NRA spent £18,000 on armoury software after theft

[Demonic69]

mickey-mouse IT degree.

Degrees in digital cartoons?

Whatever next?

You could probably get in on Open University Adam
http://www.waltdisney.org/blog/walts-honorary-degrees

[Mr_Logic]

But MySQL isn't great either when you need an accessible supported DB that isn't Oracle trying to shaft you...

[HALODIN]

It hasn't worried the Bank of Finland, Wallmart, Citrix, Craigslist, Facebook, PayPal, Zappos, Wikipedia, Ticketmaster or Sony...

[Mr_Logic]

All of whom have easy access to the open source DBA resources required to maintain their estate. Our beloved NRA is a rather different level of organisation.

[HALODIN]

Not sure what you're getting at, Oracle own MySQL and it's a very tried and tested database platform. In order to find a bug in any database platform you normally have to do something quite unusual with it. If you want MySQL support, Oracle offer it:

https://www.mysql.com/support

[Mr_Logic]

MS SQL skills are easier to obtain than MySQL. The DB tools for MS SQL are also easier to use if you have no DB skills at all.

For a smooth DB with little maintenance, MS SQL is a better product. However, if you have a rich vein of MySQL skills, because, say you're a big company with scale-out load that can maximise the return on the relatively expensive skill set of the open source DBA, then MySQL makes a lot more sense.

For the NRA, the investment in a Microsoft product would make sense. Of course they could go in a different direction, but having used both for many years, that would be my choice, assuming a relatively IT-illiterate organisation. And I think that's fair, based on all their electronic presence...!

[HALODIN]

The point is neither SQL Server or MySQL need very much, if any maintenance, they're both solid and for a piddly little system, MySQL would be the obvious choice. No that's not true, MySQL is trivial to use. If you don't have database skills you shouldn't be anywhere near either of them anyway.

I've been using SQL Server in anger for 18 years, Oracle and Informix for about 16 years and MySQL for about 8 years, the cheaper (free) bullet proof MySQL platform would have produced better value for money, both for the NRA and their membership. Think how many maintenance free forums are out there, chugging away quite happily over MySQL. Does this forum have a DBA? No...

[HALODIN]

At a casual glance there seems to be lots of FREE asset tracking MySQL solutions out there...

http://www.gfisk.com/it-asset-managemen ... -download/

[ovenpaa]

My concern is just how is GBP18k worth of software going to prevent the physical loss of firearms or parts thereof? I cannot recall any reference to a break in during the run up to the loss of the parts that provoked this case.

The software is going to be a database, the sort of thing RFD's were told to implement last year and then given a reprieve from at the last moment. We use a software based system here however it is not a swipe in/out electronic tag system and it cannot cater for one of us placing a rifle in a wrong cabinet or miscounting the number of rounds delivered.

[Mr_Logic]

Halodin, you and I will have to agree to differ on this, because I've seen the pitfalls of MySQL first hand if it is not maintained and it is far more painful than MS SQL. Yes, it's free to install, yay! But that doesn't make it free. And free asset software? Great! that's definitely the right solution for a commercial environment !

Let's leave it there, we won't agree.