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Conference ulysse::rdb_vms_competition

Title:DEC Rdb against the World
Moderator:HERON::GODFRIND
Created:Fri Jun 12 1987
Last Modified:Thu Feb 23 1995
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:1348
Total number of notes:5438

662.0. "What is this STORED PROCEDURE in Ingres??" by 22978::JEFFREYCHOY (If U can't sell Rdb What can U?) Thu May 31 1990 07:14

    My customer to be is fixed on Ingres. Some of the reasons he put
    up is as follows:
    
    1) Ingres supports 'store procedure'
    
    2) Ingres has a intelligent SQL optimiser based on AI.
    
    Q1) What is this store procedure that is so important. Can someone
        enlighten me on this and how to counter this effectively?
    
    Q2) I knew that we have an optimiser in RDO but is'nt it the same optimiser
        being used in VAX/SQL? What advantages would render an optimiser
        that is based on AI as verses ours.
    
    
    Appreciate any response and thanks in Advance for any contributions.
    
    Best Regards, Jeffrey
T.RTitleUserPersonal
Name		DateLines
662.1KBEAR::STENOISHDBS WestThu May 31 1990 18:363
    on Q2...The SQL optimizer and the Rdb optimizer are indeed the same.
662.2Optimizer TechnologyCOOKIE::BERENSONUtopia is not an optionThu May 31 1990 19:3625
INGRES' optimizer technology is no better than ours, and probably worse than
that in Rdb V4.0 (which has some rather unique technology).

INGRES' claim of being "AI-based" is probably to counter ORACLE's "rule-based"
claims.  What does ORACLE mean?  It means THEY USE NO STATISTICS in making
their decisions.  Its completely syntax based, and identical queries worded
in different ways yield different results!

Both INGRES and Rdb/VMS use a combination of rules and statistics about
actual table content to make their optimization decisions.  INGRES can,
through manual utilities, maintain more statistics than Rdb, which will
help make better decisions on some of the stranger queries (at the cost
of more DBA effort).  Rdb/VMS V4.0 has some interesting technology which
helps it due the right thing during query execution based on actual
execution results, rather than based purely on decisions made at compilation
time.

Hal

Ps: Stored Procedures are more than triggers.  Essentially, they are the
ability to store something like SQL Module Language inside the database in
a precompiled form.  Some performance benefits (for infrequently executed
queries in particular), but not generally a key factor.  In other words,
a nice (but non-standard) feature, but we have plenty of nice features that
INGRES doesn't.
662.3Some additional pointsLACKEY::HIGGSSQL is a camel in disguiseFri Jun 01 1990 16:0222
It seems that your customer may perhaps have been swayed into wanting certain 
implementation features by an INGRES salesperson?

Isn't the bottom line whether the database performs well enough to meet your 
needs, and whether has the functionality (which also includes ease of use, 
performance tuning, management, etc.) to meet your needs?  Surely, how that
performance and functionality is implemented is unimportant (as long as the 
goals are met)?

Also, last time I heard anything about INGRES' optimizer, you had to take the
database down on a regular basis and run a utility to gather new statistics 
about the database on which the optimizer could base its decisions, and then 
bring the database up again.  Have later versions of INGRES moved towards a 
more dynamic approach?  Rdb/VMS has no such utility; the optimization is 
always performed based on the current statistics in the database.

Finally, remember that SQL and RDO are languages that layer on top of Rdb.
It's not the language that does the optimization; it's the database system that
does it.  So not only are the 'SQL and RDO optimizers' the same, they are the
identical one -- the Rdb optimizer.

Bryan
662.4Thank you,the replies are very helpful.ZPOV03::JEFFREYCHOYIf U can't sell Rdb What can U?Sat Jun 02 1990 17:263