In previous papers [SC05, SBC+07], some of us predicted the end
of “one size fits all” as a commercial relational DBMS paradigm.
These papers presented reasons and experimental evidence that
showed that the major RDBMS vendors can be outperformed by
1-2 orders of magnitude by specialized engines in the data
warehouse, stream processing, text, and scientific database
markets.
Assuming that specialized engines dominate these markets over
time, the current relational DBMS code lines will be left with the
business data processing (OLTP) market and hybrid markets
where more than one kind of capability is required. In this paper
we show that current RDBMSs can be beaten by nearly two
orders of magnitude in the OLTP market as well. The
experimental evidence comes from comparing a new OLTP
prototype, H-Store, which we have built at M.I.T., to a popular
RDBMS on the standard transactional benchmark, TPC-C.
We conclude that the current RDBMS code lines, while
attempting to be a “one size fits all” solution, in fact, excel at
nothing. Hence, they are 25 year old legacy code lines that should
be retired in favor of a collection of “from scratch” specialized
engines. The DBMS vendors (and the research community)
should start with a clean sheet of paper and design systems for
tomorrow’s requirements, not continue to push code lines and
architectures designed for yesterday’s needs.