I'm deeply glad MS is contributing not controlling, given the declining state of MSSQL. Maybe it'll motivate them to pull their socks up over their own flagship product.
what is declining in MSSQL? last 3 years were an absolute gamechanger for my use cases: dockerized linux option for linux testing, very helpful columnstore improvements, the HA story is quite impressive, in fact there are only two major drawbacks that i can tell: no command line tool like pg_dump and the awe-inspiring price of the license (though i hear still less than oracle).
There's plenty more low grade shit in what was once a goof product.
I haven't used the features you discuss but then I need basic functionality to work. I've run into stupid performance bugs with trivial CTEs, and I found a link showing a CTE error which I could duplicate (pgres got it right, mssql didn't). Can't find link, sorry.
The cost, god the cost has got so much higher. I love SQL Server but am being forced off it, especially as you need enterprise to do queryable replicas etc.
In general I don't think $enterprise hearting open source is a good thing in the long run. Even if there are accidental benefits, the incentives are just not aligned.
I also find Microsoft to be one of the most evil, invasive and user hostile tech company out there despite their recent PR deluge. My opinion is pretty much set in stone at this point but I welcome anyone to cheerlead them if they so wish.
Would love to hear more regarding Microsoft evil, invasive and user hostile.
I've certainly consumed the last ~5 year PR propaganda, and am not aware of the bad stuff?
I fail to see how Windows is not the epitome of user abuse, granted I only occasionally have to use it nowadays so might be off. For starters migrating users to Windows 10 via dark UIs and even forced upgrades. Generally abusing the update channel and forcing updates users be damned. Enabling and re-enabling telemetry. Adding and re-adding Microsoft services people did not ask for. Ads in the Windows start menu.
Intercepting installation of Firefox/Chrome.
I find it quite a mental leap to go from "Microsoft improved connection scalability in Postgres" to "Microsoft is going to extinguish Postgres, arguably the most popular open-source database in existence".
Times have changed, economic incentives have not. Linux, Postgres, et al will survive but have no doubt that Microsoft will try to extinguish them.
EEE is not some discredited strategy from Gates era Microsoft that magically vanished with a few executive changes, it is a fundamental defense mechanism of umbrella enterprises driven largely by a bunch of little decisions by self interested actors at all levels of the hierarchy. Gates' Microsoft helped give it a name with a catchy alliteration, but Nadella's Microsoft will define what that phrase means in the cloud era.
This is an awesome thing. Would love to see more and more open source contributions from Microsoft.