Oracle Magazine - September/October 2007 - Marcelo Machado

ER WITHIN
technology at the edge of the enterprise.
JUPITER IMAGES
or Riverbed Technology, choosing the right database
for its network-acceleration appliances isn’t something
it takes lightly. The company’s Steelhead appliances
help boost WAN speeds an average of 30 times for customers
running anywhere from hundreds to several thousands
of nodes, and what Riverbed needs is a database that’s robust
and that can go the distance. To achieve the performance
gains it needs with the smallest technology footprint possible,
Riverbed relies on Oracle Berkeley DB, a member of Oracle’s
family of embeddable databases.
Unlike traditional databases, embedded versions reside
within software applications or hardware appliances like
Riverbed’s and don’t require day-to-day management by DBAs.
Instead, they work behind the scenes, often without end users
even knowing they’re using the data management technology.
“Customers like our turnkey solution. They buy our appliances
because they don’t want to mess around with operating
systems and figure how to get this piece of hardware to work
with that piece of software,” explains David Wu, Riverbed’s
vice president of software development. “Our customers aren’t
database experts, so it makes sense for us to bundle in an
embedded database that just tunes itself.”
NEW CHOICES
Embedded databases aren’t new—developers have relied on
them for decades. Many developers have built their own,
because their application requirements were so unique, and
commercial choices were inadequate.
“Although custom development is very time-consuming
and expensive, it enables developers to build very specific
capabilities,” says Rex Wang, vice president of embedded
product marketing at Oracle. “We understand that developers
need technical flexibility and choice, so that’s why
BY ALAN JOCH
Oracle’s strategy is to offer developers the broadest selection
of embeddable databases for the diverse range of applications
out there.” In fact, Oracle offers four embedded database
choices. (See the “Choosing an Embedded Database” sidebar
for more information.)
“Oracle offers a suite of embedded databases for network
appliances, mobile devices, packaged applications, and other
uses,” says Noel Yuhanna, principal analyst with Forrester
Research. “Customers can choose among any of those products,
with the additional advantage of having compatibility
across the various databases.”
PERFORMANCE DEMANDS
Cisco Systems released the Cisco License Manager (CLM) at
the beginning of 2007. The CLM enables Cisco customers to
inventory and manage sometimes thousands of licenses for
network devices running in their enterprises.
“If a customer wants to upgrade any of the licenses, they
place an order online and enter an authorization key into the
CLM, and it automatically obtains the licenses and deploys
them to the network devices,” says Niraj Gopal, CLM product
manager at Cisco. When customers download the CLM, the
product includes Oracle Berkeley DB Java Edition for managing
licensing and authentication information for each device.
Before Cisco settled on Oracle Berkeley DB Java Edition,
the company considered several other databases, including
several commercial offerings and a homegrown solution. Cisco
chose Berkeley DB Java Edition after pilot tests convinced
developers that it could meet their top design goals—the
database had to be scalable and portable and work within a
small resource footprint.
“[The database] had to run on powerful servers as well as
a single blade,” explains Shaw Li, Cisco software development
ORACLE MAGAZINE SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2007 59