IBM will release its latest version of its DB2 database
software, DB2 version 8.2, on 17 September.
Codenamed "Stinger", it is aimed at users of Linux and Unix.
With prices beginning at $25,000 (£13,900) for DB2 enterprise
edition, IBM hopes to take market share from Oracle, the database
market leader.
"The general availability of DB2 Universal Database redefines
the role of database administration," said IBM.
"The software delivers breakthrough autonomic computing
capabilities that allow organisations to complete complex jobs up
to seven times faster than before while also reducing the time
spent on administrative tasks by up to 65%," the company
claimed.
Autonomic computing is the technology that is building
self-managing IT infrastructures - hardware and software that can
configure, heal, optimise and protect itself.
By taking care of many of the increasingly complex management
requirements of IT systems, autonomic computing allows human and
physical resources to concentrate on actual business issues, IBM
said, citing as an example how, by utilising the latest version of
DB2, ScotDB - a leading database design and administration firm -
is apparently now able to deliver a database product that manages
itself 90% of the time.
"This represents a decisive advantage for ScottDB's smaller
customers who typically have limited background in database
administration and little or no technical support staff," IBM
noted.
DB2 is optimised for the rapidly growing clustered server
market, IBM said, and offers unmatched levels of fully automated
high- availability, disaster recovery and client reroute for
clustered environments, "providing a solution that can be installed
in half the time and is one quarter the cost of the Linux HA
cluster solutions of other suppliers".
Written by
LinuxWorld staff