Portability principle: The path to vendor-agnostic Data Platforms

The path to vendor-agnostic Data Platforms is a journey towards achieving "portability" in databases, which involves making compute components interchangeable and environment agnostic. However, the database ecosystem has diverged from programming languages in terms of standardization, portability, and vendor lock-in. Historically, databases were designed for organizations with a focus on stability, performance, and long-term support, leading to vendor lock-in. The rise of cloud computing further fragmented the landscape. Currently, achieving portable compute requires using open-source technologies like Postgres or Clickhouse, data lakes, lakehouses, Duck Pond, or multi-engine data stacks. Adding an abstraction layer can serve as a standard, enabling technology agnosticism and reducing vendor lock-in. Decoupling extension usage from core SQL access and adopting semantic data contracts can further reduce risk and break vendor locks, igniting competition and potentially leading to increased inter-operability. The portable data lake is a bridge to the future by creating a framework for vendor-agnostic components.