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PostgreSQL's support issues vs. MySQL's are simply because MySQL is a company, while PostgreSQL is a community. The good news, though, is that there are some very capable commercial support organizations, including (in alphabetical order), http://www.commandprompt.com/, http://www.enterprisedb.com/, and http://www.pervasive.com/.

For example, there's no other platform that has as many high quality, cross platform database drivers

perldoc DBI
ODBC

Sorry, that doesn't stack up. On PerlDoc DBI, what if I need to connect to Pervasive 2000 (formerly BTrieve). This is a VERY popular database for converting mainframes. With Perl:DBI and unixODBC, I'm out of luck. With JDBC, the vendor provides support. Even if I want to connect to the big name databases with unixODBC, I have to pay for third party drivers. The vendor isn't going to support me. And I still have no support if I go outside of the big name databases.

It's a nice try, but only ODBC on windows comes even close to the amount of database support provided by Java.

What's the need for them all in an office suit? You need one mediocre-but-tiny implementation for Access-like features, and the ability to connect to real servers.

You just said it. "The ability to connect to real servers." JDBC allows you to do this for free, and get vendor support. This is a big point when you consider the value of corporate data stored in an Oracle, DB2, or Pervasive database. In addition, the smaller Java databases are all good options for embedding into OpenOfice whereas there are practically no non-Java options. The only one I found was SQLite, and they don't ship an ODBC driver. (Although there is a third party experimental driver, but it is not mature enough for use. Interestingly, that same third party produces a JDBC driver for SQLite.)

In F/OSS world, anything is "more unbiquitous" than Java - because no freeNIX ships with a real java implementation.

No worries. As I remember, OOo ships with the JRE. :-)

There's also some new commercial support offerings from an established database company. Pervasive started offering a distribution recently.

In the end this silly "I'm a big boy because I use oracle and your a little gurly kiddie because you don't" bullshit is just empty bravado. Businesses generally attempt to find the most cost effective means to meet a need and often Oracle ends up being like buying a stealth fighter to deliver a pizza.

That's why REAL businesses drop the bullshit and use Pervasive (BTrieve). The best part about it is that you can mention BTrieve to just about any IT manager and he'll start waxing on about how great it was "back in his day". Guaranteed sell in just about any company. :-D

*Cough* A good RDBMS is many things, but fast isn't one of them. The reason the industry moved to relational databases (and SQL in particular) was flexibility. Non-relational databases like Berkeley DB or BTrieve are significantly faster. The reason they're not more widely used is that the flexibility of SQL vastly outweighs the performance loss it incurs. It's a matter of using the right tool for the job. Netscape and Sendmail use Berkely DB because it makes sense to do so for what they need. Similarly, Remedy uses Oracle because it needs the flexibility more than the speed. Yes, a good RDBMS is faster than a poor one, but they're both slower than a good non-relational database.

Scanning thru the posts, I noticed that no one even mentioned Pervasive (aka Btrieve). It is a solid database system that cannot be beat for performance. File sizes scale to 64gb for now and will scale even higher in the future.
-It ships with RedHat and is a DAMN sight cheaper than Oracle.
-The engine is built into Netware 5.1 and runs NDS, client access licenses, etc.
-Eleven of the top 10 accounting packages use it (Peachtree, ACCPAC, Macola, Platinum,Sage,DAC Easy,etc). ARC Serve for Netware uses it.
-A 10-user license runs less than $1000!

Before porting to all those other expensive packages, look at Pervasive.SQL first and then make a judgement.

Scanning thru the posts, I noticed that no one even mentioned Pervasive (aka Btrieve). It is a solid database system that cannot be beat for performance. File sizes scale to 64gb for now and will scale even higher in the future.
-It ships with RedHat and is a DAMN sight cheaper than Oracle.
-The engine is built into Netware 5.1 and runs NDS, client access licenses, etc.
-Eleven of the top 10 accounting packages use it (Peachtree, ACCPAC, Macola, Platinum,Sage,DAC Easy,etc). ARC Serve for Netware uses it.
-A 10-user license runs less than $1000!

Before porting to all those other expensive packages, look at Pervasive.SQL first and then make a judgement.

If you're even considering ColdFusion I suggest you also give Tango a try.

• Allaire ColdFusion
• Pervasive Software's Tango (soon to support Linux)
• Macromedia Generator, which one could argue is a very specialized type of application server. (And one I'd like to see for Linux/BSD)