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NZX Moves To Oracle On Linux
sn00ker writes "In this story in The New Zealand Herald, we learn that the NZX stock exchange has moved their database systems to Oracle running on RedHat Linux, running on commodity Intel-based hardware. What's really impressive are the performance numbers they're claiming. Quoth the article, "One key query - searching the data on historical trades to identify maximum trade values - has been cut from 36 seconds to 0.03 seconds." An improvement of over 1000 times is spectacular in anybody's books, and is one hell of a boost for the proponents of Linux at the back-end of the financial world."
Oh come on! They consolidated 21 databases and moved to Oracle. That's why it is 1000 times faster. The move to Linux is a footnote as far as the performance issue is concerned -- as stated in the article, the move to Linux was for cost. I'm sure Solaris or god help me, Windows Server 2003 would have given similar performance results. Now if they had moved to MySQL...
Dr. Rick
- "It's such a fine line between clever and stupid" (Nigel Tufnel)
- Zort! (Pinky)
Obviously a much-needed index was added during the migration...
I'm inclined to think that having a request suddenly run 1000 times faster might be due to something a DBA has done, rather than a change of OS.
Of course, if you want to yell from the treetops "Linux runs 1000 times faster..." I'm sure people will back you up.
A 1000 fold improvement in performance, just by moving to linux. Incredible. Unbelievable even.
Comon guys. What kind of idiots do you take us for?
I can't believe you'd get a three order of magnitude improvement in a single function simply because of a change in operating system. I mean, unless they had been using SCO or something.
Sure, a more efficient process scheduler, a more efficient IO scheduler, but really. It would make a lot more sense for the difference to be in the DBM, or even more likely, in the design of the database itself.
Just because someone works for a big company doesn't mean they know what their doing. The most likely reason for the speedup would have been an optimization in their own software, or their database schema. Followed by an improvement in the RDBM, and finally the OS.
A thousand fold increase in speed simply from changing the OS is just impossible to believe -- unless there was something very wrong to begin with.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I'm no windows sympathizer, but in the world of enterprise software, only optimizations at the database layer (or reworking badly written networking layer) can yield those kind of results.
Sounds like they data warehoused and redesigned the schema/indexes to better match usage.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"We went for Linux, not just because we hated Microsoft, but because the cost was compelling," Phillips said.
(Insert funny remark here because I'm unfunny)
"We went for Linux, not just because we hated Microsoft, but because the cost was compelling," Phillips said.
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The article states a really big improvment, but is seems hard to swallow. The article fails the mention what system they were running before, aside from mentioning "propietary Unix". I don't know, maybe they had some 10-year old system running the database before and with that I could buy the big improvement but with crucial information omitted in the article, feels kind of like puffed up hype.
Apart from being able to consolidate 21 databases into one, the new NZX system runs faster, more reliably and at less cost, says the company's tech team.
One key query - searching the data on historical trades to identify maximum trade values - has been cut from 36 seconds to 0.03 seconds.
Well yeah. They consolidated 21 databases. It sounds like they had an 'overgrown' design, with lots of hacks. That's why it was slow, the consolidated the whole thing into one. Probably with help from Oracle themselves on optimization. Anyone would get a huge speedup out of that.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Financial organizations are very conservative but even Deutsche Bank are migrating to Linux some of their less important processes.
In all the cases the future of the financial industry is in cheap linux clusters.
I'm glad to see them move to Linux, but I hope that their execs chose it for the performance advantages. But with a quote the one below, I doubt it.
"We went for Linux, not just because we hated Microsoft, but because the cost was compelling," Phillips said.
According to the artcle, they built a cluster using Oracle Real Application Cluster, (I guess Beowulf is just for toy apps :P) which allowed them to spread the core DB over multiple machines (!).
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
One key query - searching the data on historical trades to identify maximum trade values - has been cut from 36 seconds to 0.03 seconds.
this probably has nothing to do with indexing or other table and/or query optimizations. i think we should just show these RAW STATS to microsoft customers and they'd switch instantly.
and monkeys fly out of my database administering butt.
The improvement is impressive - but I would credit the overall architecture, rather than some single specific factors - like Oracle10g+Redhat or DBA or systems consolidation.
I mean, every part of the architecture has its role.
Some other contributing factors not mentioned, I suspect, would includes - focused performance requirements, specific purpose optimised query framework.
Can someone point to some public material on the architecture? It would be a interesting read.
Sunset over the lake, cool mist over the bridge; A leave upon the ripples, the snow reflects its glow.
Oracle chief executive Charles Phillips told the Oracle Open World user conference in Melbourne last week that if IT chiefs wanted better performance, they had to be prepared to spend less - that is, drop their proprietary Unixes and expensive multiprocessor boxes and go to Linux on clusters of two-processor or four-processor servers. That's a line to appreciate. Too bad it is from one *nix to another
As slashdot only accepts conspiracies for posting this has never really be disseminated:
The NZX (ex NZSE) runs the Computershare ASTS trading system for their equities and bond trading. They have done so for 4 years.
This system runs under Linux (Redhat) on Compaq machines.
That they aggregated some of their databases and achieved better performance is non news but the increase in performance stated is worth a conspiracy post!
C'mon, it ain't nice to call NZ that!
dear sir you appear to be knowledgable about the subject. I have just poured hot grits down my pants as per the instructions, but have not been able to boot linux on the grits???? what am I doing wrong?
This caught my eye:
I'm not disputing this, but would the savings really be that big? Consider:
On the hardware side, a major shift to Linux wouldn't reduce the number of niche hardware platforms that they'd have to support; indeed, it should increase it. Linux, as open source, will naturally be ported to a huge number of architectures, even more than it has been already. The presence of popular OS would help these architectures go more mainstream, and Poof! Oracle ends up working with even more architectures than it has to now.
The major benefit would be in operating systems, but they don't have too many to work with now. Their choices are basically
All the Windows versions use the same set of APIs, and the differences between the Unices aren't too bad.
Yes, it would be easier for Oracle, but not *that* much.
Right?
Like Mikey, I hate everything. It's true. Cost me 10 years' of life, too.
Grow up! boys.
You can't deny that the upper managers are finally taking Linux seriously.
And that's definitely a good thing.
I have it on good authority that the old database wasn't even in 1st normal form! Now, everything's all atomic, etc., and in 5th normal form.
Unless specifics about the query and the physical database model are comparable in both systems this isn't really impressive.
Comparable - not equal - since each database engines optimizer has it's individual quirks and strength.
Assuming that you have large joins on huge tables a couple of good indexes, which make the optimizer happy can reduce execution time from hours to seconds.
Table scans are expensive in database speak.
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mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
They're asking if you run Linux. But do They run Linux?
...for using the term "unices" to refer to different flavours of Unix (I like Chocolate Chip Meself).
On a more serious note, the statement made above just about applies to any operating system i.e.
If the world goes*insert OS name here*, *insert company name here* won't need to spend so much making sure its technology can run securely and reliably on every weird combination of hardware and operating system its customers adopt.
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I cannot believe the spin on this post. Even for slashdot this is way below the bar. Anybody who knows the slightest thing about databases knows that a performance improvment like this is not attributed to which operating system or database you use. They would have had to be running Access on Windows98 on a 386 ACER laptop to see a performance to increase like this. Obviously there's something else going on. For example, a simple change in how tablespaces are organized could be responsible in which case it would be possible do precisely the same thing with just about any reasonably DB/OS.
I have achieved increases of 10^4 and 10^6 in production systems by recoding a small critical part of an application (usually less than a page of code).
Most of the time the problem is stupid code or operational ignorance. Rarely is hardware, O/S or data base software changes the sole or main solution in performance problems. Hardware is only a factor when the system is underspecified to save money.
Given that they consolidated 21 databases into a single database the problem could simply have been network latency between separate physical servers.
The simplest way to get performance problems is to test on developers personal machines with tiny test databases and implement without full scale testing.
For those of you who wish to ensure that Microsoft SQL server is slow, invoke a user defined function as part of the where clause that the optimizer cannot recognize as a determinate function when joining two tables. This will ensure a nested loop join that will take an eternity.
When I was young, I had to rub sticks together to compute.
>In Mixed-Economy New Zealand, Linux ports YOU!
t /count ry2.cfm?id=NewZealand">
I think your view of the NZ economy might be 20 years old, time to get a new text book
<AHREF="http://cf.heritage.org/index2004tes
What the Oracle guy said was key, that if a software company can target a restricted range of kit, rather than every possible third party gizmo and buggy driver that can be installed under Windows, they've got a vastly easier job.
For some software applications it makes sense to refuse to ship the software on its own and insist on giving away free hardware with the deal, with the operating system of your choice (it isn't really going to matter which operating system) fully configured and installed. That way you know what the client is running your software on, you've tested it, and you've got an identical setup back in the lab to research problems on, and you know it isn't going to crash because the client's box is running some crap driver you've never heard of.
Let's see how many hours NZX is down during next five years due hw/sw malfunction. That's meaninful.
Dyslexics have more fnu.
For a moment there, I read it as "Hot girls down my pants"
And possibly your knowledge of HTML needs an update itself?
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2004 Index of Economic Freedom
The version of Oracle they're using costs around $50,000 per processor. That means the hardware and OS costs are so small in comparison that it's STUPID to buy anything but the best hardware you can get, and the OS is pretty much up to whoever has to maintain the system. Windows server 2003, Solaris, Linux, whatever - its not going to make a dent in the total costs.
"CREATE INDEX"
It's amazing what you can do to optimise a query or two...
Advice to the sarcasm-impared: do not take this posting literally.
Have To Smile :)
And if they'd moved to MySQL on Windows on itanic they'd have got another factor of 10 speed increase.
Quoth the article, "One key query - searching the data on historical trades to identify maximum trade values - has been cut from 36 seconds to 0.03 seconds."
if they lost about 99.999% of the data during the migrations....
i'd be more impressed if it was 1000x performance for kde/xwindows
Join Team Mozilla #38050 Folding@home
*Sigh*. Yes, I grudgingly acknowledge that if you had the 100,000-times improving linux-upgrade, you would have had FP. But....you STILL FAIL IT! HA :-p
Everyone seems to be thinking that the story is all about a thousand times performance increase because they switched to Linux.
I don't see the article make that claim... they just said that they changed a bunch of stuff, and they now have a different system in which one sample query is 1000x faster.
This could be (and probably is) due to a number of reasons:
-- consolidated many separate databases into 1
-- probable new data model
-- probable new application design
-- upgraded system resources (more RAM, better CPUs, faster SAN, etc.)
-- different OS
-- Oracle tuning / kernel tweaking
It doesn't make sense that they'd just re-implement the exact same system and application design... they probably spent a lot of time redoing the apps to make them smarter and faster.
To assume that Linux is singly responsible for the performance increase is kind of silly.
$0.02 (CDN)
I've discovered that Oracle is pretty much OS agnostic because it pretty much takes over the system it is installed on. That aside, when a server is pure anything, the OS really isn't relivant. When all it does is run one app, the performance is pretty much tied to that app. All modren OSes provide good disk, memory, network, etc services. Now you can argue specifics till you are blue in the face, but when running one app, it doesn't much matter.
Where an OS can shine is if you are running lots of stuff (eg webserver, scripts, database server, media server all on one box) and espically when you are screwing around and hence likely to cause problems. However when you do a DB install and run nothing but that, the OS is just a helper. It talks to the hardware and provides some simple APIs. Which OS it is isn't of much consequence to performance.
The cost thing makes me curious too. We tried Solaris on Linux. The DBA couldn't get it to work, and neither could I. Then I looked at the requirements. We are trying SUSE, since that was listed... Well, sorta. It didn't run on normal SUSE, just SUSE Enterprise Server. Likewise not RedHat, but RHEL, and also UnitedLinux. In otherwords, high dollar server Linuxes. Oracle tech support wouldn't even talk to us unless we used a supported OS. We ended up option for Windows XP Pro, since it was supported. As I said, OS didn't much matter, just that it ran Oracle.
Now while I'm sure (or at least pretty sure) Oracle could be made to run on a non-enterprise Linux, what would be the point? They wouldn't support you and support is one of the big reasons to buy Oracle (not cheap in case you were wondering).
I really question the cost thing. I am guessing someone pushed Linux, and is justifying it as a cost based decision.
Now, I'm sure people are about to jump on me, given that Linux is free... But WAIT! We are talking Linux for running Oracle here. Well, if one checks Oracle requirements you find that in additon to Windows, HP-UX, xOS and such, it does run on Linux, but it's pickey. They require and only support enterprise Linuxes such as RHEL and SUSE Enterprise.
Ok, fair enough, but these AREN'T free. RHEL is to the effect of $800. Hmmmmm... Given that ORacle will also run on XP Pro, doesn't seem like such a deal any more.
We've dealt with Oracle in this regard and found out that:
1) It won't work on stock SUSE or RedHat systems. Dunno why, but there must be something different in the enterprise versions because it won't install properly on the normal ones.
2) More importantly Oracle REFUSES to support you if you aren't on a supported OS. They just say "run a supported OS" and that's it.
Well, given that, for the kind of apps one would want an Oracle database, support is important,I'm not seeing them running on a normal Linux distro hacked to make Oracle happy. So given that they are probably on an enterprise Linux, I'm not seeing the cost savings.
The whole thing sets off my zealotry bells. It sounds like that had a horrible hacked-ass, old database system. They needed to modernize it. So they elected to use Oracle, Makes sense, when it comes to unlimited scalibility and rock solid reliability, Oracle just has it. However then someone sold them on doing it on Linux. No problem, except it sounds like cost was the selling point, which isn't really valid for Oracle.
So now we have the justification scramble. Make sure everyone, espically the bosses, buy the cost argument. Pointing out the speed increase is also a good idea, never mind what caused it, obviously it was your brilliant decisions.
I've seen this happen plenty, and it's not limited to people advocating Linux, any platform that they like will work. You get a zealot for platform X, that uses BS arguments to sell it. They then produce lots of hype, to make sure people think it was the right choice.
A significant section of the IT world think of linux as nothing more than a hobby Linux - that you can't rely on it for anything mission critical.
What this is saying is that Redhat Linux CAN foot it with the big (commerical) boys like Sun and Microsoft.
No, I did not read the f***ing article!
Not really related to the story but a couple of years back the New Zealand Stock Exchange changed there name to NZX. It then came to light that there was already something in New Zealand called NZX - a hardcore pornography magazine. In the end it was decided that there would be little confusion about which was which.
Our little girl Susan is a most admirable slut, and pleases us mightily - Samuel Pepys (1633-1703)
are you sure that no queries has been changed or indexes added?
I mean i migrated more than one database to Oracle on Linux, the numbers you mention do not seem to be realistic, or the facts in the story are not complete. Thats me though, might be wrong.
The lunatic is in my head
Yeah, economic freedom doesn't mean so much, when they don't even sell things in New Zealand. The entire economy is centered around sheep - the whole world knows NZ is a backward nation of sheep fuckers.
For us geeks anyway;
;-)
The NZ Domain Name registration system runs on Linux, and Postgres, and it's Open Source.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/dnrs/
I mean; who gives a rat about stock exchanges anyway ?
Now, this is hazily remembered, but a friend's uncle (really!) works as a developer for NZX. He mentioned this in a conversation we had a few months ago. I think the speed increase was through using analytic features of Oracle 10g along with the more powerful hardware.
They replaced various systems running older versions of Oracle with this cluster. I'll ping my friend and maybe get him to find out what this was referring to and post something.
Oh come on! They consolidated 21 databases and moved to Oracle. That's why it is 1000 times faster. The move to Linux is a footnote as far as the performance issue is concerned -- as stated in the article, the move to Linux was for cost. I'm sure Solaris or god help me, Windows Server 2003 would have given similar performance results. Now if they had moved to MySQL...
Sure, consolidation is one key to this improvement. Probably they created indexes and stuff, but probably some code (or procedures) were rewritten.
I guess MySQL wouldn't be much faster - at least it doesn't handle all the ANSI-SQL standards, like inner queries or transactions. Yes, it's good for some web applications and less complicated but heavy loaded stuff. Great database there - but for stock exchange? (Yes, MySQL has improved a LOT from version 4.x. I know that already.)
?SYNTAX ERROR
Sounds like nothing more than marketing hype. Throw out some great statistics with no details. Hey, sounds like a great model to run for president !
It does say this was just one operation. I'm betting the first time they ran
DELETE FROM clients
It took 36 seconds to return. The second time it pretty much came straight back.
You sir, are an idiot, speaking of things which you know nothing. .... oh, hang on, this is Slashdot ... Never mind.
I *have* been into the IT department of the NZSE (as it was called until recently). These guys know their stuff. The guy that most everyone I know go to to get their info on Linux (runs gentoo before anyone else has heard of it, on the bleeding edge etc, gets his info from one of the guys at the NZSE.
I was sitting there one day listening to them talk BS about versioning file systems (in this case Reiser), and I thought 'okay, here's where Mr Cutting Edge lays the techno smack down, but MR NSX took everything he had and then handed him his techno arse'. Very impressive. Of course, other than who won, I have no idea what they were saying, they are so far out of my league.
-----
Now, if you want *utterly incompetent* IT at a stock exchange, you have to look no further than the ASX.
If they hand you an html table with data points in it, every single cell will have its own font tag... and they're all the same font!!! The HTML they hand around is about 20x larger than it needs to be, and the level of information they provide is much much less than the NZX.
You could, for instance, run a Graham and Dodds style fund straight off the info you get from the NZX, at about one page view per company you're tracking, but the information required for that isn't even available on the ASX.
Hell, the ASX doesn't even have a decent *index* of its companies for crying out loud!!! And their crappy rollovers don't work on my non-ie browser, so I can't even access most of their site!! (most of it was useless anyhow).
For Ghu's sake, their (online) conditions of use state that you can't even download pages from their site, or store them on a computer.... how fscked up is that???
NZX vs ASX is a classic example of good web design vs god awful web design.
We tried Solaris on Linux,,,,,
Man, let me stand up and take my hat in genuine appreciation.
This ladies and gents, is a real hero.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
First of all, Linux support (notice that Linux is not sold, support is) is normally more generous than MS licensing.
If you are unhappy with the solution provided you can alook around for a better deal because the solution, at least at the OS level is open, so any scripts that you use to juice the DB can be transported with no changes at all.
If you get really fed up with Red HAt you can go to SuSe, and if you are a big company, you can armtwist Oracle to support other Linux distros.
If you get fedup with MS software any migration is unnecesary painful and difficult because MS puts enormous ammounts of effort to make it so.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It is a perfectly valid reason to move away from a provider you have come to hate.
Hate is not gratuitous, it should have a reason, not that a could think of any myself of course, since MS is the greatest, more ethical company, I can think of....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It is cheaper to buy 1 fastest processor SPARC that one stock Intel pc with dual CPU.
... etc then I would pick the Intel instead and perhaps run the DB's in the same machines with the web servers.
The computer costs more, even more so with SUN (clone) memory(*) but you need only one Oracle CPU licence.
Likewise you wish to run as many Oracle DB's in as few machines and run all applications elesewhere.
If you are however runing Apache,MySQL, JBOSS
(*) I am not sure if Sun boxes need special memory is needed anymore.
So they have justified reasons to be optimistic.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Seems like it should be distribution-agnostic if this were the case. They shouldn't even need libc.
Instead of "GNU/Linux" it would be "Oracle/Linux." Certainly the "lines of source code" argument the FSF uses to support "GNU/Linux" should apply to Oracle as well, and I suspect Oracle 10 just might have a line or two more than the kernel...
"if they had moved to MySQL.."?
If they had moved to mysql, they'd be completely screwed the first time it randomly trashed a table, went up to 99% cpu for no reason, or simply crashed. All of these are common.
When will you guys kick your MySQL habit?
Jesus, may aswell just use perl and CSV files, it's about the same thing and probably more reliable. MySQL is great for tiny trivial web applications and not much else - and even then you're probably better off with PostegreSQL anyway.
(speaking as someone who has had to deal with that "database" more times than he ever wants to remember)
1) Leave hands in pockets.
2) Look humbly down at your feet.
3) Optionally, you may start moving one foot forward and back repeatedly, while putting weight on other foot.
4) Repeat after me: "Aw, shucks, it was nuthin..."
or "LINUX, awww, c'mon. There's Oracle, too, give them some credit..."
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The NZ stock exchange had any kind of usage on it at all. There's what 3 companies, a bunch of sheep and Lord of the Rings there right?
I'm not trying to slight NZ, but please redo this story when something like NASDAQ switches.
This type of news item is not interesting any more. Every business operating on a Unix like operating system has a plan to move to Linux - it's just a matter of time (mission critical businesses don't just take a huge risk [despite the cost saving] and jump to a new O/S until they are really really really sure there will be no problems.
isn't the word you're looking for propaganda?
ed
actually it looks more like an oracles profit magazine article than a slashdot post...
Sounds to me like whatever setup they had before didn't have an index. I've seen batch jobs that took *days* shrink to a matter of minutes by simply indexing the database and keeping it current.
I don't know what kind of crack I was on, but I suspect it was decaf.
Just because someone works for a big company doesn't mean they know what their doing.
I'd say successfullly pulling off a massive consolidation project on a financially critical system probably puts an upper limit on their incompetence.
Just because what they say doesn't really make all that much technical sense doesn't mean they are incapable of making technical sense when it serves their purpose. Getting things done in any organization involves using your successes to push you agenda. It also means sensitivity to the other messages your audience may be receiving and what message you need to counteract it.
For example, the PHBs may have been hearing that Linux was an unsophisticated system cobbled together by a bunch of amateurs from 1980s technology. If you don't think that message is out there, or that it can't possibly be effective , you are extremely naive. If you think you can counter this argument with technical arguments about file systems, virtual memory schemes and schedulers you are even more naive. So, here's a countermessage: "Look, this Linux based system works great. It's a thousand times faster in some important tasks than the systems we spent millions on before. How 'unsophisticated' can that be?"
You might not think this mode of reasoning is entirely valid, and you'd be right. But it's not without its virtues. Successful decision makers put a higher premium on things being demonstrably "good enough" than on their being "best". And this argument meets the admittedly relaxed corporate standards of truth: it is not literally false and its advanced with the best interest of the company in mind.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
most of the massive speedup claimed in the article is likely due to basic performance tuning, the kind that usually happens during a large scale migration of this sort. i am sure they had at least one senior oracle dba on hand, who made sure that the new db is tuned to the nines.
I'm not sure why any sane person would switch to oracle, especially if they were concerned with cost. Oracle is an administrative nightmare. IMHO would be much better to switch to Sybase (also runs on linux)...
But those linux costs are nothing - compared to the oracle licensing costs:
- $40,000 / CPU for base product
- $10,000 / CPU for partitioning
- $10,000 / CPU for RAC
So, even a trivial Oracle cluster is just not going to come in under a quarter million dollars. Saving a few thousand dollars by going from windows to linux isn't going to make any difference at all.
Unless you have a large unix support staff you can leverage, want to diminish security-related patching & vulnerabilities, etc, etc. But those numbers are a little tougher to quantify.
As a DBA who is "worth his salt", a single well implemented index could easily account for such gains - almost regardless of hardware, OS, or db vendor involved.
(Score:-5, Non-Linux GroupThink)
I started reading slashdot a few years ago knowing relatively little about computers. I loved the articles, and the comments were even better.
I learned a lot about computers since then, partially through slashdot, but mostly through running Linux servers at home and doing a lot of programming. And doing google searches for whatever topic I was researching.
Now I can hardly stand to read slashdot. The subject matter is as interesting as ever, but the utter cluelessness of the editors is revolting.
How can an article bereft of any sort of analytical details make it onto slashdot? I'll tell you how, clueless editors.
I read a headline saying Oracle on Linux improves database performance and I am interested to learn more. I read the article and I find out that there is not a single shred of evidence supporting the claim that Linux had anything to do with the performance. They could have been running Linux before the change to oracle for all we know.
We are too smart and life is too short to waste time on bad journalism. I will be reading other hi-tech new sites from now on. Until slashdot gets a clue.
I hate to be a downer, but for something like this, I bet the developers discovered something called Materialized Views in Oracle, and started using them.
I was working on a large project where we tested platforms for Oracle. We ran two servers with similar hardware. One on Solaris+Oracle and one on NT+Oracle.
After serveral months, it became obvious there wes no comparison in performance. The Solaris-based server out-performed the NT-based box easily by a factor of 4-to-1.
More importantly, the NT system has to be routinely rebooted in order to remain stable. I actually had to schedule reboots just to keep the system from running out of resources!
That was more than four years ago. Since then, the NT server was repurposed into a workstation; the Solaris Oracle server is still running with an uptime of more than two years.
They _were_ running Oracle 8.1.7, + several M$ Access Databases (?). Funny thing is that they Haven't actually implemented the RAC yet, they are still on a single server - so I don't know where those stats came from.
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Sounds like a cheating underarm bowler if ever I heard one ;-)
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