Oracle EE is a good thing. A client that can pay for it qualifies as a client that can pay bills. Nevertheless, I'm drawn to OpenACS for it's openness, it's goal of running well on open source solutions.
I think it's a question of resources and it's a matter of practicality.
I would like to see OpenACS resources building an OpenACS 4 that will be best of breed on PostgreSQL or SAP. That's why I suggest looking at seeing what an opensource search engine solution might do for us.
If we put our efforts towards an opensource solution, we at first be taking a step backwards, but soon, we'll be further ahead than the current Intermedia solution. But if we can rely on Intermedia and it's current one keyword at a time search, we may never have the best of breed search solution that can differentiate an OpenACS site from a ColdFusion/Php-nuke/IIS site.
Which is not to say I don't want Intermedia to work with OpenACS using Oracle. Just that I think that Intermedia support should be more a goal more an outcome of the Classic ACS 3.4 project, than a design goal of an OpenACS 4 design.
