XACML, SAML and Web services security-related specifications.
Continuent Ships HA Cluster Solution for MySQL and PostgreSQL
Continuent, Inc. announced an update to its Continuent™ uni/cluster that provides a high-availability clustering solution for MySQL and PostgreSQL. Continuent uni/cluster uses a multi-master approach to database replication with data committed simultaneously to all servers in a cluster. This enables load balancing because any server in a cluster can process queries. The new release of uni/cluster includes native 64-bit libraries and a new management and configuration tool.
PostgreSQL 8.2 Adds SQL 2003 and Performance Improvements
The PostgreSQL Global Development Group announced the release of PostgreSQL 8.2 with new features that improve performance and support for SQL 2003. Version 8.2 also adds warm standby databases, generalized inverted indexes, online index builds, and enhanced tracing capabilities. New SQL 2003 features include multi-row VALUE statements, UPDATE RETURNING, multi-column and statistical aggregates. In addition, version 8.2 includes load-balancing via PGPool and a full implementation of Java in the database (PL/Java).
BNP Paribas Chooses DB2 Performance Tools from CDB Software
CDB Software, an independent software vendor (ISV) that specializes in DB2 z/OS data management, announced BNP Paribas has adopted the CDB product line for all z/OS platforms throughout its global banking system. BNP Paribas is banking and financial services group with 140,000 employees and operations in 85 countries. It operates six IBM Z9 mainframes with 1604 databases, 11,000 Tablespaces and 25,000 indexes. BNP Paribas uses CDB/Auto Utilities to provide automated restarts, automatic copies and continuous data availability during tablespace reorgs.
dbaDIRECT Expands Amidst Fourth Year of High Marks on Customer Satisfaction Surveys
dbaDIRECT announced a recent survey reported high customer satisfaction ratings for the fourth consecutive year. The company also announced the addition of 14 new customers in the past two quarters. The company offers database administration services for IBM DB2, Oracle, Sybase and SQL Server. It has provided IT management services since 1998 and currently manages more than 3.000 corporate databases.
IDC Reports Oracle on Top in Business Analytics Market
IDC reported that Oracle, with a 13.2 percent share and annual revenue of $2.2 billion, is the leader in business analytics software market share  . SAS was second with 8.2 percent of the market, followed by IBM. Microsoft, Business Objects, SAP, Cognos, Hyperion Solution, Teradata and Fair Isaac completed the top 10. In this market, the primary revenue for Oracle, SAS, IBM, Microsoft, and Teradata is data warehousing, with Business Objects and Cognos focusing on business intelligence tools. Total revenue for the market grew to $16.5 billion dollars, with tools generating $11.5 billion in revenue and applications generating $5.1 billion.
Database Security Report Compares Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server
Researcher David Litchfield of NGS Software has released a database security report comparing the Microsoft and Oracle flagship database products. Over the past six years, SQL Server 7, 2000 and 2005 required 59 patches to fix security vulnerabilities. During the same period, Oracle released 233 fixes to security vulnerabilities in Oracle 8i, 9i and 10g databases. Litchfield has reported 49 security vulnerabilities to Oracle.
Microsoft CEO: Linux Infringes on Microsoft Patents
At the recent Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS) conference in Seattle, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said Linux infringes on patents held by Microsoft. When discussing the rationale for the Microsoft deal with Novell for SUSE Linux support, Ballmer said Linux "uses our intellectual property". As part of the deal, Novell paid Microsoft $40 million so Microsoft will not sue SUSE Linux users over patent infringement. Ballmer said "Only customers that use SUSE have paid properly for intellectual property from Microsoft" but indicated Microsoft is willing to deal with Red Hat and other Linux distributors.
Continuent Releases Beta Version of Sequoia Clustering Solution
Continuent has released a beta version of Sequoia 3.0, a middleware solution that provides scalability and high availability for databases. Sequoia is a successor to the C-JDBC project and it provides a clustering, load balancing, hot recovery and failover solution for databases. It's available under an Apache license, with commercial versions available for MySQL and postgreSQL.
Borland Spins Off Tools Group as CodeGear Subsidiary
Borland Software Corporation has decided to move its developer tools group into CodeGear, a newly-formed subsidiary. During the 1990s, Borland established a reputation as a premier provider of tools for software developers. The company has evolved under CEO Tod Nielsen and its focus is Application Lifecycle Management (ALM). Earlier this year Borland announced intent to sell its Integrated Development Environment (IDE) business but decided to change course. Borland is moving its IDE products, including JBuilder, Delphi, C++ Builder and C# Builder, to the CodeGear subsidiary managed by CEO Ben Smith. In fiscal year 2005, revenues from the IDE business was $90 billion.
Public beta of db4o Version 6
db4objects announced the release of db4o 6.0, the open source object DBMS, to a community of 15,000 registered developers. db40 provides object persistence for .NET and Java application objects by storing objects as their application format. db40 can be used in a client-server architecture or embedded in applications. Version 6 is currently available as a public beta product that includes a Replication System and ObjectManager.
MySQL and Infobright Partner on Data Warehouse Engine
Infobright, Inc. and MySQL AB announced a partnership for integration of MySQL with the BrightHouse database engine. BrightHouse, the Infobright storage engine, compresses data so its useful for archiving data from multi-terabyte data warehouses. Its available currently for Microsoft Windows servers, with a Linux release scheduled for 2007. Infobright also offers the BrightWorks tool set for managing data archiving by analyzing query logs. MySQL estimates there have been 10 million installations of the MySQL open source database.
Microsoft Announces Release of Vista, .NET Framework 3.0, SQL Server Compact Edition
At TechEd in Barcelona, Spain, Microsoft announced a wave of new software products have been released to manufacture. These include the Microsoft Vista operating system, Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition, the .NET Framework 3.0, and Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Microsoft Office 2007. Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition is a lightweight DBMS for embedded database applications, suitable for Tablet PCs, Pocket PCs, SmartPhones and desktop computers. It shares a common programming model with SQL Server and it's free to deploy and redistribute. It provides encryption, transaction commit and rollback, merge replication and databases up to 4GB.
Sun to Release Java Source Code
Sun Microsystems is set to release key portions of the Java source code as open source software available with a GPL license. Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz is expected to announce parts of the Java Platform Standard Edition (JSE) and Java Platform Micro Edition (JME) will be available as open source code. Java components to be released include the Java Compiler and Java HotSpot virtual machine, although Sun will still offer commercial licensing for Java.
Zend and Microsoft Collaborate to Bring PHP to Windows Server
Zend Technologies has entered into an agreement with Microsoft to enhance the PHP scripting language for Windows platforms. Microsoft and Zend will develop a production-quality PHP runtime environment for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and "Longhorn", the next version of Windows Server. Zend will establish a Windows testing lab and Microsoft will develop a FastCGI component to provide the
interface between PHP and Internet Information Services (IIS).
Microsoft Announces Executive Change and Limits Operating Systems for SQL Server 2005
Microsoft has announced vice-president Paul Flessner, of the data storage and platform division is leaving as of January 1. Microsoft SQL Server 2005 experienced consistent revenue growth under his stewardship. Previously Microsoft issued an advisory that it will be phasing out support for older versions of Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft SQL Desktop Engine (MSDE). The Microsoft Windows Server "Longhorn" and Microsoft Windows Vista operating systems will only support Microsoft SQL Server 2005 service pack (SP) 2 when it becomes available. Vendors bundling MSDE with applications are advised to upgrade to SQL Server 2005 Express Edition (SQL Server Express) with SP2.
Oracle to Acquire Stellent for Content Management
Oracle and Stellent announced an agreement for Oracle to acquire Stellent for $440 million in cash. Stellent's Universal Content Management product works with Oracle Content Database and the acquisition is expected to boost Oracle's content management solution portfolio. Stellent second quarter fiscal 2007 revenues increased 12% over FY 2006 to $33.7 million, with net income increasing 139% from FY2006.
CA ERWin Certification for ObjectRiver Master Data Management
According to ObjectRiver, CA, Inc. has certified the latest release of its Master Data Management solutions for interoperability with CA AllFusion ERWin Data Modeler r7. ERWin is a entity-relationship modeling tool that simplifies database design and creation of data warehouses. ObjectRiver Master Data Management generates a data access layer, and when integrated with AllFusion ERWin Data Modeler, assists users in generating a data dictionary. It provides a capability of using Java interfaces instead of SQL in migrating to service-oriented architectures and web services.
IP2Location Announces Update to IP Location Database
IP2Location announced the November 2006 edition of its geographic location database. The database provides matching of Internet IP addresses to geographic locations. Given an IP address, Ip2Location provides the country, region, state, city, latitude, longitude, ZIP code, Internet service provider (ISP) and domain name of the Internet user. Because the service is available in real-time, it enables web applications to customize content, balance server loads, display native languages and detect fraud. The database contains more than 3 million IP address records.
U.S. Navy Selects ANTs and IBM Team for In-Memory Database Technology
IBM and ANTs software, inc. announced their selection to provide software for mission-critical electronic and combat systems for the U.S. Navy's DDG 1000 program. Prime systems integrator Raytheon announced the DDG 1000 program will use a modular architecture based on open standards. Raytheon evaluated several in-memory database products, including Oracle Times Ten, before selecting the ANTs Data Server. IBM does not offer an in-memory database product but IBM DB2 pioneer Don Haderle has taken a key role with ANTs software that included establishing a strategic alliance with IBM.
Oracle Announces E-Business Suite 12 and Enterprise Linux Support
Extending its commitment to open source computing, Oracle announced an enterprise class support program called Unbreakable Linux. The program will be comparable to Oracle support for its databases, middleware and applications and it will include bug fixes to previous Linux releases. Oracle is throwing down a gauntlet by modifying a Red Hat distribution of Linux and undercutting Red Hat's prices for support. Intel, Dell and Hewlett Packard have signed on as partners for the Oracle Unbreakable Linux program. Oracle will offer Enterprise Linux binaries for free. The OracleWorld conference in San Francisco also previewed Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12, which includes a web services repository.
MySQL Enterprise Includes Automated Monitoring and Tuning
MySQL AB introduced a new version of its commercial subscription service for enterprise computing customers. MySQL Enterprise includes technology to automate database monitoring and support self-tuning production databases. MySQL Enterprise simplifies database administration by automating tasks such as performance tuning and troubleshooting. It includes MySQL Enterprise Server, Network Monitoring and Advisory Services and 24x7 Production Support. MySQL Enterprise is available for 11 platforms, including Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, Microsoft Windows, Sun Solaris and Macintosh OS X.
IBM Unveils Information Server Platform
At the Information on Demand conference, IBM unveiled its new Information Server as a solution for data integration and aggregation. Information Server bundles the DB2 database, WebSphere Application Server, WebSphere DataStage, Federation Server, Metadata Server, Quality Stage, Replication Server and Data Event Publisher. It combines software from IBM acquisitions of Ascential, Venetica, Unicorn and CrossAccess with technologies from IBM software labs. IBM expects Information Server to be a foundation for service-oriented architectures. It can be deployed as server blades in organizations using computing grid and building information grids.
Oracle Releases Quarterly Security Patch Release
Oracle released patches in a quarterly update that fixes security vulnerabilities, including a number of SQL injection and buffer overflow problems. The updates fix 100 vulnerabilities in Oracle's Application Server, Application Express, Database Server, E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft Enterprise, and JD Edwards EnterpriseOne applications. Nearly 2/3 (63) of the vulnerabilities are related to Oracle database software (servers and application express). The risk matrices Oracle publishes for each product now include Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) ratings.
Upswing in Adoption of DataDirect Shadow for SOA and Mainframe Integration
DataDirect Technologies announced an increase in customers using its software to enable mainframe applications to consume Web services. The Shadow z/Services™ WsC Web Services Consumption tool is included in the DataDirect Shadow RTE™ suite that integrates with mainframe databases and applications. The DataDirect Shadow product provides bi-directional support (Web services consumer and provider) for mainframes and supports Web services security standards.
Pillar Data Systems and Oracle Announce Storage Grid
Pillar Data Systems, an enterprise network storage vendor, and Oracle announced the availability of the Pillar Axiom™ storage system with the Oracle® Database 10g Accelerator. The combination provides a storage grid with simplified administration for Oracle DBAs. The accelerator program guides users through a process of defining business and IT requirements in order to partition databases, separating objects into separate tiers of storage to optimize performance. The Pillar Axiom system blends storage area network (SAN) and network addressable storage (NAS) technology.
Sybase iAnywhere Ships Advantage Database Server 8.1
Sybase iAnywhere announced an updated is shipping. The Advantage Database Server 8.1 includes SQL performance improvements and improved user defined functions (UDFs) and TCP/IP support. It's an embedded client/server database management system that provides both keyed ISAM and SQL access to data. Release 8.1 also adds vertical filtering to control which columns of tables are replicated. The product has been in development for 15 years, with 3 million deployed seats globally. The company recently announced support for Borland's new Turbo Pro products for Windows and .NET development.
EMC Extends Documentum to Integrate Microsoft SQL Server 2005 and SharePoint
Microsoft and EMC have formed a content management alliance that will lead to the integration of Microsoft products with the EMC Documentum platform. The alliance will integrate Microsoft Office 2007, SQL Server 2005 and Office SharePoint Server 2007 with EMC Documentum content management software. The integration will permit archiving SharePoint repositories to a Documentum repository while preserving the ability to search content from SharePoint.
Quest Software Announces Expanded Freeware Version of Toads for DB2
Quest Software announced two milestones for Toad for DB2. Quest has released a new expanded freeware version of Toad for DB2. It also has partnered with IBM for bundling Toad for DB2 and IBM DB2 Express-C in the DB2 Developer in a Box freeware. Quest reported the freeware version of Toad for DB2 has 500,000 users worldwide. Toad for DB2 freeware includes Toad Project Manager and an enhanced data grid that has no limit to the number of rows displayed. Download DB2 Developer in a Box.
Sybase IQ Accrues Recognition and Revenue Increase
Gartner Research has positioned in the challengers quadrant of its 2006 Data Warehouse DBMS Magic Quadrant report. Recognition by Gartner follows a 34% increase of Sybase IQ license revenues for 2005. Unlike traditional online transaction processing (OLTP) databases, a Sybase IQ database is optimized for analytics using column-vectored data storage. It supports fast query performance without using query governors for complexity, amount of data or concurrent users. Sybase IQ has been a TPC-H price performance leader for 100GB and 300 GB databases.
Oracle Announces Berkeley DB Release 4.5
In announcing a , Oracle has firmed up its commitment to an open source software strategy. Berkeley DB Release 4.5 adds a framework for replication and HA systems, non-stop upgrades, and a multi-versioning solution for concurrency control. Berkeley DB is an in-process C library, a DBMS that's embeddable in applications. It stores data in key value pairs and support multiple processes per application with multiple threads per process. Languages supported include C, C++, Java, Perl, Python, PHP, Tcl, and Ruby.
Hitachi Unveils Entier Embedded Database Manager
At the Embedded Systems Conference 2006, Hitachi unveiled the Entier DBMS for embedding in applications. Because Entier has a small memory footprint (under a megabyte), it's suitable for mobile devices, televisions, GPS devices and phones. The Entier SDK runs on Windows XP Pro and Windows 2000 Pro platforms. Entier includes extensions for spatial, contextual and incremental text searches. For GPS applications, Entier uses R-tree indexing to support spatial searches.
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Everywhere Beta Tools for Visual Studio 2005
Microsoft has released a service pack (SP1) for Visual Studio developers using Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Everywhere Edition. The new tools for Visual Studio 2005 complement the Visual Studio 2005 SP1 Beta smart device development components with a design time environment. SQL Server 2005 Everywhere Edition is a platform for developers needing an in-process SQL database engine for desktop and mobile
applications.
Grid Computing Data Access and Integration Specifications Published
The Open Grid Forum DAIS Working Group announced three new specifications have been published a Provisional Recommendations. The specifications represent four years of effort to define standardized interfaces for service-based access to databases. The new specifications are GFD.74: The Core (WS-DAI) Specification, Version 1.0, GFD.75: The XML Realization (WS-DAIX) Specification, Version 1.0 and GFD.76: The Relational Realization (WS-DAIR) Specification, Version 1.0.
Oracle® Application Express Release 2.2 Announced
(APEX) Release 2.2, a tool for building and deploying web applications, is now available as a free download from Oracle. APEX enables developers to package applications and dependent objects into a single file. This packaging provides portability because applications install seamlessly in Oracle databases. APEX is a web-based development tool integrated with all editions of Oracle Database 10g and Oracle 9i Database Release 2. It includes an Item Finder Search Tool for locating items, pages, queries, tables or PL/SQL objects within the pages of an application.
Security Vulnerability Detected in DB2 Client-Server Protocol (DRDA)
Imperva Application Defense Center (ADC) uncovered a critical client-server protocol security vulnerability in IBM DB2 version 8. The DRDA flaw enables an attacker to take down a server without leaving traces in the auditing mechanisms of the database server. An attacker can use incomplete DRDA messages during a client session to terminate the server's DB2 main process. IBM has provided a patch in a DB2 FixPack.
Revelation Software Releases Driver for Real-Time Mirroring
Revelation Software updated its network product suite with the release of Universal Driver Heavy (UDH) version 3.1. UDH 3.1 is client/server software that supports the mirroring of Revelation Linear Hash Data in real time. Available for Windows platforms only, UDH is designed to handle applications that scale up with high availability.
Oracle to Add Real-Time Predictive Analytics Technology
Oracle announced the acquisition of the intellectual property assets of Sigma Dynamics. The company will use Sigma Dynamics' real-time predictive analytics technology in Oracle Business Intelligence Suite and Oracle Fusion Middleware products. The Sigma Dynamics software combines business requirements and customer insight to make recommendations. Applications include offer management, field service optimization, fraud detection and predictive call routing.
Timeline Severs Patent Licensing for SQL Server and Launches Legal Battle with Microsoft
Timeline and Microsoft could be headed to court over a patent infringement dispute. In 1999, Microsoft licensed Timeline technology for creating OLAP databases for SQL Server. Timeline terminated that limited license agreement. Timeline is involved in litigation with ProClarity over patent infringement and it has filed a motion to add Microsoft as a defendant in that case. Timeline licenses its technology to Oracle, Cognos and Hyperion.
DB2 Denial of Service Vulnerabilities Found
Secunia reports IBM DB2 version 8.x is vulnerable to two exploits that can be used to launch denial of service attacks. One threat is from unspecified errors during CONNECT/ATTACH processing. A second is related to an unspecified error after CONNECT processing. IBM recommends updating to DB2 version 8 FixPak 13.
MySQL Database Creation Security Vulnerabilities
FrSIRT reports to MySQL vulnerabilities can be exploited by malicious users to bypass security restrictions. The first problem is due to an error when creating MySQL databases. On case-sensitive file systems, a user can create arbitrary databases using case variants of a database name for which he has permissions. A second threat comes from a malicious user with EXECUTE privileges. An error results from calculating suid routine arguments in an incorrect security context, enabling the malicious user to execute arbitrary DML statements with the privileges of the user who defined the routine. The problems affects MySQL 4.1.20 and prior, 5.0.24 and prior and 5.1.11 and prior. The solution is to upgrade to MySQL 4.1.21, 5.0.25 or 5.1.12.
EnterpriseDB Announces Advanced Server 8.1 Release 2
At LinuxWorld, EnterpriseDB announced the general availability of EnterpriseDB Advanced Server 8.1 Release 2. The new release features new security enhancements, new developer and DBA tools, XML support, automatic tuning, and automated migration of data and business logic from Oracle to EnterpriseDB. EnterpriseDB Developer Studio now has the capability of browsing Oracle, PostgreSQL and EnterpriseDB databases. The company also announced availability of EnterpriseDB Network and EnterpriseDB Replication Server.
Coral8 Partners with TIBCO to Provide Real-Time Complex Event Processing
Coral8, Inc. and TIBCO Software announced Coral8 and TIBCO will work together to provide complex event processing solutions. Coral8 will support real-time processing using TIBCO Enterprise Message Service and TIBCO Rendezvous. Coral8 adapters for TIBCO EMS and TIBCO Rendezvous are available now and they are include in the Coral8 Developer Edition. The Coral8 engine combines an SQL-based language (CCL) with a continuous processing architecture.
Vista Software Announces First Fully-Managed Embedded DBMS for .NET
The release of the VistaDB 3.0 Community Technology Preview marks the availability of the first fully- managed SQL database engine designed for the Microsoft .NET Framework, Compact Framework, Windows Vista and Mono. The .NET developer community can use VistaDB3 to build 100% managed WinForms and ASP.NET database applications for desktops, mobile devices and web servers. Vista Software CEO noted that VistaDB 3.0 is not a port of the VistaDB 2.x code base, but a re-design to exploit the features of the Visual C# language and the classes in the .NET Framework.
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Sets New Decision Support Query Record for 100 GB Database
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 has set a new record for (decision support) TPC-H query processing for 100 gigabyte (100 GB) databases. Using a Dell PowerEdge server, Microsoft SQL Server 2005 (x64) achieved record-breaking performance of 16,320 composite queries per hour (16,320 QphH@100GB) with a price-performance ratio of $13.40/QphH@100GB. The Dell PowerEdge 6800 server used an Intel Xeon MP 3.4 GHz (four processors, eight cores), 16 MB RAM and Microsoft Windows 2003 Enterprise x64 edition.
Pervasive Withdraws from Open Source Database Support Market
Hoping to emulate the success of MySQL and Red Hat, Pervasive announced in January 2005 it was going into the open source database support business. Pervasive jumped in to offer PostgreSQL support for high-end databases and enterprise computing. In announcing withdrawal from that market, Pervasive pointed to commoditization within the database market. Pervasive CEO John Farr also noted the opportunity to meaningfully increase PostgreSQL adoption was "quite limited".
DB2 Viper Test Drive Ends and IBM Releases Free DB2 Edition
As the test drive period for IBM DB2 Viper ended, IBM announced the availability of a free edition of DB2 UDB version 9. DB2 Express-C 9 is free for development and deployment. It is freely distributable with applications and there are no limitations on database size. DB2 9 is available for 32- and 64-bit Linux and Microsoft Windows platforms. A version for Windows XP Home edition will be available soon. Download.
SecureWorks Finds Surge of SQL Injection Attacks against Utilities and Financial Institutions
SecureWorks reported a 40-fold increase in three months in SQL injection attacks against its bank, credit union and utility clients. CTO Jon Ramsey reported that from January to March 2006, SecureWorks was detecting 100-200 SQL injection attacks per day. By April, that number had risen to 8000 per day. Ramsey pointed out they are targeted attacks and most of them originate outside the United States. An SQL injection attack is the use of malicious SQL statement input to compromise or crash a computer, or compromise or steal information from a database. SecureWorks suggests 24x7 monitoring with a Network Intrusion Prevention System or Host Intrusion Prevention System.
REAL Software Ships REAL SQL Server
Software vendor REAL Software, makers of REALbasic, announced the release of a cross-platform multi-user SQL server. REAL SQL Server is derived from the SQLite database engine and it's designed for REALbasic users. It provides an upgrade path for users of the built-in REALbasic database engine. It's available for Windows, Macintosh OS X and Linux users with a recommended 512K of available RAM.
Download.
Oracle Repairs Security Holes with 65 Fixes in Critical Patch Update
The July 2006 Oracle Critical Patch Update includes 60+ fixes related to security problems with Oracle software. The update includes 23 patches for the Oracle database server, four for database clients, 10 for Oracle Application Server, 20 for Oracle E-Business Suite, four for Oracle Enterprise Manager, two in PeopleSoft Enterprise, one in HD Edwards HTTP Server and one in Oracle Collaboration Suite. The next Critical Patch Update will be October 17, 2006.
Cognetic Systems Unveils XQuantum XML Database Server
Cognetic Systems rolled out XQuantum 1.0, an XML database and information server that supports W3C XML Query (XQuery) with full-text extensions. XQuantum integrates XQuery with Internet standards including HTML, XML and XSLT. It includes an XQuery Server Page scripting language that enables users to link HTML forms to searches written in XQuery. The product ships with Java, C++, C# and Visual Basic programming examples. XQuantum runs on Red Hat Linux and Microsoft Windows 200x Server platforms. A single-user developer edition of XQuantum is available for $649.
Sybase ASE 15 Sets New Linux Transaction Processing Record
Sybase and IBM announced a configuration including Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise (ASE) version 15 and IBM System p5 520 with Linux set a new record for two-core systems transaction processing performance. The combination recorded 81,439 transactions per minute (tpmC) on the Transaction Processing Council's TPC-C benchmark. Previous record holders include a 2-core HP Itanium 2 and Oracle 10g for Linux and an HP Opteron with Microsoft SQL Server.
EDS Team Selected for U.S. Army Information Technology Contract
EDS announced the U.S. Army has selected its team for the Information Technology Enterprise Solutions -2 Services (ITES-2S) contract. The team composing the EDS Agility Alliance has 65 companies, including Cisco, Dell, EMC, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, Sun Microsystems, Towers Perrin, and Xerox. The Defense Department and federal agencies can use the ITES-2S contract to purchase products and IT services such as information security, business process re-engineering, and network support.
Microsoft Releases Free JDBC Driver for SQL Server 2005
Microsoft has released a Community Technology Preview (CTP) version of the JDBC driver for SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2000. The SQL Server JDBC Driver 1.1, a Type 4 JDBC driver, is available for download for all SQL Server users with no charge.
Ruby on Rails Starter Kit for DB2
IBM alphaWorks has released version 1.1 of the Starter Toolkit for DB2 on Rails. It provides a packaged set of products for developers getting started with Ruby and Rails. The toolkit includes DB2 Express - C, a DB2 Adapter for Rails, a DB2 driver for Rails, and a free to develop and deploy data server. The DB2 on Rails Starter Kit runs on Windows and Linux platforms. The toolkit is not a trial version and there is no expiration date.
GeoServer 1.3.2 Arrives
The GeoServer Project announced the release of GeoServer 1.3.2. GeoServer is an open source server for geospatial information, connecting web clients to a variety of files and spatial databases. GeoServer is capable of operating with geospatial databases containing millions of rows. It supports PostGIS, ArcSDE, MySQL, Oracle Spatial, DB2, and Shapefiles. Recent improvements to GeoTools 2.2 offload the majority of spatial processing to the database server. The GeoServer download is available at http://docs.codehaus.org/display/GEOS/Latest.
Oracle Acquisition Wave Continues with Portal Software
Oracle announced the completion of its acquisition of Portal Software, Inc., with Portal Software becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of Oracle. Portal Software provides billing and revenue management solutions for the global communications and media markets. The company delivers a platform for end-to-end management of customer revenue across offerings, channels, and geographies.
EMC to Acquire RSA Security
Storage vendor EMC has completed a definitive agreement to acquire RSA Security, a leader provider of encryption and key management technology. The aggregate purchase price is approximately $2.1 billion, with EMC paying $28 per share for RSA stock. The expected time for completion of the acquisition Q3 or Q4 2006. EMC plans to tightly integrate RSA's security products with its information and storage solutions.
DataMirror Unveils iCluster 4.0
DataMirror iCluster 4.0 is a high availability solution for applications running in an IBM iSeries environment. iCluster mirrors DB2 application data in real time from a primary system to one or more secondary systems. The secondary system is available for read-only applications, backups and queries. iCluster uses MatchMerge technology to ensure insertions, modifications or deletions made to a data store are synchronized with object transactions and mirrored to the backup system.
Coral8 Launches Version 4.0 of Complex Event Processing Engine
Coral8, a new vendor of complex event processing (CEP) software, announced version 4.0 of its Complex Event Processing Engine. Coral8 combines a high-performance stream processing architecture with an SQL-based programming language (Coral8 Continuous Computation Language). The product includes a visual development environment (Coral8 Studio) and an enterprise-class server that provides failover, cluster support, SNMP support and secure SSL support. Coral8 has reportedly processed more than a million messages per second in a
single system.
Research Study Finds Grid Adoption Increase and SOA Awareness Problem
The Fourth Oracle Grid Index report by Quocirca found a global increase in grid computing adoption, with the Asia Pacific region making the greatest gain (from 4.9 to 5.3). The index for the United States was the highest among all regions, but it was unchanged (6.1) from the previous survey in November 2005. The global grid index increased from 5.2 to 5.4. 70% of the organizations surveyed indicate they are using grid computing in some capacity. The survey also found 76% of IT respondents were familiar with service-oriented architecture (SOA), but 55% of business respondents were not. 52% of respondents are in the process of moving to SOA.
StreamBase Processes 500,000 Financial Messages Per Second, Announces Event Persistence Roadmap
StreamBase Systems reported a real-time financial messaging benchmark demonstrated StreamBase can process and analyze 500,000 messages per second on a single AMD Opteron CPU. It announced the benchmarks in conjunction with the StreamBase Event Persistence roadmap. The roadmap includes run-time compilation with StreamOptimizer and being able to query terabytes of data using StreamSQL. StreamBase integrates with IBM WebSphere and DB2 database. The company reports StreamBase Chronicle can query 1.9 billion rows of trade data in less than a minute.
Open Source ERP Company Compiere Receives Funding for Expansion
Compiere, a provider of founded in 1999, has secured its first infusion of venture capital. New Enterprise Associates has provided $6 million to enable Compiere to relocate its corporate headquarters and expand its global partner network. The target market for the Compiere ERP and CRM suite includes small to medium-sized enterprises. There have been more than 1 million downloads of Compiere software, which operates with Oracle databases on Linux, Unix, Solaris, Macintosh and Windows platforms.
IBM and Georgia Tech Develop 500 GHz SiGe Chip
Researchers at IBM and the Georgia Institute of Technology announced development of a 500 GHz chip using silicon-germanium (SiGe) technology. The researchers attained the 500 billion cycles per second milestone by using cryogenics, lowering the chip to 451 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (4.5 Kelvins). 500 GHz is approximately 250 times faster than processors in cell phones. At room temperatures, the silicon-germanium (SiGe) chips operate at 350 GHz. Computer simulations suggest silicon-germanium SiGe technology can attain operational frequencies near 1,000 GHz.
Sybase Replication Server 15 Arrives
Sybase, Inc. announced the general availability of Sybase® Replication Server® 15 and Sybase Replication Server Oracle Option 12.6. synchronizes operational data across mixed database platforms. Replication Server Oracle Option provides log-based replication for Oracle environments. Sybase Replication Server 15 works in conjunction with Sybase PowerDesigner® to provide a model-driven approach to data replication, development and maintenance.
Demo by ANTs software, Tervela and HiT Software at Wall Street Conference
Attendees of the SIA Technology Management Conference & Exhibition in New York City viewed a demonstration of financial applications from ANTs software, Tervela and HiT Software. Using the ANTs Data Server, the Tervela messaging software "can persist message records, such as orders and market data, to disk at an unprecedented 250,000 database inserts per second" according to Barry Thompson, CTO of Tervela. HiT Software has integrated its Allora middleware to provide a high-performance XML data exchange solution.
SAS and Attunity Form Partnership For Technology Integration
Attunity, Ltd., a provider of integration software, and SAS, a provider of business intelligence software, have formed a partnership for sales, marketing and technology integration. The partnership will enable customers to use Attunity's change-data-capture (CDC) capabilities with products. SAS products are in use at 40,000 sites, including 96 of the Global 100. Attunity licenses software to IBM, HP and Oracle for inclusion in their products.
Oracle Reports 25% Growth in Revenue for Q4 2006
According to a preliminary report, Oracle's revenues for Q4 2006 exceeded management expectations by a wide margin. Fourth quarter GAAP revenues were $4.85 billion (a 25% increase), with earnings per share estimated to be $0.24. Oracle's new license revenues increased 32%, application license revenue grew by 56% and database technology license revenue increased 18%.
Microsoft SQL Server Everywhere CTP Arrives
During the TechEd 2006 conference, Microsoft announced the community technology preview of Microsoft SQL Server Everywhere Edition. The new SQL Server Everywhere Edition is a lightweight database engine that's embeddable in applications and mobile devices. The product requires 2 megabytes of disk space and it supports merge replications with data synchronization. Like SQL Server Express Edition, the product is a free download, distributable without license fees.
IBM DB2 Vulnerability to Buffer Overrun and Denial of Service
IBM DB2 UDB 8.x is vulnerable to buffer overrun problems from a malicious connection request (CONNECT or ATTACH). This can corrupt memory and crash a server instance. The vulnerability affects DB2 UDB versions for Linux, Unix and Windows. Users can disable remote access to the database server or install a fix. IBM included the fix in IBM DB2 UDB 8.1 FixPak 12.
Lasso Professional Server Marries Web 2.0 Techniques and SQL Access
OmniPilot Software has released Lasso Professional Server 8.5, which provides multi-database connectivity and the Lasso scripting language. Lasso 8.5 supports Web 2.0 dynamic web page generation. It adds Lasso AJAX tags and a universal binary version for Intel-powered Macintosh computers. It supports ODBC, JDBC, LDAP, FileMaker, MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server, OpenBase SQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL and SQLite database connections.
Cargo Container Company Selects DataDirect Middleware for Customs Manifesting System
DataDirect Technologies announced Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL) has selected DataDirect Connect for ADO.NET for inclusion in its electronic customs manifesting system. Hong Kong-based OOCL is one of the world’s largest container transport and logistics companies. The system requires 24x7 operation to generate electronic customs documentation from a Sybase ASE database. OOCL has implemented electronic customs manifesting for ships traveling to Australia, and will soon update the system to handle cargo for the United States, Europe and Asia.
Oracle to Assist Grails Marriage of AJAX, Scripting and Java
Oracle announced participation in the open source Grails project that marries the Groovy scripting language with Java. The Grails development framework offers a dynamic language capability that can co-exist with Java in the same development project. The Grails framework includes components for simplifying development of database-power web applications.
Security Companies Report Surge of SQL Injection Attacks Against Financial Institutions
Atlanta-based security companies SecureWorks, SPI Dynamics and Internet Security Systems, Inc. report a dramatic rise in the incidence of SQL injection attacks against databases. SecureWorks reported 120,000 attacks in May 2006 against its 1,000 bank and credit union customers. That represents a 300% increase since March. The attackers, primarily based in Russia, increasingly extort banks and credit unions. SQL injection attacks use bogus SQL queries to gain access to confidential data or to take control of a computer.
Whitemarsh Information Systems Launches Data Interoperability Series
Mike Gorman, long-time member of the SQL standards committee, has created a new Data Interoperability Series. His company, Whitemarsh Information Systems, offers both seminars and workshops in the new series. The Data Interoperability Workshop runs five days.
Microsoft Targeting the BI Market with Office PerformancePoint Server
To expand its business intelligence product line, Microsoft has announced Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007. The new product's focus is performance management, with support for analytics, planning and business scorecarding. PerformancePoint Server will include analytic and visualization technologies from ProClarity, which Microsoft recently acquired. PerformancePoint Server includes provides an integrated solution for scorecarding, analytics, budgeting, consolidation, forecasting, planning and financial reporting. It integrates with Excel, Outlook, SharePoint and SQL Server 2005.
HP Lowers Fault-Tolerant Server Pricing for NonStop SQL Users
Hewlett-Packard is hoping NonStop SQL databases and NonStop servers can regain their former dominance among users of fault-tolerant computer systems. HP has created a new NonStop Server that uses Intel 1.3GHz Madison processors and NonStop ServerNet interconnect for four nodes. The single system image can scale out to 2048 processors, with 8GB RAM per processor socket.
Comments Solicited on History Facility Proposed for SQL Standard
History is proposed as a new part of the SQL standard. It is now a Committee Draft and will be voted on by the end of August. Mike Gorman summarizes his concerns as "In short, the document restricts the capture of history to merely whole rows of tables within one database of a single DBMS on a single instance of hardware under a single operating system." We join Mike in encourage readers to read the History draft and contribute to the review process. Download ANSI SQL History draft (ZIP format).
Fix for PostgreSQL SQL Injection Vulnerability Can Break Applications
Open source community developers released fixes for a PostgreSQL SQL injection vulnerability in web-facing databases. Applications that deal with un-sanitized strings are vulnerable, particularly those using a Far Eastern multi-byte encoding (SJIS, BIG5, GBK, GB18030, and UHC). PostgreSQL minor versions 8.1.4, 8.0.8, 7.4.13 and 7.3.15 include a security patch, but the patch may break some applications.
Oracle PL/SQL Export Extensions SQL Injection Vulnerability
The US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (CERT) reports an Oracle PL/SQL Export Extensions vulnerability may allow an attacker to modify privileged information. DBAs and developers who write Oracle extensions use the DBMS_EXPORT_EXTENSION package to import and export information within an Oracle database. Users can create plug-in index types using the ODCIIndex Interface and the ODCIIndexGetMetadata method. The DBMS_EXPORT_EXTENSION package does not sanitize the user input to ODCIIndexGetMetadata, which enables an attacker to execute SQL statements with SYSDBA privilege.
MySQL Security Vulnerabilities Exposed
A Debian security advisory reported several MySQL security problems. The The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures Project identified four vulnerabilities. CVE-2006-0903, improper handling of queries containing the NULL character, allows users to bypass logging. CVE-2006-1516, improperly formed user names, allows attackers to read memory. CVE-2006-1517, incorrect packet length, permits attackers to obtain sensitive information. CVE-2006-1518 and CERT VU#602457 refers to a vulnerability from improper validation of user-controlled parameters in COM_TABLE_DUMP packets. Specially crafted packets can cause a buffer overflow and allow the execution of arbitrary code.
IBM and SAP Partner for mySAP All-in-One in U.S.
announced a partnership to pursue the small and midsize enterprise (SME) market. IBM Global Solutions will be a reseller of mySAP All-in-One solutions, with assistance from IBM Business Partners. The new agreement will enable the partners to pursue opportunities in life sciences, construction, food and beverage distribution, wholesale distribution and industrial machinery.
Sybase iAnywhere Adaptive Server Anywhere Attains EAL3 Security Certification
Sybase iAnywhere announced a security certification milestone for the Adaptive Server Anywhere® database within SQL Anywhere® 9.0.1 and 9.0.2. Testing by an accredited laboratory revealed the Adaptive Server Anywhere database exceeds requirements for Evaluation Assurance Level 3 (EAL3) certification. EAL3 certification means the database complies with the Common Criteria certification standard of a joint activity of the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Security Agency (NSA).
Adobe Announces Fix for Dreamweaver SQL Injection Vulnerability
Adobe released an advisory about a Macromedia Dreamweaver SQL injection vulnerability. Code generated by Dreamweaver 8.0.2 and earlier versions is vulnerable, for Windows and Macintosh users. It affects ColdFusion, PHP MySQL, ASP, ASP.NET and JSP server models. The generated code does not validate input so an attacker could use malicious SQL statements to gain control of a machine. Adobe has provided an update for Dreamweaver 8 and instructions for code generated using Dreamweaver MX 2004.
CDB Software and DBI Announce Partnership for Database Accountability
CDB Software and Database-Brothers, Inc. (DBI) announced a to enhance enterprise accountability. The companies will update CDB/Audit, a reporting tool for database auditing, to track information about web access to databases. CDB offers accountability solutions for DB2 z/OS and DBI provides solutions for Oracle and DB2 on Linux, Unix and Windows. The new software will identify the actual end user connecting to DB2 through DB2Connect and web applications.
Ventana Research Reports Gains in Open Source Business Intelligence (BI)
A new report from Ventana Research notes an increase in the adoption of open source software for business intelligence (BI). Based on a survey of 320 organizations, the report indicates deployments of open source BI have been successful. The survey also found more than 80% of respondents have deployed or are planning open source BI applications.
Gartner Research Cites Oracle Siebel CRM Application in 2006 Field Service Report
Gartner Research has positioned Oracle's Siebel CRM Application in the Leader Quadrant of the 2006 Gartner Field Service Management (FMS) Magic Quadrant. Gartner produces Magic Quadrant reports to permit comparison of products with features desired for a specific marketplace. Gartner selections for the Leader Quadrant "demonstrate field service management market strength and have the ability to affect market trends in all the categories of criteria on which they are evaluated". Siebel Field Service capabilities include wireless connectivity, problem resolution, schedule optimization, shipping, receiving, depot repair, inventory management and invoicing functionality. (Download the complete Gartner report.)
CA Releases AllFusion Modeling Suite r7
CA released , a new version that includes a patented generalized data modeling (GDM) engine. The GDM engine is embedded in the ERwin Data Modeler, in part to deliver data model consistency. Besides AllFusion ERwin Data Modeler, the AllFusion product suite includes AllFusion Model Manager and AllFusion Data Model Validator. The r7 release includes a capability to do a compare and analyze the effect of database design changes. AllFusion Modeling Suite r7 supports DB2 iSeries, DB2 for Linux, Unix, and Windows, DB2 for z/OS, Informix, Ingres, Microsoft SQL Server, ODBC (generic), Oracle 10g/9i, PROGRESS, Red Brick Warehouse, SAS, Sybase and Teradata.
Tier-3 To Release Huntsman 4.5
Security vendor Tier-3 announced version 4.5 of Huntsman, a threat management system. Huntsman can detect known and unknown threats using the Behavioral Anomaly Detection (BAD) system. It maintains a repository of rules and policies in an SQL database managed by IBM DB2, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server or MySQL. Huntsman runs on AIX, HP-UX, Linux, Solaris and Windows. Tier-3 will participate in the AusCERT Asia Pacific Information Technology Security Conference (21-26 May, Gold Coast, Australia).
Sybase Revenues Increase in Q1 2006, Mobile and Wireless Growth Reaches 30%
Sybase reported Q1 2006 license revenue increased 7% over the first quarter of 2005. Q1 2006 license revenue was $66.9 million, compared with $62.7 million in 2005. Total quarterly revenues increased 2% to $195 million. In the mobile marketplace, Sybase introduced RFID Enterprise 2.0. It also integrated RFID Anywhere 2.0 with SAP's Auto-ID infrastructure.
IDC Reports Oracle, IBM and Microsoft Hold 82.8% Share as Database Market Expands
IDC reported the worldwide market for relational DBMS increased by 9.4% in 2005. The total market was $14.6, with the top 5 vendors holding the same position in 2004. Oracle had 44.6% of the market, followed by IBM at 21.4% and Microsoft with 16.8%. The combined market share of Oracle, IBM and Microsoft was 82.8% of the market in 2005. The fourth and fifth positions were Sybase (3.5%) and NCR Teradata (2.9%), respectively. IDC noted the open source MySQL DBMS has attracted developers and "could ultimately spur a change in the way RDBMS products are priced and licensed."
Gartner Reports Linux, SQL Server and Mainframes Mark Growth in Database Market
An annual survey by Gartner Research reported the 2005 relational database market expanded 8.3% to $13.8 billion. The strongest growth in adoption, not revenue, occurred in the open source DBMS category that includes MySQL, PostgreSQL and Ingres. In terms of total software revenue, the top 5 vendors represented 92% of the market. Oracle had 48.6% of the market, IBM had 22% and Microsoft had 15% of the market. Linux platforms had 84% growth and the growth of mainframe platforms was greater than Unix. Among commercial SQL products, Microsoft experienced 16.6% growth and Oracle had 7.8% growth.
Idera Announces SQL Server Monitoring Software for Mobile Devices
Idera announced SQL Server monitoring software that is accessible from Windows mobile devices, such as PDAs and phones. SQL mobile manager 2.3 is compatible with Microsoft SQL Server 2000 and 2005 databases. It provides real time information, including alerts and performance metrics, that enable database administrators (DBAs) to diagnose problems and respond quickly, regardless of
location.
SilverStorm Announces RDS over InfiniBand Solution for Oracle Real Application Clusters
High-performance interconnect solutions from SilverStorm Technologies are in use by customers listed among the top 500 supercomputer sites. It's no surprise Oracle has teamed with SilverStorm to develop a Reliable Datagram Sockets (RDS) InfiniBand interconnect solution for Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC). RDS over InfiniBand is a high-bandwidth, low-latency transport system that provides IPC communication between RAC nodes. InfiniBand technology enables organizations to create high performance clusters using commodity servers and storage. The new RDS over InfiniBand solution includes Oracle 10g release 2, Oracle Real Application Clusters with RDS and SilverStorm QuickSilver 3.2 for Linux.
Microsoft Releases Service Pack 1 for SQL Server 2005
Microsoft released (SP1) for Microsoft SQL Server 2005, a few months after the initial product release. SP1 adds database mirroring capability, updates to SQL Server 2005 Express Edition and a new SQL Server Management Studio Express. Microsoft has plans to do a product release every 24 to 36 months, with an upcoming release to provide continuous availability. Database mirroring complements Always On Technologies such as failover clustering and database snapshots. Microsoft tested mirroring with 20 customers before including it in SP1.
Microsoft Unveils SQL Server Everywhere for Mobile Devices
Microsoft is readying SQL Server Everywhere, a lightweight edition of SQL Server for embedded
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