O'Reilly European Open Source Convention - 17-20 October, 2005

Session
Migrating to Open Source Databases
Jutta Horstmann, TU Berlin

Track: Databases
Date: Wednesday, 19 October 2005
Time: 16:00 - 16:45
Location: Foyer Room
As open source database management systems mature, they are evolving as a target system for database migration. There may be multiple reasons for migrating your current database system, e.g. financial economies, performance, security, building in-house know-how instead of depending on commercial support. Migration may focus on the database server host's operating system (e.g. porting Oracle databases from Windows to Linux servers), on the database management system (e.g. switching from a proprietary to an open system like MySQL or PostgreSQL), on the application that uses some DBMS as its backend--or on all of the aforementioned parts.
Horstmann's talk focuses on DBMS migration scenarios and strategies, specificially:

Evaluating available open source database management systems (Firebird, Ingres, MaxDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL) with regard to "enterprise readiness"
Source system scenarios: Which are the best and worst starting points for a database migration-- which obstacles do you have to be aware of?
Migration strategies: How to migrate successfully and which steps do you have to take?
Horstmann will propose a roadmap, outlining priorities and degrees of difficulty.
He will clarify these theoretical considerations by providing two case studies: the migration of a data warehouse from Oracle/Windows/Microstrategy to MySQL/Mondrian/JPivot/Linux and the migration of a library administration system from Informix/Solaris/D4GL to PostgreSQL/Linux/PHP.