Thread

1. giancarlostoro · 1790262685 · focus · HN ↗

   I really don't get who keeps using Oracle outside of Java, and how they make their money, must be some legacy contracts or something, but Oracle has always been customer hostile, from all the things I've heard, they sound like a ransomware company (idk if they still do it, but they'd sell you the database, then "audit you" and if you used anything that wasn't in compliance, fine you, until you converted that to Oracle DB too or whatever wild stuff). I just don't get it. I get even less how its execs are okay running what could be a much more successful company so poorly. You can change Oracle for the better and become even more profitable if you change how you do business.

   Take Java as a solid example, they removed JavaFX from the core of Java, which made everyone think JavaFX was dead, recently they started providing enterprise support for JavaFX, which signals its production ready, but, who wants to trust Oracle? I sure don't. I can use C# for free without any of that baggage, and if I get all sorts of stable options for a GUI, and with Avalonia (and Uno?) I can run my GUI on any OS.

   1. robertlagrant · 1790264048 · focus · HN ↗

      It's only relatively recently (in the lifespan of large companies) that OSS alternatives have come along that can do much more of what Oracle can do. Oracle was miraculous for a long time. It was also a huge pain to operate (source: I know people who've operated it), particularly in its RAC configuration, but if you could operate it you could run a bank and rely pretty well on Oracle being rock solid.

      1. giancarlostoro · 1790347459 · focus · HN ↗

         That's fair, I'm not trying to knock on them for their tech, I'm sure some of it is solid, though Java felt like it hit a wall for years (only in like 2023 did it finally start catching up to C#... and remember Kotlin was made specifically because Java was just so... behind on so much).

         1. robertlagrant · 1790425771 · focus · HN ↗

            Oh, agreed. I'm only talking about their database.

            1. giancarlostoro · 1790604661 · focus · HN ↗

               In all fairness, the JVM is insanely optimized, and .NET and the JVM are neck and neck, but language feature wise C# felt nicer to work with. I guess its a blessing in disguise, it allowed C# to gain a lot of usage. :)

               1. robertlagrant · 1790759407 · focus · HN ↗

                  I agree about the JVM. I think the big difference between C# and Java is just that C# has allowed breaking changes, and so has improved various things at the language level. Java hasn't really.

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