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SAP Releases Full sapdb Source
A reader writes: "SAP has released full source of their sapdb sql database system under the GPL.
It can be found at http://www.sap.com/solutions/technology/sapdb/deve lop/dev_sources.htm
It's probably the most complete free database system available
right now, with much more features than interbase, mysql or postgresql.
The codebase seems to be rather old and is written in a mix of Pascal
and C. It contains interfaces to Perl and various languages."
The database doesn't need Java, Perl and Python, it has interface libraries to use the database from these languages. To build the database from the sources, you'll need Perl and Python.
SAP have a very good reason to have an open source database - every time they sell SAP (small licence $250K to the skys the limit, Nestle have 500K user.) they end up giving 5-10% to Larry Ellison for Oracle run-time. Oracle also sell Apps and compete with SAP. Additionally, they are notorious for giving the apps away, to sell the database. So, now SAP can attack a very nice segment of Oracle's already fast maturing database business. (It's big, the Oracle salesman with the biggest revenue in Germany is the SAP liasion guy...) And, they can claim to be very "a la mode" as they do so. And the community does benefit, after all, it's not them that SAP wants to attack... I think this is already an established tactic - Star office from SUN being an obvious example. Adabas D used to get some blinding benchmarks, and good reviews. If it's still state of the art, then it's worth looking at. As to it being SAP R/3, not at all. SAP has a complete middleware/development/runtime environment that is independent of the database, except for ANSI-SQL calls. That's what they build the applications in. It just uses the database for storage, not for application logic or transaction monitoring.
Instead, download Sybase 11.0.3.3 from linux.sybase.com. The server is available for free for production use, unlike Oracle, DB2, or MS.
Sybase and MS SQL server were the same program until release 4.8. When installed properly, a Sybase server will work with MS SQL server 6.5 ODBC drivers.
No, Sybase doesn't have the tremendous TPC benchmarks that Microsoft has achieved, but they soundly beat Oracle for a long time.
If you use Sybase instead of SQL Server, you haven't tied your database to an operating systems vendor. Smart move.
According to the official SAP DB FAQ:
Another FAQ entry answers the question of whether SAP is merely dumping the database on the open-source community so somebody else can clean up their old code:
Also, remember that SAP makes money on consulting/support services. So SAP AG would be foolish to release it merely to pass the burden of providing support on to the community.
But the question to me is, if SAP has their own database, why don't SAP customers use that instead of adding complexity by purchasing third-party databases from (among others) Oracle, IBM, and Microsoft? If the SAP SQL database works, why don't they use that? Can't be a matter of cost; surely SAP doesn't charge more for their SQL product than other companies.
At my last client site, we spent two years trying to force SAP to work on a mandated third-party database. We were never told that there was an option to use a SAP database engine.
I ain't trolling. Anybody know for sure? Is this thing viable?
Sap DB has many features and administrative tools still lacking in PostgreSQL.
Try real archiving and replication, for instance. Being able to specify where to allocate tables and indices without using "ln -s". An overwriting storage manager so you don't need to VACUUM nightly (or hourly as some do on very busy systems).
That just scratches the surface.
Yes, PG is vastly improved and I'm a big fan. And much of the above list is scheduled for PG 7.2. But today it's PG 7.1 and PG doesn't have these features.
OpenACScurrently is supporting Oracle and PostgreSQL with our upcoming OpenACS 4.x product. Sap DB is very likely to become the third RDBMS we support with the toolkit.
SAP recently (CBit 2000 & 2001) released a couple of CDs containing free (90 day freely-renewable license) version of SAP R/3 on Linux, and their new Web Application Server, also on Linux.
Both 'Testdrive' CDs can be obtained either as ISOs from the SAP ftp server here (R/3 BASIS on Linux) and here (WAS on Linux).
Alternatively, for those without big fat pipes can order the CDs from SAP Shop
Both these demos use SAPDB as the underlying repository for storing ABAP programs at their associated data.
There's some documentation supplied with the CDs. In addition there's a wealth of documentation about SAP AGs products at help.sap.com.
I have a couple of forums on my website for discussion of these products. Feel free to drop by sapstuff.com, and visit the TestDrive CDs Discussion forum or the BASIS Forum (BASIS is the term for the underlying technology which the SAP applications use).
Thousands of dollars? More like hundreds of thousands, I think.
SAP R/3 has an abstraction layer that allows it to run on top of many different databases, including Oracle and DB/2. It may also run on top of sapdb, but few if any R/3 installations actually do so. During the year I spent working for a consulting company specializing in SAP implementations, I never even heard of sapdb, much less of anyone actually using it on an installation - everyone was using Oracle or DB/2. No doubt this has played a role in their decision to open it up.
So I wouldn't expect sapdb to be a particularly high-quality database - SAP's strength is in business applications, not the databases they run on top of. If you're interested in an open-source database, you should probably stick with one of the ones that already has an established open-source following and developer community.
And yet every time I read a story about a company discontinuting a piece of software, everybody says 'oh, then they should open source it, so we can continue to get benefit from it.'
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Wow, I have been trying to convince the goons at work for the last couple of weeks that we do not need MS SQL server and the expensive licenses that go with it. The problem is that when I mention the word postgres or mysql they cringe because it is words they never heard before. Now when I go in monday and I say the word SAP jaws are going to drop. The question then will become how fast can we convert. Pascal now that is just a plus since we are a delphi shop an strong supporters of the pascal language.
Got Code?
This aren't exactly news, the sources were released on February 26th.
More info can be found at www.sapdb.org
"Mommy, mommy! The garbage man is here!" "Well, tell him we don't want any!" -- Groucho Marx
Does anyone here have any experience with SAP DB, and can comment on its quality/ scalability/ performance? I'm assuming that they're all reasonably good (at least as good as SQL Server, maybe more along the lines of DB2 and Oracle?)
This could be the big break that OSS DBs were looking for; now there's products for both the low and high end of the RDB market.
Unfortunately for me (having never used SAP) 5-6000 SAPS doesn't mean much... I don't suppose you could give a rough estimate about how many transactions per second that would equate to, could you?
I find it interesting that you'd choose other free DBs (MySQL, PostgreSQL being the 2 I know of) over SAP DB. Can you explain this statement further?
Thanks for all your insights.:-)
Everyone, raise your hand if you've purchased a license for SAP DB as a standalone product, without the (still commercial) SAP core product (SAP R/3).
Anyone? I thought not. So OSSing SAP DB isn't costing SAP any (or maybe very little) lost license fees.
Now since the DB is OSS, it has the potential to have a lot of community development work devoted to it. This work is done for free of course.
Theres also some good publicity for SAP (at the very least a post on /.). This could spin off into more sales of SAP R/3. But if it doesn't, then there's really nothing lost.
If the product takes off, SAP could start offering commercial support (a la Red Hat & IBM for Linux).
Best of all, businesses now have the option of using a free enterprise-worthy DBMS (look out SQL Server). How much would you like to bet that SAP starts advertising how well their SAP R/3 product integrates with their own database?
I work with SAP R/3, and have seen the sapdb in action. It's actually just an old DB system they bought from somewhere (I think informix or some such, but I can't remember the company right now). All they did was rename it.
Reason they did so was actually to be able to compete with the other DB's that's usually distributed with SAP R/3, such as Oracle, DB2 etc. 'coz when You buy a "SAP in a box" set, You get a DB of Your choice, plus SAP version of Your choice for an OS of Your choice. Of course most SAP custumers run on UX systems, and use obscenely expensive DB's like Oracle. But SAP pays for the Oracle License (it's in the box, I think I have like 40). This ofcourse cuts into SAP's profits. So by simply letting people choose a DB that's FREE for SAP to use, they save a SH*TLOAD of cash (consider half a mil. customers worth 5-10K in licensing fees pr. year. Haven't checked the numbers, but I imagine it's in that neighborhood).
As for the use of the DB, I still go for Oracle, and so does our customers. After all, the Oracle DB has better support, a better name, and as an SAP customer You don't pay no matter WHICH DB You choose. So why not go for the best ?
Most do.
And seeing the base in action, I would say it's nice, but needs some major renovation rather than just the current level of patchwork that has been done to it for years on end. Once You scale up to 5-6000 SAPS (measurement for usage in an SAP system), You might aswell get out the hand-cranck, 'coz it just wont do. But for smaller systems with less then 2000 SAPS it runs fine... The smaller the better. It might be able to handle big loads, but not REALLY big loads.
Personally, I wouldn't get caught dead with the sapdb in my systems. But if SAP gives it a big overhaul, maybe it will be able to compete with the big DB's. Unfortunately, knowing SAP's record for ovehauls, they'll probably be fixing it for years on end before it runs even close to smoothly. Anyone who's worked on an SAP system (development) will agree with me on that.
So for now I's go with one of the other free DB's in the market, if I needed a large DB for free. Otherwise I stick to what I know to be working without any problems (read: Oracle, DB2 etc.)
--- To err is human... Am I more human than most ?
How fast is this thing?
What are its limitations?
How scaleable is it?
Has any slashdot reader installed and used this before?
The fact that it is available for my 2 favorite languages (PHP, Perl) in my book makes it a Good Thing (TM), but I guess that until there is some feedback from the community on my above questions, the download rate might be a little low.
Newsfollow.com
Our code did what we needed, supported our business
There was considerable investment in getting it there (man years)
Our current db was proprietary or otherwise limited
Our current db had severe downsides, broken files, limited tools to fix, no journaling, unable to backup in production, etc.
I expect SAP addresses some of those and what they gain is people like me who see on thing they want and work so their db code has a layer to other enviroments and some of these features they may not have.
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A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Several skeptical comments have been made here that SAP is just trying to get the OSS community to clean up it's old code, or perhaps they have elected to dump their DB product and run their framework on 3rd party databases, an this is just a PR stunt to gain favor in the OSS community (or with those less skeptical anyway).
/. and other places to try to head off the backlash by the OSS comunity, to code dumping, and thus optimizing the PR benefit and tax status of getting rid of old application code.
It seems to me that recently, OpenSourcing by large corporations, of old code, or of products neat their end-of-life, has become all too frequent. It has become a currency, and standard business strategy much like 'Corporate Giving' to charities. There are entire business consultancies built around the service of: "Hire us to manage your corporate giving program". These consultancies oparate mych like tax atourneys, coming up with donations to charities that make a company look good in it's chosen market segment; the donations being of a size appropriet to get the tergeted tax writeoff.
This suggests a business opportunity 'Open Sourcing Consultant'. This person could provide the service of developing a strategy for OpenSourcing old application code and making it look all spiffy and new, also developing press releases and planting stories on
--CTH
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As a technical consultant for SAP America, I can say with certainty that SAP DB (previously known as Adabas), is far better than mySQL and Postgres SQL. It has had full transaction processing for many years and is quite comparable in performance to the other big ones like MS-SQL Server and Oracle 8. Although I don't think it is quite as good as them, it's definitely in the same league. (I'll see if I can dig up some benchmarks...)
Nevertheless, SAP DB is a full-blown Relational DB. Many European companies are "live" with their production systems using SAP DB as the backend.
I'm surprised more people haven't started using SAP DB now that it's fully GPL'd. If you need a real DB that can really scale and can't afford to buy Oracle or MS-SQL server, this is the one to get!
Btw, Open Source is not something that's new to SAP. When you buy SAP R/3, you get all the source code to all of the programs that execute on the R/3 system. Many customers heavily modify the code to adapt it to their own business processes. (The core "kernel" code is not open source and probably never will be.)
I think SAP is on the right track. Open Source is really starting to make sense to some companies. Hopefully the rest will realize this, too.
SAP DB will become Open Source. It is the first object of the SAP portfolio to go that direction. SAP DB can be used free of charge in non SAP environments
Hrmm Ok.. Well anyways after looking at it, has anyone used it to claim its better than MySQL, etc, etc., sure the page layout blows MySQL's out the frame, but it damn sure needs a heck of a lot of dependencies (JAVA, PERL, and Python?!) to run it. I wonder how it would hold up (server loads) in comparison to MySQL, or Oracle on diff architects.
Anyone actually using this yet?
360 degrees of Karma
This is one of the first steps in integrating the GPL thinking in the "old" enterprises. Although I don't like the software they make, thank you SAP...
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[insert witty one-liner here for your own pleasure]
File with names like [vg][a-z][a-z][0-9]+ are Pascal sources.
SAP DB is not swapped out for Oracle, the customer buys SAP software with the database of his choice from the start.
Customers pay for the database as a certain percentage of SAP licences (different for each supported database), but it's paid to SAP. So it may appear to technically inclined people that the database is for free.
SAP bought SAP DB (then Adabas D) to be able to offload some processing to a different server without requiring additional database licenses.
SAP bought SAP DB to be able to implement some non relational DB processing without being locked into a specific vendor.
SAP DB has never been actively marketed because SAP didn't want to appear as a competitor to IBM or Microsoft.