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Oracle Attacks MySQL with Free Version of Its Database

Oracle Is Trying To Get a Part of the Low-End Database Market

Oracle announced the release of its Database 10g Express Edition (XE) - a free low-spec version of its commercial database.

This reaction comes after MySQL AB launched their latest version of their open source MySQL database, MySQL 5.0, which supports stored procedures, triggers, views, cursors, information schema and XA distributed transactions.

"Oracle Database XE allows developers, DBAs, ISVs and students the opportunity to learn, develop and deploy on the world's leading database software, at no cost," said Thomas Kyte, vice president, Oracle.

"No one has to make do anymore; everyone can now start with the best."

"Developers, DBAs, students, and ISVs often look to no cost DBMSs to get started in developing and learning to develop database applications," said Carl Olofson, research director for information management and data integration software research at analyst firm IDC.

"When such a DBMS is supported by a wealth of literature, online technical material, and professional experts, and allows developers to easily grow and support their applications and data needs over time without needing to convert their database later on, the result is a low risk path that offers a high potential return not only immediately, but in the long run."

Oracle Database XE is built on the Oracle Database 10g Release 2 code base and is fully compatible with the family of Oracle Database products including Oracle Standard Edition One, Oracle Standard Edition and Oracle Enterprise Edition.

The users can upgrade to other editions of the database and move their applications without any changes.

Oracle Database XE is available on 32-bit Linux and Windows operating systems. The free edition poses some restrictions on the database - it can only use one CPU (dual core included), the memory usage is kept under 1GB, is limited to one instance per system and can store up to 4GB of user data.

Third parties are allowed to distribute or embed Oracle Database XE with their products.

Oracle also said Novell and Red Hat will offer their access to Database XE for their users. Use these links for more information on Novell and Oracle or Red Hat and Oracle.

The beta version of Oracle Database XE is available for download and a forum for discussing related issues was opened as well.

Currently, developers prefer the MySQL open source database, according to a recent Evans Data study.

IBM already released a free version of its DB2 database and Microsoft plans to release an Express version of its SQL Server next month.