Oracle Corp has ousted Informix Software Inc from a prestigious reseach project working on future technologies to support geographical information systems. Oracle announced last week that it was designating the University of Arkansas CAST Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies as its first center of excellence for spatial technologies, contributing software and technical support worth $1.8m to the project, which has been working in Fayetteville, Arkansas since 1991. CAST, previously an Informix Corp user, will integrate Oracle products, including the Oracle8 Spatial Cartridge for managing geospatial data, into its research curriculum. CAST is working on future generations of technologies needed to underpin geographic information systems and related technologies. We have decided to shift all our database applications and research over from Informix to Oracle, said Fred Limp, director of CAST, a decision he said was based primarily on Oracle’s development of the Spatial Cartridge technology and the way in which they have integrated geospatial data into their object-relational database management system. Support for standards set by the OpenGIS Consortium was also a factor, he said. Oracle recently established a Spatial Research Laboratory of its own at its New England development center in Nashua, New Hampshire, which will be working with CAST. Oracle and CAST are also working on a warehouse of Arkansas geodata in conjunction with federal, state and local government, which it claims will be the first large scale application of its kind, including over 1Tb of data.
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