Oracle - MS SQL Server and MS Access

[guitarman]

Oracle DBMS is a full blown client server RDBMS which supports multi user environment. With many built in advance technology in data management, Oracle 10g, the latest Oracle product, proves to be one of the top DBMS available today. Unlike Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft Access, Oracle DBMS is able to run on many different platforms including Microsoft and Sun Solaris platform and it is the first commercial RDBMS to become available on Linux in August 1999. The drawback is that with its sophisticate functionality, inappropriate handling of the software can lead to performance degrade in the system.

Microsoft SQL server is another client server RDBMS by Microsoft. The latest stable version to date, Microsoft SQL server 2000, shares similar features to Oracle 10g database. One of the main attractions is that it is relatively cheaper than Oracle 10g database with intuitive graphical user interface.

Unlike the two main RDBMS discussed, Microsoft Access is a desktop database. It is not meant to be used in an environment where heavy multi users are expected. Database size, security enforcement and database failure recovery limit Microsoft Access to be a full fledge RDBMS. Having said that Microsoft Access is not suitable for many applications, it is still a good choice for many small and medium enterprises because of its reasonable cost, supports for Visual Basic for Application in addition to its ability to create a fast prototype and standalone application in a Rapid Application Development.