PRESS RELEASE

Raining Data Announces the Developer Release
of its High-Performance TigerLogic XML Data Management Server
on Windows 2000 and Windows XP Platforms

IRVINE, CA. – December 17, 2002 –

Raining Data Corporation (NASDAQ: RDTA), a long-time provider of scaleable, flexible and reliable data management software, today announced availability of the developer release of its TigerLogic™ XML Data Management Server (XDMS) V1.0 on Windows® 2000 and Windows XP platforms. TigerLogic XDMS is a high-performance information infrastructure software that provides both scalability, XA-compliant transactional integrity and fine-grain search capabilities, typically associated with enterprise databases, as well as the dynamic extensibility, n-tier hierarchies and ease of use and deployment, mostly found in data repositories and file systems.

Developers of Java and XML applications can now leverage J2EE Connector Architecture (JCA), World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C’s) XML Schema, XSLT, SOAP and XPath standards to efficiently store and retrieve critical business information and virtually eliminate the need for costly XML to relational data mapping to attain gains in performance and productivity.

“XML is increasingly proliferating and accelerating the deployment of dynamic, Java-based applications in such industries as health care, financial services, telecommunications, and higher education,” said Ronald Schmelzer, senior analyst at ZapThink, LLC. “This new breed of dynamic applications requires greater levels of performance, flexibility and extensibility when it comes to scaleable storage, indexing, and query of XML-enabled information and application metadata,” added Schmelzer.

TigerLogic XDMS bridges the gap between structured and unstructured data and provides up to an order of magnitude gain in performance of XML data access.¹ The product makes it possible for application developers to efficiently implement XML storage and retrieval for customer care, account consolidation, integrated financial research portals, patient claims processing and other enterprise environments.

“The use and adoption of XML continues to grow, fueled by its extensibility, deployment and ROI benefits. Fortune 1000 enterprises and developers of packaged applications increasingly use XML to integrate and Web-enable dynamic access to critical information and business processes,” said Carlton H. Baab, President & CEO of Raining Data Corporation. “TigerLogic XDMS maximizes the extensibility and flexibility of adaptive XML applications and unlocks the full business value of XML in high-performance enterprise environments. XML’s inherent hierarchies with virtually unlimited levels of depth uniquely match TigerLogic’s dynamically-extensible data model for persistence of any XML data,” said Baab.

TigerLogic XDMS compliments Enterprise Application and Information Integration (EAI and EII), RDBMS and application server software to provide a high-performance XML-querieable and extensible mid-tier platform for storage of business information and application meta-data. With TigerLogic XDMS, developers can tap into business intelligence across structured operational data stores (ODS) residing in back-end RDBMS as well as unstructured flat-file text documents, images, email and spreadsheets housed in shared file systems or content repositories.

Dynamically Extensible Pick Universal Data Model (Pick UDM)
TigerLogic XDMS leverages the Company’s time-proven hierarchical and multi-dimensional Pick® database technology to deliver its Pick Universal Data Model (Pick UDM) that has been fine-tuned for XML and Java environments. The software provides an enterprise-grade XA-compliant transactional platform to natively persist, query and manage structured and non-structured data, including XML, office documents, email or graphical content. The dynamic flexibility of its core Pick UDM enables TigerLogic XDMS to effectively process XML documents making the product uniquely extensible to accommodate structural data changes in real-time, with support for virtually unlimited depth of XML hierarchies.

Next-Generation XML Profiling and Indexing for Up To an Order of Magnitude Gain in Performance
TigerLogic XDMS delivers high performance and scalability through its data model, profiling and indexing capabilities. These features have been uniquely architected to deliver query performance that is up to 10+ times faster than most alternative XML database technologies.¹ TigerLogic XDMS intelligent XML profiling and index management dynamically capture and record XML meta-data for documents with or without pre-defined DTD’s or XML schemas. The XML content is profiled and validated to build indexes that leverage the extensibility of the Pick UDM and provide the intelligence for run-time query optimization. This results in unparalleled query performance while retaining a fine level of granularity of XML data search and retrieval features, providing reliability and performance required by high-volume dynamic business applications.

Improvement in Developer Productivity
TigerLogic XDMS improves developer productivity and reduces application development and deployment time by virtually eliminating processor and people-intensive XML to relational or object mapping. The costly overhead of such mapping is required for persistence of XML in most of the alternative products that are based on object or relational data models and, thus, cannot natively store the hierarchical and multi-dimensional structures of XML content. TigerLogic XDMS supports a broad range of standards-based connectivity options, including Java API, HTTP, SOAP and JCA, enabling developers to rapidly learn the TigerLogic XDMS environment and easily integrate with existing applications and platforms to greatly improve productivity and ease of use.

“Our heritage in building enterprise-grade data management systems enables us to deliver TigerLogic XDMS with support for XA-compliant transactions, on-line backup and recovery, scaleable indexing, search and retrieval capabilities and dynamic storage allocation for environments requiring 24x7 operations,” added Baab.

Pricing and Availability
The developer release of Raining Data’s TigerLogic XDMS is currently available for Windows 2000 and Windows XP environments. Product license fee pricing starts at $25,000 per server and varies based on selected configurations. Availability on Solaris, Linux and other platforms is scheduled for 2003.

About TigerLogic XDMS

TigerLogic XDMS is a high-performance information infrastructure software that provides extensible, scaleable and reliable storage and retrieval of critical business data across a variety of structured and unstructured information sources. TigerLogic XDMS’ proven, scaleable and flexible Pick UDM provides uniquely extensible storage, access and management of any XML data and enables structural data changes in real-time, with support for virtually unlimited depth of XML hierarchies. The product’s next-generation XML profiling and intelligent indexing deliver increased performance in query processing. TigerLogic XDMS delivers enterprise-grade reliability, scalability, XA-compliant transactional integrity, on-line backup and recovery and dynamic storage extensibility required for 24x7 operations with virtually unlimited size of data stores. Developers of Java and XML applications can use TigerLogic XDMS to eliminate the management and processing overhead of mapping and reconstructing of XML documents. TigerLogic XDMS supports open standards, including J2EE Connector Architecture (JCA), World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C’s) XML Schema, XSLT, SOAP and XPath specifications.

About Raining Data

Raining Data Corporation (NASDAQ: RDTA), headquartered in Irvine, California, has been providing reliable data management and rapid application deployment solutions for developers of innovative applications for more than two decades. Raining Data's flagship products include: 1) high-performance TigerLogic™ XML Data Management Server (XDMS), which provides flexible, scaleable and extensible storage and retrieval of critical business data across a variety of structured and unstructured information sources, delivering scalability and transactional integrity of enterprise databases as well as dynamic extensibility and ease of use, mostly found in repositories and file systems; 2) D³®, mvEnterprise® and mvBase® family of powerful Pick® based hierarchical multi-dimensional database management systems that are the choice of thousands of application developers worldwide; 3) mvDesigner®, an object-oriented rapid application development (RAD) tool developed for use with multi-dimensional database applications; and 4) Omnis Studio®, a powerful, cross-platform, object-oriented RAD tool that is well suited for developing sophisticated thick-client, Web-client or ultra thin-client database applications.

The Raining Data customer installed base includes more than 500,000 active users, representing over 20,000 unique customer sites worldwide with a significant base of diverse vertical applications. With over 140 employees in four countries, the company has an extensive distribution channel, a global 24x7 customer support and a strong international presence. More information about Raining Data and its products can be found at www.rainingdata.com

¹ Based on internal Raining Data performance benchmarks conducted on IBM xSeries servers running X007-defined query profiles on Windows 2000 Server. TigerLogic XDMS was benchmarked against two other commercially available XML database products: 1) an object DB technology based product and 2) a hierarchical DB technology based product. More information on X007 benchmarks can be found at www.comp.nus.edu.sg/~ebh/XOO7.html.

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Except for the historical facts contained herein, the foregoing release contains forward-looking statements regarding the growth in the use and adoption of XML and the potential market for TigerLogic XDMS. Actual results could differ materially from those expressed in any such forward-looking statements, including but not limited to the ability to penetrate new markets and attract new customers, the market acceptance of the Company’s TigerLogic products and updates, the success of research and development efforts and technical risks related to such products and updates, and other risks and uncertainties. Please consult the various reports and documents filed by Raining Data Corporation with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including but not limited to the Company’s most recent reports on Form 10-KSB and Form 10-QSB for factors potentially affecting the company’s future financial results. All forward-looking statements are made as of the date hereof and the Company disclaims any responsibility to update or revise any forward-looking statement provided in this news release.

Raining Data, Pick, mvDesigner, D³, mvEnterprise, mvBase, Omnis and Omnis Studio are registered trademarks and TigerLogic is a trademark of Raining Data Corporation. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are properties of their respective owners.