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Firebird

Score9.8 out of 10

16 Reviews and Ratings

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What is Firebird?

FirebirdSQL is an open-source database which can be embedded.

Categories & Use Cases

Reviews

What users are saying about Firebird.
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A cost effective database management system.

Incentivized
Pauline HarrisView profile
Account Specialist in Finance and Accounting at Northwestern Mutual (5001-10,000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Being able to perform well on standalone servers with higher data volumes with well-written SQL has made us utilize it to allow simultaneous connections seamlessly as this large supports our organization's needs. We use it to perform all staging activities as it can be deployed on Linux-based environments.

Pros

  • Taking back ups is easy.
  • It is an open source and free
  • Fast performance.

Cons

  • Clustering features require alot of attention.
  • Remote access can be quite slow.

Most Important Features

  • Low maintenance
  • Its free
  • Easy to deploy, use and run.

Return on Investment

  • Cost effective saving us from paid relational database.
  • Community support.
  • Efficiency in handling simultaneous connections.

Alternatives Considered

Oracle Big Data SQL Cloud Service and Microsoft SharePoint

Other Software Used

Forescout Platform (CounterACT), Bitwarden, Avanan

Fantastic data management system at low cost.

Incentivized
Jane CareyView profile
Account Executive in Finance and Accounting at Nigel Frank International (1001-5000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use it to deploy on Linux based environment and perform all staging activities on it. It offers low-print relational database systems that suites all kinds of pc applications which is great for us. It is able to handle up to 1TB of data and thus can accommodate our organization's needs and it also supports SQL.

Pros

  • Performance is really fast.
  • It is portable and easy to take back ups.
  • Its open n source and free.

Cons

  • More attention is needed when it comes to high availability and clustering features.
  • No embedded version for android.
  • Remote access can be quite slow

Most Important Features

  • Friendly and powerful SQL language.
  • Zero maintenance.
  • Full text search.

Return on Investment

  • Cost effective as it's free.
  • Effeciency with some speed test availability.
  • Low maintenance has saved us on operational costs.

Alternatives Considered

SQLite

Other Software Used

Bitwarden, Avanan, Storyblok

Classic Database Management System

Incentivized
Muddassar InayatView profile
IT Solutions Consultant in Information Technology at Gulf Commercial Group (501-1000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are using Firebird SQL with ECM Software named M-Files. it really made our life easy because it is easy to manage, take backups, import and export. Not only this but it allows us to perform all of kind of staging activates on it. it also allows us to deploy on the Linux based environments.

Pros

  • Reliable RDMS for the SMB's and we found its performance is really fast.
  • It allows us to store the physical files into the folder location and reference of the document in the database.
  • Easy to take back-ups, and portable.

Cons

  • Need to work on it to save GIS based data.
  • Although it is using third party admin tool but should have it own graphical interface
  • Needs more attention on High availability and Clustering features

Most Important Features

  • Powerful and friendly SQL language
  • logging
  • Full Text Search

Return on Investment

  • Cost Effective Solution
  • Community Support

Alternatives Considered

MySQL

Other Software Used

Azure AI (Cortana), PowerApps, Microsoft SharePoint

FirebirdSQL as free and low maintenance SQL database

Incentivized
Verified User
Employee in Research & Development (10,001+ employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

FirebirdSQL is a nearly zero maintenance, low footprint relational database system suited for all kinds of PC applications, since even an embedded version exists which doesn't require installation - just copy the files. It supports SQL and database sizes > 1 TB are no problem. It is fully Unicode compatible, drivers for various development environments are available either from the vendors of these environments or from 3rd parties and there exists a healthy open source community around it along with documentation.

Pros

  • In a test back when I started to use it it beat MySQL Hands down on some easy speed test.
  • While the included backup functionality of MySQL failed back then (don't remember the details) the one from Firebird did work out of the box and Delphi meanwhile even has easy to use components to use this from a program written in it.

Cons

  • It stores the user accounts in a central database and not in the database the self written application uses, at least up to V2.5.
  • Theres no embedded version for Android as far as I know.
  • Versions prior to V3.0 could always read the older file format versions. That has changed now, which makes upgrading an existing DB harder in some scenarious.

Most Important Features

  • Zero maintenance
  • Easy installation
  • Works stable

Return on Investment

  • Can't really say that, as my application is most of the times given away for free. But if the RDBMS would cost money, giving my app away for free wouldn't have been done I guess.

Other Software Used

SQLite

Usability

Free and Practical

Incentivized
Verified User
Professional in Information Technology (1001-5000 employees employees)

Pros

  • It's free.
  • Open source.
  • No capacity restrictions (at least up to 950GB).
  • It works with low system resources.
  • It is seamless on many platforms. (Windows-Linux-FreeBSD-HpUX-Solaris-MacOS).

Cons

  • Documentation.
  • No GUI tool to view data.
  • Slow via remote access.

Most Important Features

  • Free.
  • Easy.
  • It does not require much maintenance.
  • Install, run and forget.

Return on Investment

  • The return on investment was of course because it freed us from paid relational databases.
  • We have never experienced a negative situation.

Alternatives Considered

PostgreSQL, SQLite, MongoDB and MySQL

Other Software Used

MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite