Oracle or SQLServer - .NET or J2EE?

[Syed Mudussir Husain]

Hello,

I am doing a very large web based database project.

Over the period of 5 years, "more than 100, 000 Books" will be stored in a
Database along with a LARGE amount of book attributes majorly consists of
very large amount of people reviews about a book.

We then need to analyze or generate reports from that large volume of STATIC
data in Infinite number of ways.

My questions are:

Q1. Just to get general sence, Which suits the best Oracle or SQL Server for
this project and Why? Keeping scalibility, volume of data, etc. in mind?

Q2. Which development platform best suits best for this kind of project .NET
or J2EE and Why.

Q3. We have to analyze or generate reports from that STATIC data in Infinite
number of ways, Which analysis technology should be used and Why?

Thanks,
Rafey.

 

[Rob Tillie]

Q1. Just to get general sence, Which suits the best Oracle or SQL

Server for this project and Why? Keeping scalibility, volume of data,
etc. in mind?

Both are up for the job, but use SQL Server for the answer on Q2.

Q2. Which development platform best suits best for this kind of
project .NET or J2EE and Why.

..NET !!! it's far simpler to program! J2EE is a pain in the arse to program.
The combination Sql Server / .NET is perfect.

Q3. We have to analyze or generate reports from that STATIC data in
Infinite number of ways, Which analysis technology should be used and
Why?

You can use Crystal Reports, included in VS.NET. You can also program your
own report generator.

Greetz,
-- Rob.

 

[Michael Høtoft]

Considering Q3, Crystlal reports has a lot of limitaions, It is good to some
things like reporting from stimple relations like order and customer. If
your just a little bit creative you'll find yourselv limited by a lot of
undocumented limitations.

By the way CR 9 has been launched as serveral diffrent products, not all are
released yet and it seems to be shrouded with a lot of "sales talk".

As a experienced combatant, fighting with crystal reports, I strongly advice
that you not only do an proof of concept on the reports and see that it can
report of i.e. the nortwind database, but also do a thorough detail
reporting of an access database with sample live data to ensure that you
will be able to generate alle the reports you will. If your "lucky" you'll
already have generated your reports and proven that it works in detail. On
the other hand, you'll soon find out that you'll have to use another product
or a lot of time working around the limitations of CR.

Regards Michael

 

[John Timney \(Microsoft MVP\)]

My personal experience is that .NET is much easier to develop with, most
J2EE problems are typically attributed to poor architectural models whihc is
very easy to do. net is easier to implement from the outset - thats my
opinion and many others will say otehrwise and be entitled to their
opinions.

If your doing a bookstore, I would strongly suggest you look at the examples
on the www.asp.net site, and the reports starter kit also found there and
use that to determine how to balance your decision. I dont honestly believe
you could get a "real" answer to your questions - recent speed test (correct
or not) have shown .NET with SQL Server to outperform pretty much anyhting -
but you need to make up your own mind. However, there is a lot more to that
to consider in architecting a scale solution and choosing the technologies
that best suit your requirement.

Incidentally, posting to such a large number of groups for a very general
question is considered bad practice and you will get a better response if
you focus your question to a specific group.

--
Regards

John Timney (Microsoft ASP.NET MVP)
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Professional JSP 2nd Edition
ISBN: 1861004958
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ISBN: 1861003625
Beginning JSP Web Development
ISBN: 1861002092
</shameless_author_plug>

 

[Kevin Spencer]

Oracle or SQL Server? Well, now if you were watching a horse race, and one
horse (let's call it "Oracle") had started out of the gate before the other,
and the other horse (let's call it "SQL Server") had started out slow but
had been accelerating at a continuously increasing rate, and now the horses
were nearly even, which one would you anticipate to win the race?

I would apply the same logic to the question of .Net vs. J2EE.

The point is, it isn't good enough to look at the features and performance
of 2 technologies in a "snap shot" as if they were static. Software evolves.
It is more accurate to analyze the trajectory of a technology than to simply
compare the features and performance at any one instant.

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
http://www.takempis.com
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

 

[Mike Bird]

Kind of a strange question. I believe both databases and both platforms
could do the job. The choice usually comes down to developer experience and
costs. If you don't have any developers with any experience in either, and
plan to do this yourself then .NET and SQL Server are probably going to be
easier to learn. IF you are outsourcing, then you probably should leave
that decision up to the contractor with the possible exception of the
database since costs can vary greatly.

The fact that you had to post this question probably means you should be
getting more direction on requirements for supported OSs and cost
limitations from somewhere before you start choosing technologies.

 

[Syed Mudussir Husain]

First kindly accept my apologies for posting question large number of
groups. I believe posting question to following three groups would suffice
the job:

1. microsoft.public.dotnet.general (to get an idea of .NET strength about
this particular problem)
2. microsoft.public.sqlserver.programming (to get feeling how SQL Server
could be helpful)
3. microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.aspnet (to know how ASP.NET could be
helpful)
4. microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.csharp (development language of the
project in case of .NET)
5. microsoft.public.sqlserver.olap (how OLAP could be helpful in analyzing
static data)

Sorry about this mistake.

Thank you for previous help. It has given some clue to the right way.

Another thing which I probably left in the question is the budget
consideration, sometimes a major factor when you select SQL Server over
Oracle. This project is non profit project community project and money comes
from people/organizations donating money. Currently we are in the process of
finalizing budget. But I believe my main concern right now is not the cost
but to get confident that if SQL Server could support following data volume
requirement:

Over the period of 5 years, "more than 100, 000 Books" will be stored in a
Database along with a LARGE amount of book attributes majorly consists of
very large amount of people reviews about a book.

I wanted to get an idea if SQL Server has any performance or otherwise any
limitation when data volume increases.

Similarly you can design data driven web sites using both .NET and J2EE. But
again does .NET has all it takes to develop highly available and efficent
large data driven website with expected daily vistor count to the website
over half-million.

Also to analyze large volume of static data would it be better to use SQL
Server OLAP analysis services or does it has any limitation.

Once again Thnaking you,

Regards,
Rafey.

 

[Christian Boult]

Q1.

Just as a side note we are starting to see clients moving from the
Unix/Oracle to the 2003/Sql Server platform.
I don't know if this is a sign of things to come but SQL Server has the wind
in it's wings I believe.

Out of experience Oracle can be quite performant but is really finiky and it
is really easy to write a query that looks ok but that will be really slow.
SQL Server is less of a pain in that sense. If I'm not mistaken Oracle is
also a bit harder on the wallet.

Q2.

..NET is really easy to use and I believe the learning curve is much less.
J2EE could do the job, it will take more time and the right people to do the
job will cost alot more and also it will certainly take more time to do it.
On the other hand if you have to do it on UNIX then J2EE would be it.

Q3.

Depending on what kind of data minning your looking to do Crystal could do
it. But there are some limitations. If you have alot of $$$ to spend you
could look at something more powerfull like what cognos is offering.

You should also post this in forums of the J2EE community. You will probably
get very different opinions ;-)

Chris.