In my opinion Oracle/Sybase is best if you want to stay employed long term. They are mostly used by banks and big blue boys. Why would you choose one over the other. Please explain. Keep ideas Rolling. 4th Dimension (4D RDBMS) ADABAS ALLBASE SQL Advantage Database Server Advantage Ingres 2.6 BASIS Birdstep RDM Server CA-IDMS CISAM Cache Centura SQLBase Clipper Cloudscape CodeBase D3 DABroker DB2 DB2 IBM AS/400 UNIX DB2 Linux DB2 OS/390 DB2 Windows DBMaker DL/I DMSII DaffodilDB DataFlex/PowerFlex Datacom Domino ECB EDA Empress RDBMS Enscribe Essentia FireBirdSQL FirstSQL/J Embedded Mobile FirstSQL/J Enterprise Server FormWeb FoxBase FoxPro FrontBase HSQLDB Hypersonic SQL IBM AS/400 IDMS IMS Image/Turboimage ImageSQL Informix Ingres InstantDB InterBase JDBC JDataStore LDAP MS Access MS SQL Server Mimer SQL MySQL News Server Nonstop SQL/MP ODBC OS/390 Sequential Files OleDB-Provider OpenBase OpenIngres Oracle PICK Paradox Pervasive.SQL PointBase PostgreSQL Primebase SQL Database Server Progress Quadcap RDB RMS Recital Redbrick Warehouse SAP DB SAS SESAM/SQL-Server SOLID Embedded Engine SOLID SynchroNet SQL/DS SUPRA Server SQL SearchServer Sequential Solid Server Sybase Teradata RDBMS Text (CSV, Tab separated etc.) ThinkSQL TinySQL TurboIMAGE UNIFY VFP VSAM XML YARD-SQL dBase kdb mSQL xbase
MySQL. Most widespread on webhosts and does it's job great, v5 brought some nice advanced features that were present in other databases such as Oracle and probably missed by some. Besides it's free. MySQL also has paid support if your serious about your data. Other than that, I've never heard of some databases you've listed, where's that list from?
I have only ever used Mysql, Oracle and MS sql. Comparing overall useability, security and efficiency I personally prefer Mysql, especially since its free and open source. Open source is always the best way to go.
Today, only a handfull of databases have a sigificant market share (Oracle, Sqlserver, MySql, PGSql, MSAccess), but their presence depends on what market segment they are. For personal use or groupware, MSaccess has the largest number of licenses installed and sold every year. (Dbase was big 10 years ago, but it is not used much anymore). Sqlserver is probably the second largest and all others are far behind. For departmental databases, SqlServer is the most used DB, even in oracle-oriented companies. For corporate departments in multi-national companies, Oracle remains the leader, followed by Sqlserver (but also Sybase, IBM and several others) For web sites, MySql and Sqlserver are the 2 leaders. PGSql is growing fast. Oracle is present for large corporate web sites, but its price is rather dissuasive for smaller web sites. Now the crystal ball... The subject is highly controversial and you may not like my forecast. IMHO the rising stars are SqlServer and PGSql. (Microsoft has hinted some 10 years ago that they would replace MSAccess by Sqlserver) SqlServer has this unique feature that is it equally suitable for personal use and for large corporate applications. (As far as I know, the largest world DB application is still SqlServer, not Oracle) MySql is broadly used on Linux web servers, but it is marginal elsewhere. It lacks many essential features. I would not bet on it because historically, the missing features have been added several years after the battle. Oracle will surely keep their importance for corporate DB in multinational companies, but they have already become rather marginal for departmental servers (Sqlserver is the most broadly used, PGSql could be a winner if Linux and free software picks-up) There are other considerations to take in account for a career orientation: All DBs in your list have a market niche, and they are likely to keep some market share. If you become an expert in one of them, you can enjoy a situation with very little competition, very similar to a cobol programmer today (yes there is still a demand for cobol programmers)
I have to say MYSQL, nevertheless, if you are planning of building an application to access and maintain millions of records with multiple tables and lots of data, say you are the phone company, then you should consider Enterprise database server options
Mysql is one of the worst databases. It can't even maintain dataintegrity when your server loses power. (look at what happened at wikipedia when they lost power) It also has very poor sql standards support and confusing licensing. It was for a while the only choice if you wanted a free database server but there are better alternatives now such as postgres, firebird, sqlite (all open source) and oracle, ibm and microsoft offer limited free databases.
It is true that big companies are using the Oracle. But for small and medium companies, they are using SQL as Database. I already serve two companies and they are using SQL for their Automated System. I prefer SQL even though I do not have proper courses/study on it. It is easy to research or google on it and easy to implement and to set up. I do not have problem with SQL with my three years on programming. I heard lots of promise on Oracle but for a starter like me on programming and to small and medium companies who needs database I advice using SQL. I would like to learn Oracle too if given a chance to work on it.
My experience of large companies is that even they are split over the use of Oracle. One of our clients (a multinational bank) uses Oracle for data warehousing but MS SQL for transactional systems. With the improvements in SSIS, AS etc I think MS SQLs market share will continue to grow in in the large and corporate arena and SQL Express is already making inroads in the SME space.