Solutions for the Information Project Team • www.dbta.
com
Enterprise Support Multiple DBMS Solutions
By Diane Beeler
Many companies merge or acquire
other companies. This requires a blend-
ing of two or more disparate systems.
Perhaps one is an Oracle shop and the
other a DB2 UDB shop, so now you
have to support two database platforms.
Percent of customers downloading
Web DBA who have these servers
100%
86.2%
63.8%
50%
0%
Windows NT UNIX (AIX, HP UX,
or 2000 Solaris, Linux
One uses Windows NT servers and the
other uses AIX and Solaris servers with
different versions of each of those oper-
ating systems. Since you now have
Oracle and UDB and PeopleSoft now
supports UDB, you add the PeopleSoft
application. You upgrade to Oracle 9i,
but not all of your applications are 9i-
tolerant, so you still have to support 8.x.
Now you are supporting multiple data-
bases, multiple operating systems, mul-
tiple applications and multiple versions
of software. Life becomes more com-
plex. Your DBAs who knew Oracle
don't know UDB. They also don't know
the PeopleSoft application and they still
need to become familiar with Oracle 9i.
Now the experts you hired are scram-
bling to manage unfamiliar databases
and tools. Add in another acquired
company that has Microsoft SQL
Server, yet another operating system
and additional new applications and
you can see how this snowballs in com-
plexity and unmanageability.
The easy answer seems to be to con-
vert the acquired systems to what you
1 Database Trends and Applications
Volume 16, Number 2 • February 2002
already have, but the size and complex- really care about is whether they can
ity of most enterprise databases make run the applications they want on multi-
this too costly and problematic. ple database platforms, IT managers are
According to a recent IDC database faced with finding tools that allow
report: "…although IT managers would often inexperienced DBAs to manage
like to consolidate the number of differ- these diverse and complex environ-
ent database products in their shops, ments. Of users downloading Web
they have not seen much progress in DBA, 49 percent are DBAs. Of those,
this direction. The myriad of mergers 55.8 percent have less than 5 years
and acquisitions and the consolidation experience.
of departmental systems have served to In the June 2001 DBA Tools and
keep the average number of different Utilities Forecast and Analysis report,
database products steady in the five-to- IDC confirmed this skills shortage
seven range for a number of years." among IT workers and said that this
This claim is supported in the data contributed to the need for easy to use,
that BMC Software collects when users functionally rich tools in the distributed
register to download their distributed tools market. They also said that the
database tools. The data below is col- distributed tools market will grow 11
lected from several thousand down- percent from 2000 through 2005 while
loads of Web DBA™, a web-based large systems tools will only grow at a
data-base management tool. The per- rate of 4 percent during the same
centages add up to greater than 100 per- period.
cent, because
many users have
Number of Years of Experience of DBAs Downloading Web DBA
more than one
database plat- 11.5%
form, more than DBAs with 0-1 years
one type of serv- 12.8%
er and more than DBAs with 1-2 years
44.2%
one type of DBAs with 2-5 years
UNIX operating DBAs with >5 years
system.
There is a new 31.5%
wave of applica-
tions that repre-
sent a shift in IT spending from ERP In the same report, IDC listed these
back-end to customer-facing front-end drivers in the distributed tools market:
applications. SQL Server packaged Growth of databases
applications (in human resources, DBA skills shortage
inventory management, etc.) are Demand for high quality, scalable
becoming more prevalent, for example. applications
IT planners now look for consistency Emergence of e-business applications
in applications rather than consistency Demand for Web-based applications
in database platforms. Demand for cross-platform support
Given that what users of IT systems continued
February 2002 Subscribe today at www.dbta.com/subscribe
 Consider these examples. A large oil
and gas company recently acquired sev-
eral large companies and is merging the
information systems of each of these
companies. They have legacy systems
to maintain and must consolidate sys-
tems that are on multiple database plat-
forms, multiple releases of software,
multiple releases of tools and multiple
hardware platforms. Keeping track of
all of this is a big challenge and so is
backup and recovery. The average DBA
has experience with 2 to 3 platforms.
What criteria do they use in choosing
tools to manage all of this? They look
for tools that can be used by the most
people and tools that go across plat-
forms. They are using PATROL and
SQL-BackTrack. The PATROL avail-
ability products provide an open, flexi-
ble solution to challenging administra-
tive requirements of distributed
computing environments. PATROL
enhances the contribution and value of
your database administration group by
automating critical but routine adminis-
trative functions and spotlighting the
information necessary to make faster,
2 Database Trends and Applications February 2002
better decisions. PATROL is available
for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, DB2
Universal Database, Sybase and
Informix.
SQL-BackTrack is an intelligent,
high-performance backup and recovery
product that simplifies and automates
many database administration tasks
associated with backup and recovery. It
speeds up the recovery process and
frees up time for DBAs and this increas-
es productivity on day-to-day tasks.
SQL-BackTrack is available for Oracle,
Microsoft SQL Server, Sybase and
Informix.
Here is another case study. A large
public utility has the opposite problem.
It is splitting into two companies - one
regulated and the other deregulated.
The new deregulated company is start-
ing nearly from the ground up on their
database. The problems it faces are
inherited legacy systems in production,
the need to standardize as much as pos-
sible on tools more than platforms and
figuring out what tools to use. They
have very large systems to backup and
recover and need tools that provide
maximum availability, performance and
scalability. They have chosen SQL-
Backtrack and PATROL Recovery.
PATROL Recovery for Oracle is an
advanced backup and recovery solution
that delivers rapid database recovery
through right-sizing, or performing
the smallest, most efficient recovery
possible.
What other tools could these compa-
nies use to manage their heterogeneous
environments? PATROL Knowledge
Module for monitoring heterogeneous
enterprise databases, SQL-Programmer
for development across heterogeneous
platforms, Web DBA for web-based
database management and PATROL
DB-Change Manager for schema
management.
In conclusion, diversity is not going
away. It is the world we live in and we
can take advantage of it and manage it
with the right tools for distributed
environments.
Diane Beeler is in Product
Management and Marketing at BMC
Software. http://www.bmc.com
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