Oracle prepares free database

IDG News Service - Oracle Corp. plans to release a free version of its database by the end of the year in a move to compete more effectively at the low end of the market.
Oracle released a beta version of the product, called Oracle Database 10g Express Edition, on Friday for 32-bit Windows and Linux systems. The software can be downloaded free for development and limited production use. It can also be distributed free with third-party products from independent software vendors, Oracle said.
The company hopes to attract new users to its software by offering them a free "starter database" for development and deployment purposes, Oracle said. Along with developers, it wants to attract more independent software vendors, educators and students.
Production use comes with restrictions. The database is limited to use with 4GB of data and 1GB of RAM and can be used on only one processor per server, Oracle said. The same conditions apply for use by independent software vendors. Support is offered by way of an online forum for users.
The product is built on the same code base as Oracle's existing 10g databases but with some options removed, so applications will run unchanged on Oracle's higher-end databases, according to Tim Payne, Oracle's vice president of technology marketing for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The company hopes users will try out the free version and then upgrade to a paid Oracle product if their data management needs outgrow its capacity.
"We're finding customers out there who haven't considered Oracle in the past, and who have these kinds of low-end requirements," Payne said.
Oracle leads the relational database market with its main rival, IBM. But Microsoft Corp.'s SQL Server has been gaining ground quickly, according to analysts, and momentum is also building behind open-source products from MySQL AB and others.
Oracle released the free product to attract new developers and shore up its business in "the low-end corporate database market," particularly against Microsoft, according to Donald Feinberg, a vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner Inc.
Microsoft is about to release its SQL Server 2005 upgrade, he noted. The 2005 family includes a low-end database called SQL Server Express that, like Oracle's 10g Express, is free for limited production use. Oracle now has an alternative for customers considering SQL Server Express, Feinberg said.
The product could also help fend off a potential challenge from MySQL. The company is not a big threat to Oracle today, but its software improves with each new release, said Andy Hayler, founder and chief strategist