Kevin Closson's Blog: Platforms, Databases and Storage

I haven’t quit blogging, it’s just that I haven’t had a spare moment since joining EMC Data Computing Division back in March. My involvement in the upcoming Apress book about Exadata entitled Expert Oracle Exadata is complete so that is one of the few side-bar efforts that occasionally held me back from blogging. So, I should be able to craft some interesting content soon. I have a huge backlog of material I need to cover.

Now that I’m mentioning that Apress book I realize I still haven’t added Kerry Osborne to my blog roll. That’s a serious oversight. Folks, don’t miss Kerry’s blog!

What Is An Asymmetrical MPP? I Know What I Mean When I Say That. Do You?
After this blogging hiatus is over, I plan to start a blog series to cover an interesting architectural characteristic of data warehouse solutions. No, I’m not going to be the billionth person to regurgitate the phrase “shared-nothing MPP” because it simply doesn’t matter. That’s an argument for academics. Readers of this blog have commercial needs for business solutions—and IT budgets. The topic I’ll be blogging about is MPP symmetry or, more accurately, lack thereof. So I need terminology. In fact it would be nice to coin a term. Unfortunately for me, however, Netezza laid claim to the term Asymmetrical MPP, or ASMPP, for short. The context in which they use the term is not pejorative.

After I blog about MPP asymmetry, or what I refer to as Asymmetrical MPP, the term will be clearly pejorative—but the reasons will have nothing to do with Netezza. I have no intention of mentioning that particular technology at all going forward.

I think I’ll close this little update with a photo of one of the fish I caught during one of my last weekend outings before joining EMC. A photo of a fish is off-topic so I’ll put it under that page and offer a quick link here:

It’s just a fish.