Oracle and technological feasibility

Technological feasibility is a problem resulting from the public at-large’s gross misunderstanding of the capability of modern computers. Back in the 1980's, many people assumed that computers like the HAL-9000, from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, really existed, and it was very difficult for practicing computer scientists to explain the real world limitations of the hardware of the day.

Today, some intelligence sources must process more than four petabytes (1PB = 1000 TB) of data per month, and the bar on what constitutes technological feasibility is constantly being raised. Today, most of the technological limitations are driven by the limitations of the hardware rather than those of the software. In 2010, there are still many limits to our ability to process information:

* Drinking from the garden hose: With today's memory limitations, processing more than two million rows per second is not possible.

* Searching: Even with the fastest supercomputers, complex searching through petabytes of information cannot be done with sub-second response time.

* Storage density: As of 2010, it takes 37 megabytes just to store the DNA genome from a single human being, and it could be a century before we can match the storage density of a mammalian brain.

* Artificial intelligence: Even with the advances in computing power, scientists still cannot replicate the intelligence of a fly's brain.

* Networking: Even with the "dark fiber" high-speed links, real limits exist on the speed at which we can transfer large volumes of information.

Every computer science student is taught that hardware advances always precede advances in software, and Oracle is not an exception. However, Oracle has been far more visionary in the area of emerging technologies than other database vendors, and Oracle is often years ahead of the technology.

One reason that Oracle continues to dominate the database market is their forward-thinking vision, and they recognize that their software must be tested and ready to use as soon as the new hardware technology becomes available.

Follow the link below to discover more about how Oracle is a technology-driven database and how Oracle leverages on emerging technologies to retain their place as the world's most flexible and robust database.

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