Why did I write this? I got challenged by Andy Warren

to write a bit about why I wrote something. I complained to him that he

has some "mechanical" posts on this blog that just mention he wrote

something with some questions, and don't really blog about why he wrote

something. He challenged me to write about why I wrote something, so

here I am.

This was a Database Weekly editorial, which is always tough. I gather news through Friday and then race through one before Saturday. Since I have to shoot a podcast, it's tough to spend a lot of time on this. I used to make notes throughout the week when I was doing every other week, but since I'm on a weekly schedule, it's tough to get to it.

I also used to comment on 3-4 stories, but I found I got less feedback from those, so I went back to a single story or item that I write about.

This week I was really busy, so as I scanned through the DBW items, the new TPC-E benchmark stood out. I didn't think there was a lot to write about until I looked over the list and realized that only SQL Server is represented on this benchmark. Which means that neither Oracle, IBM, or now Sun (MySQL) is making an effort to build a system.

I think Sun wants to play in this space, so I'm speculating that they'll make an attempt soon.