Oracle has demonstrated some of the new features of its 11g database, stopped that the Linux version would ship in Q3, probably in August.
"It's our intention to do a pricing announcement closer to the release date," said Chuck Rozwat, executive vice president, server technologies at Oracle at a launch event in New York. "It's just a matter of weeks before we make that announcement."
Oracle wouldn't comment on when 11g would be available for Microsoft's Windows operating system.
What also remained unclear was which of the 400 features on display would end up being part of 11g and so free to customers upgrading from previous versions of the database and which functionality Oracle will charge users for as additional options for 11g. Rozwat said he couldn't make that call on Wednesday, but that the information would also be forthcoming next month.
Earlier during the launch event, Oracle President Charles Phillips tried to set the 11g release in context.
Oracle's currently celebrating its 30th year in business since beginning life as Software Development Laboratories, later Relational Software, a startup working on building a relational database.
Since that time, Oracle has expanded, often through acquisition, into providing a wide range of other software notably middleware and back-office applications. Databases remain an important source of revenue for the vendor and also provide a 275,000-strong customer base into which it can try to sell its other products.
The name ‘Oracle’ originally came from the code name for a project the startup was working on for the CIA, said Phillips, a comparatively recent addition to the company, who joined Oracle in 2003. He recalled an anecdote he'd been told by Larry Ellison, Oracle's co-founder and CEO. The startup had expanded to two offices but had no way to run cabling for its servers between the two rooms. It appeared an intractable problem, but Ellison picked up a hammer and banged a hole in the wall, resolving the issue. "That's why we're Oracle today and he still carries that hammer around," Phillips quipped.
Customers' data needs are highly diverse and Oracle's trying to cater to all of those different requirements, Phillips said. He drew a comparison with modes of transport. Some users are riding tricycles while others are flying first class on a Boeing 747 jet, he said, so running the gamut from a basic need to store and access data up to highly sophisticated requirements around database security, management, storage and compliance issues.
Comments
Steve Bale, EnterpriseDB said: So after all the hype 11g is finally here Whilst it boasts some new functionality enhancements Oracle appears to have been asleep whilst the analyst community has been discussing the real database market drivers and customer requirements Nowhere in the announcement does Oracle say how 11g will support other systems or help new and existing customers migrate or upgrade to the new environmentResearch firm Vanson Bourne recently reported that more than three-quarters 79 per cent of UK businesses find data migration projects inconvenient and disruptive to the business as they impact core production IT systems but Oracle conveniently ignores this As data continues to grow the focus for database vendors should be on simplicity and reducing total cost of ownership for its customers not confusing them with complex and unnecessary tuning and reporting complexities The real drivers are the required functionality and ease of migration or adoption all at an acceptable cost