all the Sybase admins I know hate SQL server because it essentially puts them out of a job

Well.... MS-SQL may be easier to administer, but it is platform-specific, which limits scalability (although admittedly high-end Intel boxes are pretty fast these days), and with the ease of administration comes a reduction in tuning flexibility.

Which of course has nothing whatsoever to do with perl, so I'll shut up now :-)

Michael