python + sapdb = (-:

[Sandy Norton]

Hi folks,

First a bit of context: during the .com era my company (then a wee
startup) had to cough up extremely high licensing fees to one of the
database vendors (which will remain unnamed). Even though their
product 'worked', it did so with quite a bit of effort and complexity,
requiring a lot of maintenance and tuning, and we never ended up using
the 'advanced features' because that entailed additional expenditure.
In the end, the total licensing fees eventually outstripped our
hardware costs, and the experience left us feeling a little bit
violated.

<forward to the present...>

In the search for 'enterprise level' alternatives, I eventually came
upon SAPDB, an 'enterprise level' database open-sourced by German
software company SAP. The reasons why they open-sourced it are
actually an interesting read [see http://www.sapdb.org].

This is what I have to report so far: installation is a breeze, Python
support is superb (python15 to python23!), the documentation is
extensive, and the supporting database management software is
excellent. There are numerous fee-based support options which we are
happy to pay. And best of all, NO LICENSING FEES!

All in all, it's the best database software experience I've had so
far...

Viva open-source software!

regards,

Sandy

PS: I am not affiliated in any way to SAP!