What Is Exadata?

Abstract

No doubt you already have a pretty good idea what Exadata is or you wouldn’t be holding this book in your hands. In our view, it is a preconfigured combination of hardware and software that provides a platform for running Oracle Database (version 11g Release 2 as of this writing). Since the Exadata Database Machine includes a storage subsystem, new software has been developed to run at the storage layer. This has allowed the developers to do some things that are just not possible on other platforms. In fact, Exadata really began its life as a storage system. If you talk to people involved in the development of the product, you will commonly hear them refer the storage component as Exadata or SAGE (Storage Appliance for Grid Environments), which was the code name for the project.