Oracle has released an improved version of its
open-source Oracle Berkeley DB Release database, aimed at
developers wanting to embed a transactional storage engine within
their high-performance applications.
The new Oracle Berkeley DB Release 4.5 now supports
multi-version concurrency control, non-stop upgrades for replicated
environments, and a pre-built replication framework to simplify
development of widely available applications.
Rex Wang, Oracle vice-president for embedded systems marketing,
said, “This version adds compelling new features, reduces
complexity and helps developers build and deploy applications
requiring fast, reliable storage without human administration.”
Multi-version concurrency control improves the performance of
highly concurrent, mixed read/write systems by giving each user
their own “snapshot” of the database, and managing concurrent
changes by many users.
Non-stop upgrades allow a replicated Oracle Berkeley DB system
to be upgraded without downtime.
A replication framework provides a pre-built and supported set of
functions for quickly building replicated or widely available
systems, simplifying and accelerating development, said Oracle.
Analyst Forrester estimates the current open source database
market is worth $400m (£216m) a year, which includes support,
services and licenses. The analyst estimates this market will
increase to $1bn by the end of 2008.
Oracle Berkeley DB Release 4.5 is available under a dual
licence. A no-cost open-source licence permits redistribution if
the application using Oracle Berkeley DB is open-source. A
commercial licence is available for redistribution of proprietary
applications.