All things being equal what have people worked with and what do you prefer?
I have a great opportunity on a new project where I get to utilize whatever I really want. I'm leaning toward SQL Server and might try 2008 rather than 2005 just because it's a new data warehouse and the fact that it's a MS shop sort of makes life easier for everybody involved. Plus the whole integration of ssas, ssis, ssrs, and so on. And the fact that you can integrate MS Office and sharepoint is kind of cool. Even though I'm not a big fan of sharepoint. They seem to like it though. SQL Server is comparatively less expensive for smaller companies and projects. But I'm not a big fan of Windows Servers. But would it be wise to jump on the new 2008 bandwagon without really using it or knowing about the bugs? That is the big question. Heck it hasn't really been released yet. But it's intriguing.
There is the Oracle option but the problem is nobody really seems to know Oracle on the team and we'd have to purchase a lot of extra etl and bi tools. But I do like the possibility of using a linux or unix server option and for future growth, I'd still prefer an Oracle DB over SQL Server. But will I need that much robustness? Also I haven't really utilized Oracle DW Builder so teaching others on the team how to use it would be a learning curve. Especially considering they are a MS shop. Not always easy to sell.
There are the MySQL and PostreSQL(more like EnterpriseDB based sort of on PostGreSQL) but I've never actually built a data warehouse based around open source. Might be interesting and would save them some money...but then again who knows. MySQL is great for web based OLTP.... Not so sure it's that great for OLAP or DW. EnterpriseDB is interesting but I've never really used it and I'm sure nobody on the team has worked with it. At least when it comes to data warehouses.
The whole Vertica cloud computing idea is another intriguing idea. But is it wise to base a data warehouse off of a cloud computing server. I'm not so sure about that. I'll have to research Vertica a little more.
DB2, Teradata, Netezza and so on are just not in the equation. Teradata is great but it's too expensive and in all honesty for this project, it's just too big. Even with growth it probably wouldn't be worth it. I've never used Netezza but I'm assuming it's similar in cost to Teradata. They are great and true massive parallel processing systems, but do I really need to spend that much money for a database that isn't holding petabytes of data?
As far as DB2 is concerned.. I'm just not even considering it. The majority of projects I've worked on who used DB2 were mainframe based. I know that's not all it's used with, but that's my experience. A lot of people seem to ignore or forget about DB2. Not exactly something that would get the team or sponsor excited about a new project.
In conclusion :
I like the inexpensive SQL Server aspect with all those integrated tools. I also like the fact that this company is a MS shop. But again is 2008 really going to be able to compete with Oracle and other databases or will it just be another MS product that crashes and burns like Vista? I don't think it will as 2005 actually was a decent enterprise database, but it still wasn't as good as Oracle.
This project has about 3 or 4 sources and only gigabytes of data. It would be interesting being one of the first to actually implement a dw based on SQL Server 2008. But would it be worth it? That I don't know yet.
What are some of your opinions?
I have a great opportunity on a new project where I get to utilize whatever I really want. I'm leaning toward SQL Server and might try 2008 rather than 2005 just because it's a new data warehouse and the fact that it's a MS shop sort of makes life easier for everybody involved. Plus the whole integration of ssas, ssis, ssrs, and so on. And the fact that you can integrate MS Office and sharepoint is kind of cool. Even though I'm not a big fan of sharepoint. They seem to like it though. SQL Server is comparatively less expensive for smaller companies and projects. But I'm not a big fan of Windows Servers. But would it be wise to jump on the new 2008 bandwagon without really using it or knowing about the bugs? That is the big question. Heck it hasn't really been released yet. But it's intriguing.
There is the Oracle option but the problem is nobody really seems to know Oracle on the team and we'd have to purchase a lot of extra etl and bi tools. But I do like the possibility of using a linux or unix server option and for future growth, I'd still prefer an Oracle DB over SQL Server. But will I need that much robustness? Also I haven't really utilized Oracle DW Builder so teaching others on the team how to use it would be a learning curve. Especially considering they are a MS shop. Not always easy to sell.
There are the MySQL and PostreSQL(more like EnterpriseDB based sort of on PostGreSQL) but I've never actually built a data warehouse based around open source. Might be interesting and would save them some money...but then again who knows. MySQL is great for web based OLTP.... Not so sure it's that great for OLAP or DW. EnterpriseDB is interesting but I've never really used it and I'm sure nobody on the team has worked with it. At least when it comes to data warehouses.
The whole Vertica cloud computing idea is another intriguing idea. But is it wise to base a data warehouse off of a cloud computing server. I'm not so sure about that. I'll have to research Vertica a little more.
DB2, Teradata, Netezza and so on are just not in the equation. Teradata is great but it's too expensive and in all honesty for this project, it's just too big. Even with growth it probably wouldn't be worth it. I've never used Netezza but I'm assuming it's similar in cost to Teradata. They are great and true massive parallel processing systems, but do I really need to spend that much money for a database that isn't holding petabytes of data?
As far as DB2 is concerned.. I'm just not even considering it. The majority of projects I've worked on who used DB2 were mainframe based. I know that's not all it's used with, but that's my experience. A lot of people seem to ignore or forget about DB2. Not exactly something that would get the team or sponsor excited about a new project.
In conclusion :
I like the inexpensive SQL Server aspect with all those integrated tools. I also like the fact that this company is a MS shop. But again is 2008 really going to be able to compete with Oracle and other databases or will it just be another MS product that crashes and burns like Vista? I don't think it will as 2005 actually was a decent enterprise database, but it still wasn't as good as Oracle.
This project has about 3 or 4 sources and only gigabytes of data. It would be interesting being one of the first to actually implement a dw based on SQL Server 2008. But would it be worth it? That I don't know yet.
What are some of your opinions?