Posted by
CmdrTaco
on from the come-one-come-all dept.
Dacta writes "At last, Interbase 6.0 is available (with source) for download.
The announcement is here, with dowload mirrors in Chicago, Herndon and San Jose
You may also be interested in the licence - basically it is MPL with "Interbase" substituted for Mozilla/Netscape."
Effects on other free databases
by
azz
·
· Score: 3
Wow! Thanks, Borland. I'm going to enjoy playing with this tonight.
I wonder how this is going to affect PostgreSQL and MySQL? It'll be interesting to see if it sucks developers away or not. I suspect it won't, as database specialists are few and far between...
And while I'm here, did Slashdot miss Redhat's GPL release of Source Navigator (Cygnus's IDE)? Hmmmm... I don't think I'm going to get any sleep tonight.:)
"I want to use software that doesn't suck." - ESR "All software that isn't free sucks." - RMS
This license is even less restrictive than the GPL... It's not every day we get software of this quality under a license this non-restrictive. Lets all write to Borland and thank them, maybe it will send a message. If they got good feedback it could mean more quality open-source.
Depends entirely on your viewpoint and the circumstances. If you can be hurt by others commercializing your software then the choice is obvious. If you want any developer for any reason then the choice is equally easy. If you have a deep personal belief that all code should be and remain free then the choice is again easy.
GPLed software is not free in the anyone can do what he/she pleases view. It is free in the sense that no one can subvert it for his/her own public uses.
With (almost)truly free licenses like the BSD license the thing people seem to object to is the purpose of the license. You are allowed to make your project closed and commercial. This is not a drawback nor a feature. It is entirely dependant on your position and point of view. If you think all code should always be available then you of course dislike this license.
Software ultimately fulfills the needs of a customer. Sometimes that customer is the developer, other times it is end users, and sometimes it is both develoepr and users. I fail to see how the GPL is more free to the end user. The end user is not even involved with the code (maybe to compile it). It is however, sometimes, more *beneficial* to the end user. This is entirely dependant on having competent developers.
It seems to me that the vast majority of "Open" licenses are targeted almost entirely at developers. As others have said, the end user (unless a developer) doesn't care what the license is. They want a working product so they can get work done or have fun.
-- Fsck cluebie moderators. I'll say what I want, offtopic or not. And fsck having to qualify every bloody statement just
FWIW - PHP 4.0 also supports native Interbase connections.
--
-- "You're gonna need a bigger boat."
- Chief Brody
Interbase Performance (Re:MySQL vs Interbase ?)
by
MZamora
·
· Score: 3
We've been running our stock trading system with Interbase for over four years, with great results and performance: 150 *heavy* simultaneous users, over 8000 avg daily financial transactions, over 800,000 avg daily db transactions on a midrange HP-UX machine, avg response times for interactive operations are sub-second (simultaneous with other heavy batch stuff).
Unfortunately, we *might* have to move over to Oracle because we're still not convinced that Borland takes Interbase seriously, and most big-iron development tools vendors aren't convinced either: they're *not* updating their support for Interbase (most still support up to Interbase 4.0C).
Let's see what develops in the open source community. I'm hoping that much of the functionality lacking in Interbase that commercial DBs already have will be integrated by "open sourcerers", and then we might not have to use Oracle:-).
Didn't get the source quite cleaned up
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 4
:)
/* these constants are purely idiotic; there's no point in having a predefined constant with no meaning, but that's Ed Simon the master programmer for you! */
Dalton Calford has written Robots or agents that listen and react to IB events in different languages. This aspec tof Interbase is a potential goldmine for developers.
Dalton in a fit of immense generosity and goodwill has posted some other tips, tricks, musings here.
BTW a very poweful one two three punch is Delphi IBObjects, interbase or soon to be klyx, ibobjects, interbase.
One more thing. Have you downloaded the documentation yet? it ROCKS!. This is best documentation for a open source project I have ever seen (well maybe php is pretty awsome too).
Make no mistake this a serious contender for the database sweepstakes.
--
War is necrophilia.
Re:How is it in practice?
by
Malcontent
·
· Score: 3
Well it's no Oracle but then what is? No clustering, no incremental backups, no raw device support, almost no tuning options (no really needed though), no JVM in the database etc. If you are not using the very high end features of Oracle switch otherwise you might need to stick with oracle.
The directories they chose for the RPM file are pretty bad.
They put files into a directory called/opt/interbase. Most Linux boxes don't have an/opt tree. That seems to be a Solaris thing.
Second, they stick their libraries and headers into/usr/include and/usr/lib. This is OK I guess, but they stick a single program into the directory/usr/local/sbin. Why not stick to the pattern they established and put it into/usr/sbin?
That's just a nit though. I suppose all that will be fixed once Debian includes it.
That's because most linux distibutions ignore the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard. I believe that this is part of the Linux Standard Base which has most of the major distributions as members so IMHO they should be using/opt.
Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes.
-- Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes. She's just dressing, goodbye windows, tired starlings.
Interbase has some very awesome features. The overview took the tone of a semi marketing type item yet it was infomrative and if you read through some of the garbage its rather clear to see as a programmer/developer what Interbase offers.
Some of the features that stuck out in my mind from the over view.
-Small memory footprint -Triggers -Stored Procedures -User Definable Functions with some 'libraries' per say already defined for math and string handling -Alert events EX:A certain item goes below xyz dollars it can send an alert using some sort of constant polling method. I am not sure exactly what this one was.. but basically it looks like whenever changes are done to the table if certain criteria are met it can call up a stored proc/UDF or something. This is a bit more powerful than a trigger or a stored procedure since you do not have to do any speical coding on a insert/update/delete.
Some other interesting things... There was a *LOAD* of case studies on the interbase site.
As far as I'm concerned, InterBase is a pretty good piece of software. In my experiences with it, it's always performed up to expectations and it does everything I've ever needed it to do. I'm not saying it's right for everyone, but definitely check it out if you haven't done so yet.
If, on the other hand, you're already a devoted or knowledgable user, make sure you visit the Interbase developer's handbook. It's a worthwhile project that could use your help.
I'm excited about this version of Interbase. (Insofar as one can conceivably be exciting about a database -- sign of a true geek, huh?)
yours, john
It fits between PostGreSQL and MySQL
by
Eric+Green
·
· Score: 3
Interbase fits between MySQL and PostGreSQL on the features-vs-performance scale. MySQL is very small and fast, at the expense of having few features (lack of transaction support, in particular, being a real issue for many applications). PostGreSQL has just about every feature under the sun nowdays, it has a set of standard types and functions that would be the envy of any database, it has a huge number of server side function programming languages (you can program stored procedures in Perl or TCL!), it has language interfaces to every popular scripting language and programming language, but it is rather sluggish and its database files use a lot of disk space.
Interbase fits quite well between them. Interbase has the most-desired features wanted in MySQL (transactions in particular), though these features slow it down in comparison. But it is still quite a bit faster and more compact than PostGreSQL in many applications, at the expense of having a rather limited selection of types and predefined functions.
If I were using MySQL 3.22 and needed stable transaction support, I'd probably switch to Interbase. If I were using PostGreSQL and needed more speed, I'd probably grit my teeth and wait until the next revision of the PostGreSQL storage manager, which is promised for Real Soon Now -- unless its current speed was utterly unacceptable, in which case I'd strongly look at Interbase, while gritting my teeth. Not that Interbase is a bad database. It's just that PostGreSQL has gotten much, MUCH more featuresome over the past couple of years, and many of those features, such as an indexable TEXT type (which Interbase lacks), are quite useful in the kinds of applications that I write. Having to go back to fixed-size VARCHAR records would be a step backward for me. Even MySQL 3.23 doesn't make you do that (you can index the TEXT BLOB type in MySQL 3.23, or, rather, you can index the first {n} characters of it).
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder how this is going to affect PostgreSQL and MySQL? It'll be interesting to see if it sucks developers away or not. I suspect it won't, as database specialists are few and far between...
And while I'm here, did Slashdot miss Redhat's GPL release of Source Navigator (Cygnus's IDE)? Hmmmm... I don't think I'm going to get any sleep tonight. :)
"I want to use software that doesn't suck." - ESR
"All software that isn't free sucks." - RMS
RMS' eyeball is going to explode if any other companies release an Open Source program (under a QT-ish or MPL-ish) license and call it Free Software.
This license is even less restrictive than the GPL... It's not every day we get software of this quality under a license this non-restrictive. Lets all write to Borland and thank them, maybe it will send a message. If they got good feedback it could mean more quality open-source.
Depends entirely on your viewpoint and the circumstances. If you can be hurt by others commercializing your software then the choice is obvious. If you want any developer for any reason then the choice is equally easy. If you have a deep personal belief that all code should be and remain free then the choice is again easy.
GPLed software is not free in the anyone can do what he/she pleases view. It is free in the sense that no one can subvert it for his/her own public uses.
With (almost)truly free licenses like the BSD license the thing people seem to object to is the purpose of the license. You are allowed to make your project closed and commercial. This is not a drawback nor a feature. It is entirely dependant on your position and point of view. If you think all code should always be available then you of course dislike this license.
Software ultimately fulfills the needs of a customer. Sometimes that customer is the developer, other times it is end users, and sometimes it is both develoepr and users. I fail to see how the GPL is more free to the end user. The end user is not even involved with the code (maybe to compile it). It is however, sometimes, more *beneficial* to the end user. This is entirely dependant on having competent developers.
It seems to me that the vast majority of "Open" licenses are targeted almost entirely at developers. As others have said, the end user (unless a developer) doesn't care what the license is. They want a working product so they can get work done or have fun.
Fsck cluebie moderators. I'll say what I want, offtopic or not. And fsck having to qualify every bloody statement just
FWIW - PHP 4.0 also supports native Interbase connections.
--
"You're gonna need a bigger boat." - Chief Brody
We've been running our stock trading system with Interbase for over four years, with great results and performance: 150 *heavy* simultaneous users, over 8000 avg daily financial transactions, over 800,000 avg daily db transactions on a midrange HP-UX machine, avg response times for interactive operations are sub-second (simultaneous with other heavy batch stuff).
:-).
Unfortunately, we *might* have to move over to Oracle because we're still not convinced that Borland takes Interbase seriously, and most big-iron development tools vendors aren't convinced either: they're *not* updating their support for Interbase (most still support up to Interbase 4.0C).
Let's see what develops in the open source community. I'm hoping that much of the functionality lacking in Interbase that commercial DBs already have will be integrated by "open sourcerers", and then we might not have to use Oracle
:)
/* these constants are purely idiotic; there's no point in having
a predefined constant with no meaning, but that's Ed Simon the
master programmer for you! */
#define BUFFER_LENGTH128 128
#define BUFFER_LENGTH155 155
#define BUFFER_LENGTH256 256
#define BUFFER_LENGTH360 360
#define BUFFER_LENGTH400 400
#define BUFFER_LENGTH512 512
#define BUFFER_LENGTH80 80
#define BUFFER_LENGTH60 60
#define BUFFER_LENGTH120 120
#define BUFFER_LENGTH180 180
Dalton Calford has written Robots or agents that listen and react to IB events in different languages. This aspec tof Interbase is a potential goldmine for developers.
Dalton in a fit of immense generosity and goodwill has posted some other tips, tricks, musings here.
BTW a very poweful one two three punch is Delphi IBObjects, interbase or soon to be klyx, ibobjects, interbase.
One more thing. Have you downloaded the documentation yet? it ROCKS!. This is best documentation for a open source project I have ever seen (well maybe php is pretty awsome too).
Make no mistake this a serious contender for the database sweepstakes.
War is necrophilia.
Well it's no Oracle but then what is? No clustering, no incremental backups, no raw device support, almost no tuning options (no really needed though), no JVM in the database etc. If you are not using the very high end features of Oracle switch otherwise you might need to stick with oracle.
War is necrophilia.
The directories they chose for the RPM file are pretty bad.
/opt/interbase. Most Linux boxes don't have an /opt tree. That seems to be a Solaris thing.
/usr/include and /usr/lib. This is OK I guess, but they stick a single program into the directory /usr/local/sbin. Why not stick to the pattern they established and put it into /usr/sbin?
They put files into a directory called
Second, they stick their libraries and headers into
That's just a nit though. I suppose all that will be fixed once Debian includes it.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
I found myself wondering exactly what Interbase could do for me
So I dug through their site (not hard to find) and found this lil gem
Interbase Product Overview
Interbase has some very awesome features. The overview took the tone of a semi marketing type item yet it was infomrative and if you read through some of the garbage its rather clear to see as a programmer/developer what Interbase offers.
Some of the features that stuck out in my mind from the over view.
-Small memory footprint
-Triggers
-Stored Procedures
-User Definable Functions with some 'libraries' per say already defined for math and string handling
-Alert events
EX:A certain item goes below xyz dollars it can send an alert using some sort of constant polling method. I am not sure exactly what this one was.. but basically it looks like whenever changes are done to the table if certain criteria are met it can call up a stored proc/UDF or something. This is a bit more powerful than a trigger or a stored procedure since you do not have to do any speical coding on a insert/update/delete.
Some other interesting things... There was a *LOAD* of case studies on the interbase site.
Case Studies
I looked at some of these and they were real industry proven case studies IMO.
Its Free.. and it has a good reputation
You can buy support for it
It appears to be VERY ANSI Compliant and supports all the trappings of MS SQL Server..
It also claimed to be self optimizing... anyways hope this provided a little information.
Jeremy
If you think education is expensive, try ignornace
As far as I'm concerned, InterBase is a pretty good piece of software. In my experiences with it, it's always performed up to expectations and it does everything I've ever needed it to do. I'm not saying it's right for everyone, but definitely check it out if you haven't done so yet.
If, on the other hand, you're already a devoted or knowledgable user, make sure you visit the Interbase developer's handbook. It's a worthwhile project that could use your help.
I'm excited about this version of Interbase. (Insofar as one can conceivably be exciting about a database -- sign of a true geek, huh?)
yours,
john
Interbase fits quite well between them. Interbase has the most-desired features wanted in MySQL (transactions in particular), though these features slow it down in comparison. But it is still quite a bit faster and more compact than PostGreSQL in many applications, at the expense of having a rather limited selection of types and predefined functions.
If I were using MySQL 3.22 and needed stable transaction support, I'd probably switch to Interbase. If I were using PostGreSQL and needed more speed, I'd probably grit my teeth and wait until the next revision of the PostGreSQL storage manager, which is promised for Real Soon Now -- unless its current speed was utterly unacceptable, in which case I'd strongly look at Interbase, while gritting my teeth. Not that Interbase is a bad database. It's just that PostGreSQL has gotten much, MUCH more featuresome over the past couple of years, and many of those features, such as an indexable TEXT type (which Interbase lacks), are quite useful in the kinds of applications that I write. Having to go back to fixed-size VARCHAR records would be a step backward for me. Even MySQL 3.23 doesn't make you do that (you can index the TEXT BLOB type in MySQL 3.23, or, rather, you can index the first {n} characters of it).
-E
Send mail here if you want to reach me.
We're looking at paying our Oracle tax in a few months, and I'm not looking forward to it.
We're building a portal on EJB, and we need a rock-solid backend. Everyone of course trusts Oracle, but my GOD do you ever pay for it.
What've been people's experiences so far with this DB?
Cobalt Networks' new RaQ4 is shipping with Interbase preinstalled...