Are Open Source Databases Following in Linux Footsteps?
By Clint Boulton June 13, 2003 One would be tempted to think Oracle is alone in its assessment that Microsoft may be threatened by a MySQL down the road. Not so. Gary Ebersole, president and COO of upstart ANTS Software, said he could see reasons for Microsoft having concern about this issue. Ebersole speaks as a competitor of Oracle and IBM, and ANTS technology looks to eliminates database-locking conflicts in high workload applications that need to be frequently updated, such as messaging platforms or stock trading. Ebersole argues IBM and Oracle can’t handle the concurrency of data ANTS can, and sees that as a way for the small company to insert itself among the big vendors. “I would contend that MySQL is following the same trajectory that Linux has followed,” said Ebersole, who sold his firm Clustra Systems to Sun Microsystems last year. “It’s a strong, viable technology. MySQL is a very mature, stable product, whose disciplines are just as strong as Linux. 80 percent of database r
