Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Is database-as-a-service a good idea?

Seen this article by Jean-Jacques Dubray on InfoQ, related to this other article by Arnon Rotem who explains why Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) is a bad idea:

  • It circumvents the whole idea about "Services" - there's no business logic

  • It makes for CRUD resources/services

  • It is exposing internal database structure or data rather than a thought-out contract

  • It encourages bypassing real services and going straight to their data

  • It creates a blob service (the data source)

  • It encourages minuscule half-services (the multiple "interfaces" of said blob) that disregard few of the fallacies of distributed computing

  • It is just client-server in sheep's clothing


To me, DBaaS is just a new way to access a database and it is far from Data Services (which are all about data integration, mapping, persistence & SOA). The most interesting benefits of a DBaaS are to offer a DB that you won't administrate. Conversely, it also raises some questions in terms of scalability and confidentiality.

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