Is this a money issue strictly? And do you know if the company has looked at
all of the angles about cost.
Why I ask is I do not see that one should get ammo to sell someone on a
particular database server. I do believe one should know all of the facts
and be able to counter false perceptions, however. Here is my two cents.
One can go very cheap with MySQL, if they do not purchase any support. But
that is cheap on the server side and does not take in account the costs
associated with employees to program and maintain or the education needed if
the employees do not have MySQL experience. This impact has to be included
in the mix. Long term ROI might be realized, but you might find the cost of
spinning employees to be fairly high. You can solve this with consultants,
but if your market is not heavy on MySQL experience, this comes at a
premium. How much? Can't say with your market.
Now, suppose you go to supported MySQL, which is a wise path, instead of
just download and install. Is it still cheaper? Depends on how you license.
MySQL is a yearly charge ranging from $600 per server to $5000 per server.
At each level, you get additional features. At the highest levels you get
consulting support, faster turnaround time and indemnification. When you
compare to the costs of SQL Server, you can get it fairly cheap under SPLA,
although there is an initial cost added to the per proc cost. Long term,
however, the cost is cheaper.
All of these factor into a decision.
You also have to factor in features you need. If you want simple reporting,
there is another product your team has to learn and the potential of
support. Same for OLAP features. If you are not using them, they don't
factor in, but these features are not included in MySQL out of the box and
will factor in if you use them. This all effects cost of the system.
Back to the employees? Do they know MySQL? If so, there may not be a big
issue. If not, there are training costs. It might be classroom training or
OTJT, but it still has a cost associated. Perhaps it is just lost
productivity, which is a soft cost, but it is still a cost. Often management
sees extra employee time that is not aimed at a solution as part of the
fixed cost of business and forget that learning time takes away from
productive time.
If your management is going to MySQL because they can download it for free
and that is the sole issue, I think you should educate them. If they have
thought out the rest of the story, you are fighting an uphill battle and may
be on the wrong side of this war. Just make sure you are approaching this
sensibly.
--
Gregory A. Beamer
MVP, MCP: +I, SE, SD, DBA
Subscribe to my blog
http://feeds.feedburner.com/GregoryBeamer#
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| Think outside the box! |
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"Cirene" <ci****@nowhere.comwrote in message
news:eO****************@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
I'm trying to convince my client that MySQL server is not the way to go
for his project. Here are some reasons why...
- If you use the MySQL Connector you are bound to GPL (unless you want to
pay $$$)
- Doesn't work as good "out of the box" with Visual Studio 2008
Any other reasons why SQL Server is better than MySQL? I was thinking
about using SQL Express, but my client says it's too limited. Any
thoughts?
Thanks!
