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MySQL A Threat To The Big Database Vendors?
geekinexile writes: "Bloomberg is running a story on the growth of MySQL as an alternative to the big commercial database systems." The story mentions PostgreSQL as well, and presents a generally positive view of both.
Linux + Apache + MySQL + PHP
It's the ultimate Free Software combo... and it powers StumbleUpon just fine, thank you!
augment your senses: http://sensebridge.net/
sourceforge just bailed on opensource databases and ill bet ya all bloomberg's money that story came out of an oracle or sql server db.
mysql/postgres have their place, but oracle is not running scared just yet.
four-oh-four
PostgreSQL is a serious competitor, but MySQL is not. Everytime someone slobbers off about how MySQL is the greatest thing since sliced bread, what they really are doing is yelling "I AM IGNORANT! I AM A FOLLOWER!". I'm not kidding. The basic database functionality missing from MySQL (though always "coming soon") absolutely KILL it in any credible comparison.
This is a dumb article, because what they're really saying is "These morons could have gotten by with Windows 95 and the ODBC dBase IV driver as their, err, relational database driver, so they used that instead of Oracle".
1.4.3.1 Using the MySQL Software Under a Commercial License
(snip)
When you link a program with code from the MySQL software or from GPL
released clients and don't want the resulting product to be GPL, maybe because
you want to build a commercial product or keep the added non-GPL code closed
source for other reasons. When purchasing commercial licenses, you are not
using the MySQL software under GPL even though it's the same code.
-----
This means you can't use libmysql in your closed source code.
If you have a need for the scalability, reliability, high-availability in Oracle (or similar), then MySQL isn't even a consideration.
Maybe someday. But not today.
---
Information wants...you to shut your pie hole.
``We've spoken with other agencies about our open-source projects,'' she said. ``People first get interested after hearing about the budget savings.''
MapStats hasn't crashed since it was created, she said.
not bad for a low end peace of fluff.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
"MySQL: The Communist Threat."
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
As the report says, it will take couple of more years before the database vendors will be fearful of MySQL or PostgreSQL.
MySQL, in particular, is missing quite a bit of essential functionality like views and stored procedures that - this is the key - makes it more difficult for other applications to use it as one of the data sources. A lot of enterprise products supports one or more of these expensive databases, and unless those enterprise software are changed to use PostgreSQL or MySQL as the database for it, the big db companies will still have years of guaranteed revenue.
They may be able to take away some of the lower end market, but until the time when likes of SAP and OpenText supports MySQL and PostgreSQL as well as Oracle and DB2, I don't think the db companies will seriously be challenged.
I love MySQL, love the speed, the accessibility, the ease of deployment and its suitability for small and medium-sized projects. I'm an advocate.
... Nope. ASP and SQL Server. I cried my way to the bank.
...
But -- it can be a tough sell to the big fish.
I was hired by a Fortune 500 financial services and real estate company to do an internal project that really was not challenging development. Essentially, the requirements boiled down to a very hobbled version of Slashcode. I bid the project at X dollars, spec-ing PHP and MySQL, figuring that I was going a bit high for the actual hours involved and that I would make a nice roll of dough if they accepted. But I still knew that given the sheer size of the company, that my bid would be considered a bargain, if not a lowball.
What threw it? MySQL and PHP. What are they? (WHAT ARE THEY?!?!?!) Well, we're going to have to get through Standards and Compliance, issue an exception, and well, we'll see, we just don't know. Okay, said I, I'll do it for four times the cost and implement it entirely from scratch using ASP and SQL Server.
Great! Sold. Damn. And you have to understand I really TRIED. I wrote two papers, directed them to a bunch of links
I believe inroads will continue to be made for open source. I have faith. But I think there's still some time and a lot of tireless advocacy to come
A few months ago, ESR gave a talk at the local computing department and told us that Big Unix died because it was closed source. When asked how he explained Microsoft's 20 years of success, he replied "Really good advertising?".
The same explains why MySQL is popular -- if you have good enough advertising, it doesn't matter what sort of crap you put out or how many better alternatives there are.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
Now I know everyone's going to jump down my throat with "Hey, that's going to be in 4.x.y" blah blah... these things have been in use since the stone ages, too little too late and the support still isn't on par with Sybase, MsSQL, Oracle, etc..
scott
We tested porting our company's software to Linux and MySQL.... we kept the Linux port but we couldn't use MySQL because our application does a lot of reading and writing, and from what I understand vanilla MySQL does not support transactions but instead locks the entire table. I think there are some mods to MySQL that support transactions but without it fully supporting transactions I just don't think that major companies will ever move to it. It is perfect for Web sites where the ratio between reading and writing is heavily skewed towards reading, but for applications that need to do both, I don't think MySQL is an option... yet. Some people in the company, however, swear by MySQL and say it is heads-and-tails faster than all the "enterprise" dbs like Oracle. Certainly it is not a resource hog like Oracle.
I personally would like to see 3 kinds of database engines that allow one to scale the gammut with little or no application rewrites along the way to fit the different syntax and conventions.
1. Small, lite-duty engine mostly for embedded or small-footprint apps. Subset of lanugage of #2.
2. Full language, but lacking performance tuning. Mostly for development and smaller shops.
3. "Big-iron" version that has full language and performance tuning features.
I realize that one can use Postgre if they out-grow mySQL, but it is a different language and conventions. You have to rewrite some of your application software.
I am afraid that as mySQL becomes more popular, it will become a "feature beast". I would rather see a split between #2 and #3 rather then live with a feature beast.
Table-ized A.I.
The dirty secret of big databases is that most people don't know how to program them, how to configure them, and don't need most of the features. And even if they get everything right, they still end up with a very costly and complex solution, a solution that likely doesn't perform very well and needs a special DBA to keep it all running. That's why MySQL is successful.
They are two different products with two different uses.
MySql came along and took away the appeal of using text files as data stores for web applications and such - it gave perl scripters a simple, easy-to-understand database that works pretty darn well.
MySQL is a great product, but only for the things it does well. If you try to make it do things that it can't, of course you're gonna get burned.
If you actually *like* databases, you'll probably like PostGres better anyway - don't bother with MySql.
MySql has found its niche. Linux, Apache, Perl/PHP and MySQL are powering thousands of websites right now. I have a few myself and they work well - There is absolutely no need for me to change the database - it just works.
I wouldn't want American Express to start using it today though - they actually *need* the features that Oracle offers.
Not all databases need the kind of bomb-proofing that you can do with Oracle - some applications just need to be able to pull data quickly from simple tables.
The thing that I don't understand though, is why MySql has so much more popular appeal than PostGres - It seemed that one day, everybody just seemed to be using it. Why was that?
Cheers,
Jim
-- My Weblog.
Yahoo is using it for exactly what it's good at: Running websites. Why does it worry you they run their fintantial site? I cam't imagine why that needs something high end. Data comes in one way and gets read many times and that's the sort of use MySQL's raw speed will blow both postgres and oarcle away at.
If it was on something that needed replication, or writes were the common case I could see a problem. But I doubt either is true in this case. Instead it looks like it's being used for an application tht it will handle well.
Yahoo is only being smart; the high end databases
comsume a lot of resources and shouldn't be used where they aren't needed. It would be foolish to run the entire company on a single vendor's software.
...most people don't need Oracle.
Oracle has been used for a lot of projects where it doesn't really need to be used, usually because the company already had a licence, but sometimes because the project was way over-spec'd.
Don't get me wrong, MySQL doesn't even come close to challenging the benefits of Oracle or DB2 in replication, scalability and so on. However, in applications where you don't need them, MySQL is perfect, especially because it requires no monetary investment. (It requires other kinds of investment, of course, but everything does.)
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
I work for Conectiva (Brazil), involved in a project where a minor telecom company is replacing most of their Ora*le databases to PostgreSQL. Mostly due to cost reduction (should be for a more noble cause, but...)
Note, this is the first step of a big project involving migration to free plataforms everywhere it is possible inside the company.
IMHO it's a good idea, but they must keep in mind that there already are some limitations that I'm sure it'll be solved ASAP. Of course that a little of investment in the FreeSoftware/OpenSource comunity will help a lot too, but this is subject for another project ;o)
-=-=-=-=
I know life isn't fair, but why can't it ever be un-fair in MY favor!?
The best part is that mysql is integrated well with other free technologies like php and perl, which have been gaining a lot of acceptance. So when you turn to an open-source web solution you're freed from the need (hey, that-- oh you know) to run expensive oracle or sybase (or DB2, I guess I should be fair) RDBMSes. This is especially easy because websites tend to be redundant these days, so they're pretty robust by default.
Anyway, the plan is to add stored procedures and triggers in mysql 5.0. It already does replication, which one expects to improve. It's one-way now. Once these things happen, mysql will just need to undergo some serious testing and possibly some serious bugfixing to ensure stability even under really terrible conditions, and maybe provide a better management GUI, and bango! The big guys will be running scared. At that point, mysql will be able to take over all but the largest installations.
So go mysql! We're counting on you. Oracle costs too much.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
It's sad how all criticisms of MySQL on slashdot are consistently modded down. Although MySQL is a fine product with a lot going for it - there is plenty to be *legitimately* critical about.
Is it that the MySQL supporters on slashdot are only familar with application programming interfaces to relational databases - and so don't understand the differences between a modern relational database and MySQL? Or are they simply pushing the product that they are most familiar with?
I've been involved in purchases of millions of dollars in relational database software over the last sixteen years; been a DBA on Oracle, Informix, and DB2; and developed on those as well as Sybase, SQL Server, Adabas (SAP-DB), Dbase IV, and Access. And I can say that there are plenty of traditional IT applications that I would try Postgresql out on - just about everything in the OLTP arena that doesn't require massive scalability. And unfortunately, there are far fewer traditional IT database applications that I would recommend MySQL for - it simply lacks too many features that are already available in postgresql, and that in the RealWorld(tm) save your bacon.
Ok, you can mod me down now.
(* Having said that, I think that is absolutely ludicrous. PostgreSQL is a serious database system, but, regardless of future potential, mySQL is not. Reading about it running the Yahoo Financial site says more about the quality of the Yahoo Financial site than it does about the quality to the mySQL DBMS. *)
You don't even know what their requirements are! Don't bash something until you see the requirements and environment it will be in. mySQL tends to favor read-intensive activities but is a little weak on write-intensive and transaction stuff.
Perhaps their needs are mostly reading. Maybe some other system dumps the data into mySQL once every midnight, and people query on it all day with little writing.
The point is that you are prematurely dismissing something without looking into specifics.
It is rarely X is always bad and Y is always good. Things have various strong points and weakpoints.
You are acting like a PHB.
Table-ized A.I.
You need to pick a database that suits your needs. For some people MySQL is all that they will ever need. For others, referential integrity, transactions, stored procedures and triggers are a requirement not an option.
I've seen instances where an app was done in Oracle when it should've been done in something like FoxPro v2.6 for DOS, and I've seen apps done in M$ Access97 that should've been done in PostGres/Oracle/Sybase/SQL Server.
Each has its place and should be chosen to fit a business model. Picking a database just because it has the most features is not always the correct solution. Picking a database because it has the least initial cost is also not always the correct solution.
Sure, MySQL is simple. Sure it doesn't do everything Oracle can do. But there are a huge number of small businesses, Churches, scools, etc which don't have huge budgets, have to work with a very limited IT department (In some cases volunteer labor) and need some sort of database capability. Used to be DBase III (And I've seen some HUGE apps implemented in DBASE.) MySQL provides the right combination of features, stability and price to compete really well in that arena.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Next in Slashdot:
Linux: A Threat To The Big Operating Systems Vendors ?
and
Apache: A Threat to Commercial HTTP servers ?
I wish TPC www.tpc.org would do some MySQL tests and show just how it really perfoms when compared, to DB2, Oracle, and MS SQL Server.
.NET crap is doing this. Imagine XML results sets with heirachy. Tree based joins may also be in the works with this kind of power.
Why can we not put an end to this debate. I wish slashdot would just refuse to repost this crap that people keep saying to see their words be pubilshed.
It is simple, MySQL is a simple db system well suited to web-sites and application where it doesn't really fucking matter. Suppose if slashdot lost a couple of days worth of stories. Is the world going to end, NO, people will be, well whatever that feeling is when you loose data, but life will go on.
If I lost 5 minutes worth of production data, I'd probably have to find another job. People would not get their orders, we might loose a client. If I worked for the NASDAQ, it might mean real $ figures.
People who work in these high stress database positions understand the debate, and probably won't even post anything beause they are tired of it. I know I am. Learn Oracle, or SQL Server and MySQL postgres and then post your ideas, just don't learn MySQL.
Now that is not to say there is no hope for open systems, I sure hope there is because Oracle is expensive, and I hate most big companies. There is a large list of things that Postgres and MySQL have to do. Here are the big ones.
Log based transactions.
Whenever something happens to the data, the change is stored in another file, along with the data file. This way transactions can be rolled back or restored from transaction log backups without a need to restore the whole database. Get a copy of the datbase backup from a certain time and restore every transaction log backup after that and your back to your last transaction log backup. It also helps to replicate a database, and makes true "live" backups possible while a system is live without a huge performance impact, because the transaction log is also backed up, but at the last second, so when you restore the db, you also restore that log backup that was made at the last second while the database was locked.
One data file for multiple tables.
Having a seperate file for each table is like using dbase or paradox. Hell even Access has one file folks. It is needed for mysql and postgres to manage their own "file system within a file".
I think Postgres is going to do this soon according to some of the discussions.
Complete SQL-92 support.
for all the bitching we do about not supporting standards, MySQL seems to think it is all right to say, "oh they'll make it slower". Give me a break.
Locking, Locking, Locking.
This is imperitive for true transaction support. It is also complicated, deadlocks are no fun. But we must be able to do db, table, row, and key locking. This way you can lock down a row for editing, and not allow anything else to mess with it until your current transaction is done. The classic example is the checking to saving account transfer by two people at the same. MySQL and postgres are not as good of Multiuser system as the big boys. Right now postges sends a message to the application saying, this is locked retry transaction, this is just not up to real enterprise levels.
XML support.
This is a new one, but one that is going to rock the DB world. The crappy thing about current tech is that all record sets are 2 dimensional. But if you've ever done more than 3 or 4 one to many joins this can be a big bitch to scroll through. It also replicates data in the result set leading to more memory consumption, network bandwith, etc. MS SQL as part of the whole
Stop saying we will take over Oracle, and take the steps needed to make it a reality.
I've just recently gotten into Oracle out of necessity. It is very very reminiscent of my Novell days.
They are too focused on their appserver and various "microsoft replacement" apps. Documentation is awkward when it exists, and even the smallest things result in a support call to find out about a bug or workaround. It takes even the resident guru days to do what would take a morning for me on a BSD/Apache/PHP box.
The point? It's not that "Oracle is crap". That's clearly not the case. They're just so busy making the database do *everything* that they're going to look up and find out that people are using open source databases instead of Oracle. By then it may be too late. It won't happen overnight....remember that there are plenty of Novell boxes still humming.
It's Oracle's arrogance about the up-and-coming databases that make it a statistical goliath.
The brief history of software is littered with companies that were once of the same mentality as Oracle. They need to stop trying to be the end-all software co. and write some documentation.
I've been using it for quite some time, and I love it since it's nice and easy to use and very fast.
But if you think that it will replace a company like Oracle, you're way off. MySQL is cool, but it can't handle nearly what Oracle or even DB2 can.
Those bigger DB's run the biggest stuff for a reason. There's no way that MySQL (as it is today) could handle the loads that they do. It may happen in the future, but that's a ways off. There is no current threat at all to the big guys.
Sure not everyone that uses the bigger DB's needs their full potential, so some could switch to MySQL. But the biggest databases will stay with the commercial vendors.
But the GPL license isn't a problem, since you can buy commercial licenses for MySQL so that it can be distributed with non-free software. So that's a non-issue.
This is left as an exercise for the reader.
I've been using mysql for four years, and I've recently began migrating to Postgresql. I've found Posgtgresql to have all of the features that I've wished MySql had, and they don't feel "tacked on" like InnoDB and Berkeley DB support do in MySql. I would highly reccomend Postgresql over MySql for any serious application due to its native support for transactions and sub-selects. It also has wonderful features like views and stored procedures that are still in the planning phase for MySql.
Seeing as how both are free, the only winning factor for MySql at this point seems to be speed. If you're planning on using a system that doesn't have to deal with the possibility of simultanous writes to a particular table then MySql probably makes more since due to it's superiour speed; however, if you're handling a high number of concurrent writes then Postgresql is the way to go due to it's improved reliability and ACID compliance. MySql only supports table-level locking by default, which seems silly for any application where a lot of inserts are happening at the same time. I know that there are 3rd party libraries which provide a solution for this, but I'd rather use a database where these features have been planned for from the beginning.
MySql is catching up in the areas in which it's lacking, but it's still going to be a bit longer before it has a comparable feature set to some of the more industrial strength databases. On the upside, I'm glad to see free software solutions in the database market making their mark because the acceptance of these technologies will only further Linux's success in the long run.
A musician without the RIAA, is like a fish without a bicycle.
MySQL Max binaries support InnoDB, which uses row-level locking. It can also be compiled from source with InnoDB.
/. uses InnoDB.
Also, IIRC,
Simon
Are you spreading mysql-supporting FUD ?
Here is how to install PostgreSQL on Windows:
http://www.ca.postgresql.org/docs/faq-mswin.htm
A free program doing certain tasks better than high priced commericial programs? This should be illegal here in the USA, don't be surprised to see corporate execs begging Congress to ban this kind of thing!
C:\>
Whether MySQL or Postgres, I don't care as long as open source ends up being a platform for databases. Microsoft can try to portray Linux as a niche webserver platform now, but with a solid foothold as a database platform, open software, as a platform, will be substantially harder to dislodge.
--LinuxParanoid
Okay, I just have a real simple question:
Let's say that Database package A is made by a huge corp and package B is like MySQL, free, open source, etc.. Now, let's say that functionally they're similar and that any given company could use one or the other without aching too much.
If there is a bug in package A, the corp would have monetary incentive + engineers to fix it. (This is hypothetical, so spare me real world scenarios...) If there's a bug in package B, what exactly is the incentive to get it fixed in a timely manner?
Just to be clear, I am not criticizing free software. I'm genuinely curious because I'm not fully educated on the topic.
This is an important question because larger companies are willing to pay the money for the 'package A' scenario, but only because they have a sense that spending th1e money put into it means problems are quickly correctable. (I know, reality is a different story, don't beat me up for that point.) With package B, if something's missing, they don't have much alternative other than to go ahead and use package A. Package B is free, but if they already adopted it there's time/money/effort already invested. This could prove embarrasing. It seems like it'd be hard for a company with enough money to buy and support package A would ever be interested in package B. So how does one go about convincing them?
I'd really like to understand that aspect of Open Source before I recommend MySQL or something like that to my boss.
"Derp de derp."
What about clusters with distributed data? No shared storage. What software does this?
That *is* a key problem in open source. The project developers develop features around their own key interests first. One could fairly argue that you ought to just code the features in question that you feel are missing from the product, but that's hardly a possibility for most of us because of the time and skill needed to modify something as complex as a RDBMS like MySQL.
That said, you really don't need to sell your boss on what a given open source will be. You only need to concentrate on what's there right now and the ROI tradeoffs involved in procuring such a product over the traditionally favored commercial product (be it Oracle, SQL Server, whatever). At the end of the process, you may find yourself choosing the commercial product anyway. It happens.
As the article said, not everyone needs aircraft carriers. Most of us get by just fine with a frigate. Choose the right tools for your environment. Like it or not, those factors may include political factors which force you to steer clear of open source.
Please mod this post only if you think others should/n't read this. I have enough ego^H^H^Hkarma. Thanks!
...for the applications that don't require those things.
(Why drive a truck when a bicycle would do?)
Oracle is great, don't get me wrong, but I have seen applications spec'd with Oracle maany times when the developers weren't using those things at all. Very often, this is being done with your tax money too.
Too many people think that a kickass databse is somehow going to make their crappy schema into a good one.
Of course, the whole key is to start with a good design and know the limits of your tools. If you do that, both MySql and Oracle can happily co-exist.
Cheers,
Jim
-- My Weblog.
I have to agree with this, there are certainly many applications that require the name, stability, and configurability of one of the big providers. However, I have noticed a pretty distrubing trend, distrubing to me as a software analyst anyway, the firm I work with purchases loans as an investment, it buys a few hundered loans a year. They originally used a spreadsheet to track payments, balances, and other info about the loans. As this became unmanagable, it was decided that a database would be needed, they bought a new system and put oracle on it. By the time hardware, software, and the consultants were paid, the bill was quite large, all to track about 1500 loans! Say what you will about Access, but this was about the perfect application for it. MySQL or PostgreSQL would have worked, but no one there knew how to manage it. There are people who could be taught how to create and manage access, especially for something this small.
I also am beginning to believe that these sorts of applications of enterprise databases, for something like this, I would guess that most managmets would be quite receptive to a no liceses cost alterative to Oracle. This is starting to give me the hebejebes about investing in enterprise database companies.
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
Data comes in one way and gets read many times and that's the sort of use MySQL's raw speed will blow both postgres and oarcle away at.
I disagree, every test I've ever done or read in the last 3 years, postgres is as fast or faster than MySQL (using reasonable sized data not "100 test records"). Do you have a link to a benchmark on recent versions of each (without magic 3rd party patches)?
Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.
Edward Everett (1794 - 1865)
It's important that MySQL and other similar open source is free of charge, as it reduces the price of web hosting, as you can get a server for a good cost and everything that runs on top of it is now open sourced. Dramatically bringing down the price of smaller upstarts to host on the web.
Addressing the typical slashdot negativity when MySQL is mentioned...
MySQL, w/ InnoDB tables (binaried as MySQL-Max) supports transactions with row-level locking and multi-versioning. It also supports foreign key constraints to some degree (on delete cascade, IIRC).
MySQL w/ InnoDB is extremely fast, and this isn't just on SELECTs. UPDATE/INSERTs are much faster than in MyISAM tables. Looking back, the turning point where MySQL went from a good database to a great database is when it picked up InnoDB, IMO.
No, MySQL does not yet support stored procedures, subselects, or views. These are coming in 4.1, along with built-in hot backup support. Plus better replication. 4.0 is available now and seemingly stablizing. The biggest buzz is how thrilled people are with the query cache. At the current pace of development I imagine the above mentioned features will appear and stabilize in version 4.1 within 2 years.
Is MySQL an Oracle replacement in all circumstances? Absolutely not, but very often Oracle is wholly unnecessary for many of the tasks it's purchased for. We're currently running MySQL + InnoDB on a 36GB dataset at a load of ~500 queries/sec average against a 3 month period. Approxiamtely 30% of queries are data modifications. This is obviously not an impressive system to many of you, but I'm fairly pleased with it, especially considering that "professionals" have been telling us abandon this toy database for years. Personally, I'm glad we saved the down payment on Ellison's next yacht.
Is MySQL a PostgreSQL replacement? Probably not. There are back and forths about speed and features--PostgreSQL does support more of the features listed above--but I find MySQL to be easier to use and better supported, and the benefits to me of switching are not very apparant. Your mileage may vary. It's not the end of the world to enforce some business logic in the application layer, and it has its own benefits.
MySQL continues to impress us and the support we receive is outstanding. And that was before we even decided to purchase a yearly support contract. I have nothing but praises to sing about MySQL, and I think it can only get better.
Oh and it's free and open source. *shrug*
MySQL is basically a database as powerful as Access and others with no performance hit whatsoever. It's not that MySQL is an amazing feat of programming (a good one, but not an amazing one) but it shows what a simple database can do when performance is key. Consider /. which is run on MySQL. A personal database powers one of the best sites on the web, bar none...
Agreed. I use MySQL in a few different production environments, and it works great -- speed is good (even on old, old hardware) and the flexibility is excellent (different formats on a per-table basis). However, I find the SQL implementation somewhat lacking.
UNION support is a little late -- why did it take until 4.0.0 to implement? Furthermore, the lack of subselects makes everyday activities such as multi-table UPDATEs a little arcane. (Read the "it can't be done this way" comments on the bottom to see what I mean. AFAIK the only solution is to create a new table, do an INSERT
MySQL also lacks triggers and views -- views are kind of handy, but if given subselects, can usually be done without. Triggers, though, give one a way to enforce logic (say, relational integrity), which would be very nice to have.
Oh well. I really would like to have my cake, but I guess I'll settle for eating it...
I would suggest the reason is that for consultants who are recommending a custom solution the terms of the GPL are not onerous. The GPL unlike other licenses does NOT require one to give source changes back to the original developer. You just have to give the source code including your source changes to the customer licensed under the GPL.
In theory the customer can then take your changes and distribute them for free under the GPL. But why would the customer do this if your solution is giving the customer a competitive advantage?
I would conjecture that databases are an almost ideal situation for the GPL to not affect consultants. The customer will not be worried because in all likelihood they aren't going to be distributing the customized database outside the company, so they don't have to reveal the code you gave to them under the GPL. You don't have to be worried because even though you licensed your code under the GPL, the customer has no incentive to publicize it.
Boy it seems not a couple weeks ago we were discussing something along these lines here on SlashDot. I think I've said everything I need to say on the lacking features of MySQL, so maybe I'll chat about something else.
:)
I think everyone 'knows' of an Oracle-dependant piece of software in your shop (or school, or website, etc.) which really doesn't 'need' Oracle. We look at apps with 100 users and say - "Heck! Even flat-files would be fine for this app!". Those sorts of Oracle installs are certainly feeling the IT budget crunch. No longer can management write $80K checks to Oracle each year for support and product upgrades. They're looking for a way out and I think some of the smaller more niche products (Sybase ASE, PostgreSQL, MySQL, etc.) need to be ready to step in and take them (so listen up MySQL developers and zealots!).
When we discussed this before I brought up what I thought were valid complaints (no hot backups, no binary dumps, EXPLAIN output is cryptic and could be cleaner, replication is still a little immature, etc. etc.). Regardless, some 'rebuttals' I received were the Open Source Party Line - e.g. 'Why don't you code it yourself?' or 'There's a workaround for that.' That is certainly not a healthy attitude to tell potential customers of your product. These guys dropping $100K on a RDBMS and are feeling the pain would love to pay MySQL support contracts, however if you have the attitude that somehow the end-user, who would like to actually pay you money for your product, needs to keep their mouth shut and gratefully take what you charitably give out you're not going to retain them as a customer. Like it or not, they are used to getting what they pay for. And if you're really focused on getting more Enterprise-ish people to use it then you'd best start acting like it.
Give them what they want, treat them like CLIENTS (e.g. deserving of some respect) and not simply another l33t hax0r ("Code it yourself, n00b!") and they'll beat a path to your door.
Thanks,
--
Matt
In our corporation we used Oracle with good success for many years. We switched to Postgres for many reasons and have found great success with it. It is very stable, excellent documentation available and is much more straight forward to administer. No problem convincing the suits as the cost of the Oracle licenses went into orbit. I would recommend Postgresql for use in a production environment
I jumped at the chance to use MySQL for a large project as a win for opensource. I carefully designed a db that would hold one billion records, as required for my project at work. Well, after a week of importing, when it came time to reindex a field, MySQL's technique was to freeze the table and make a fresh copy (thankfully I had enough room), although the copy took 3 days (during which the db wasn't available). I switched to Oracle and life has been so much better.
In the end, MySQL might handle the raw numbers that some of the big players do, but when you're working with large data sets, Oracle (and presumably others) give you more power. Take the actual physical data structure that Oracle allows you to work with: each database comprises of dynamic multiple variable length data files that can allow tables to span physical disks. MySQL will get there someday, but they're still a little behind.
_______
2B1ASK1
It says right there that if you want to spend the time and money on non-OSS development, they'll be happy to take some of your money in exchange for providing you with some code & service.
Is it a crime to profit from you work?
Alternately, go look at the BSD licenced PostgreSQL if you want to fork it and use it closed-source.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
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Mysql: 49 hits
Postgresql: 2 hits
Oracle: 4595 hits
One could argue that the people that post on DICE are dumber than most, but there still doesn't seem to be much of a market for mysql and postgresql.
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
mySQL is the right tool for *far* fewer jobs than those to which most people believe it applies. Many people end up writing code to deal with various aspects of data management that the database is supposed to take care of because they don't know that the database is supposed to take care of the data.
If you only know mySQL, you will attempt to solve your problem within the limitations of the tool. The problem is that many things can't be done in multithreaded or worse, multi-process application code to ensure integrity. If the DB won't do it, and it doesn't support transactions, then you've just gotta hope people don't ever use your application in a way that will make your data invalid.
I just don't get the appeal of mySQL. The last time I tried it, it seemed more difficult to use than postgres, and it supports a subset of the functionality. I have not done a project that doesn't require at least some basic database feature that mySQL doesn't have in years. Sure, I suppose I could've written code to emulate some of those parts of the database, but certainly not all. For the parts I could emulate, the application would most certainly run more slowly (multiple queries to emulate a subquery or what I do in a stored procedure), and the ones I couldn't would just have to be left out, which would make the applications more buggy (lack of transaction support on applications that run on multiple front-ends would simply cause the apps to fail).
Anyway, basic point is that if you don't understand your problem and/or the tools that are out there to help you solve it, you will solve it incorrectly. It may seem like it's working, but those types of implementations fail really quickly when they go multi-user.
-- The world is watching America, and America is watching TV.
Great, YET ANOTHER article on open source databases that fails to mention SAPDB or Firebird, even though they're both a hell of a lot better than MySQL in most respects (especially true of SAPDB).
Most journalists (and 75% of Slashdotters) apparently are ignorant of the advanced features offered by the "big boy" commercial databases they so love to deride; they end up doing all open source databases a disservice by equating all open source databases (in the mind of the pointy-haired boss) with the puppy of the household, MySQL.
Erlang.org: wow
Actually MySQL does replication just fine (but it is only one way, there can only be one master). If you need few updates and huge amount of reads this allows you to spread the load amongst several servers.
That's a weakness PostgreSQL (which doesn't do any replication at all) should fix in a future release.
MySQL (or even Postgresql) don't claim to be drop-in replacement for DB2 or Oracle. But they claim to be good enough for simple database tasks, which happen to represent a huge share of the business market (for every high-availability banking application there are a 1000 small databases storing employee holidays, classroom affectation, etc.). These small databases are not only a bigger market in term of quantity (if not in value), but some of them also grow into big databases someday.
Remember when Microsoft was doing MS-DOS, no Unix vendors would have been worried, they had much better capabilities. When millions of PCs were sold with MS-DOS they started worrying. When Windows came out they growed gray hair. Now SQL Server and Windows Server have eaten the market of smaller servers and high-end workstation. This is the strategy of eating your way from the bottom to the top, and it will also work for MySQL and Postgresql : as time passes and as they mature they eat out an ever larger chunck of the database market.
A Fortune 500 company probably isn't limited to local business. They probably do business all over the world. I don't know which one is more globalization challenged, PHP or MySQL, but they're both like Gilligan's Island: primitive as can be.
.Net, XML, HTML 4, etc., are Unicode to the bone, the last I checked poor PHP and MySQL were both still stuck in the legacy world of regional character encodings. You can build a global app with Java/Oracle or .Net/SQLServer, but the best you can do is a regional app with PHP/MySQL.
Whereas NT/2K/XP, SQLServer, ASP.Net, Java, C#,
This doesn't only matter for monster projects. Small systems can still be global -- unless you decide to go with tools like PHP & MySQL.
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
Most database-systems set up by scientific projects I've seen, have been using either Oracle or Microsoft systems. This is of course completely insane considering the need they have, and a total waste of money. Unfortunately many people read a little about databases on sites like /. and start to belive that they are setting up a large database.
After reading this thread, one can easily think that American express is running an averaged sized system with normal demands on security... The truth is that almost no school systems, museums, scientific projects etc. etc. ever need an enterprize solution. An example of the problem is an institut for Marin research in Colombia where they used Oracle. They paid $15.000 each year in licence fees to set up a database for their collections. They wanted to put it on the web and needed to pay $5.000 more. This is a simple task that Mysql, with all it's flaws, easily could manage, and without the need of an experinced Oracle techincian. There are Highschool Linux geeks in Colombia as well...
The overkill in usage of database systems around is probalby enrmous and a very good source of revenue for Oracle and Microsoft. Think about this when you are bashing the lack of advanced features in Mysql. Someone might actually belive you and buy an Oracle licence to run the member database for their local bridge club...
Guys,
Let me offer my view on the Bloomberg article. It is a huge success for the whole open source community that MySQL gets written about in a publication which is for non-techies only. It is an indication that open source development is not in vain - that open source is becoming a viable alternative even in the most conservative IT shops.
So in stead of arguing for and against this or that open source database, let's work together to become even stronger in the business world!
A key reason for MySQL's huge installed base is that Monty and David - the founders - focused on speed, reliability, and ease of management. That's why Bloomberg is writing about MySQL. And that is also the way to find paying customers who make it possible to hire more programmers and further develop the product.
I am sorry if this sounds like marketing speech. We at MySQL AB are working our butts off to conquer the business world. Now as we are doing so, it will benefit all open source databases. Will you help us?
Marten Mickos, CEO, MySQL AB
Being a developer of Java web applications myself, I always wonder why Firebird doesn't find any broader use.
I mean, in an commercial environment, there's always the reason to have someone to blame if you choose a closed-source solution like Oracle or DB2, so the managers refuse to accept Free Software or Open Source. Plus there are features in Oracle etc. still missing in the free alternatives.
But what about all the small, non-commercial projects? Firebird is really easy to install, it's scalable as hell and is, contrary to MySQL, a real database.
Two weeks ago I sat in a room full of US AirForce SysAdmins. Mostly they are a MS SQL Server shop. I mentioned MySQL and every SysAdmin, to the person, chuckled and cracked a smile. The manager turned to me and said, "We had one of those installed a few years ago."
Apparently, MySQL was a joke to them. Thats a pretty big institutional hurdle to jump.
From my own experiences MySQL does what it does very well. But lack of cascading updates/deletes and subselects are the big problems. SQL Server has plenty of its own quirks though(but you don't read about those on the side of the box).
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
> 1. Supports subselects
> 2. Supports views
> 3. Supports triggers
> 4. Supports stored procs
> 5. Does most the things that everyone takes for granted with a decent db server
Strange. Am I missing something, or am I just dumb? Firebird (open source version of Interbase from Borland) does all that, and does it well. It runs on Unix, Linux and Windoze (yes, some people need that), works very nice and fast, is reliable, costs exactly nothing, and I use it in quite a few real-world applications.
How come I never hear of it on Slashdot?
Have a look at http://sourceforge.net/projects/firebird/
Ciao,
Klaus
Free PC version of ChipWits at http://www.breueronline.de/klaus/chipwits/
When designing a database application the first decision is where the application logic should be stored. In a large database the choice is to store logic in the database or in the application. There are good reasons for both approaches, but mySQL limits you to strictly application logic. While this is not bad and makes most programmers happy, it's also one of the most common causes for inefficient database usage. Most programmers think more in loops than SQL and a loop is the kiss of death for a database. The one undeniable requirement of a database is the ability to filter and return only the data needed for a given operation. Since mySQL does not support sub queries, stored procedures, ref cursors, etc, it simply can't do this. The work around is to pull the required information and analyze it in the application. Again, this is a programming solution that has to be applied because the database is not up to the task. The argument against the big databases is that they offer too many things that folks don't use. This may be true, but the corollary is that there is a large pool of things that I can and will use. I would use mySQL in the same places I'd use MS Access for about the same reasons. This makes it a handy tool for database development and testing. However, I don't think it really qualifies it as an enterprise database or a realistic "threat" to Oracle, DB2, SQL Server, etc.
Yep, I got it working too, but its concept of how you managed sysadminish things like where storage went and how the database was found made Oracle's configuration look pleasant (scratch that, nothing makes Oracle's configuration look pleasant).
MySQL was distributed as RPMS at the time, but even compilng from source and installing was a matter of standard open source conventions. I didn't have to modify 3 config files to get it to install, etc.
I'm not trying to be pro-MySQL here. Personally I think PostgreSQL is good for MySQL and visa-versa. The competition is helping them both to grow. But, PostgreSQL lost me on ease of installation back then, where it would have been my database of choice if it had been easier to install.
Whereas NT/2K/XP, SQLServer, ASP.Net, Java, C#, .Net, XML, HTML 4, etc., are Unicode to the bone, the last I checked poor PHP and MySQL were both still stuck in the legacy world of regional character encodings.
Have you tried using UTF-8, an encoding of a sequence of Unicode characters into a sequence of 8-bit bytes, with your PHP/MySQL design?
Will I retire or break 10K?
In the case of libmysql (C native-interface library of MySQL), developers are forced to pay so much money for using GPL code(libmysql) in their software as non-GPL state, plus their customers have to pay money for commercial-licensed MySQL server.
Bull. The libmysql client software is NOT GPL but rather Lesser GPL, which allows linking the client software against a proprietary application program. "A license is not required if: You include the MySQL client code in a commercial program. The client part of MySQL is licensed under the LGPL". Even then, MySQL with InnoDB is $400 per multi-processor machine, as opposed to MS SQL's $20,000 per processor for the unlimited-client license.
Microsoft doesn't require such license fee when you use OLE/DB etc. to get native access to SQL server.
Yes it does. Microsoft SQL Server is priced based either on the number of processors or on the number of machines that will access the database.
Will I retire or break 10K?
MySQL A Threat To The Big Database Vendors?
Nope. Not really.
Is the bug likely to generate fewer sales or not?
If such a bug causes loss of data or compromise of private information, and the story hits Com.com or one of the other tech news sites, and the product does not have a monopoly in the product space, you bet the IT people will do their best to avoid such a product for new installations.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Against Oracle?
Maybe when about a million things that are part of the SQL stanard make their way in. Last time I used MySQL, it couldn't do subselects.
First of all nothing in the original post said anyting about running MySQL/PHP on a Linux box. If the guy went in and pitched running it all on Linux w/ Apache it's no wonder he got laughed out the door if thei standard is MS Windows servers. (think about it, would you walk into a Solaris shop and suggest that their new billing system you are bidding to write for them should be using VB on SQL Server?)
;), tell them that they can still use their apps if they install a Linux server and their TCO will be less. Then point and laugh at the ASP deverlopers trying to figure out what they are supposed to do at the blinking cursor (wondering why everything is black and white and where's the icons?) when they are porting their ASP apps.
I've installed several PHP/MySQL based Open Source web applications on our Windows 2000 intranet server with no problems (I've then had to abstract out the DB calls so that I can move the data to our Oracle server since, apparently, most LAMP developers can't be bothered to architect their applications properly and have hard-coded MySQL function calls everywhere), surprisingly enough even running as a CGI they still execute faster than our ASP apps.
This could be a better way to migrate a company to Linux, get them hooked on PHP applications installed on their Windows servers. Then when Microsoft comes around for their yearly upgrade check
"For a successful technology, honesty must take precedence over public relations for nature cannot be fooled." -Feynman
I have used Interbase from Borland and Firebird is an excellent choice.
It is easy to set up and maintain and it is a full commercial implementation.
Yes, and it has the good stuff too (triggers, stored procs, views, etc.).
And, if you really need to pay someone you can always get Interbase from Borland directly.
NexuSys - Linux support by the best
Without SPs your performance won't scale too well - SPs run on the database server, which is (usually) a nice big fast machine with RAID etc. You don't want to offload everything onto the client as the network traffic between client and server can be huge (especially if you're dealing with big tables >1 million rows which aren't really that unusual these days). SPs allow you to do Query->Big fast machine->Result without all the messing about - *especially* if your DB structure changes you can maintain a consistent interface to the underlying data (views are mostly used for this but some of the more complex things will need SPs).
Subqueries are essential... some things just can't be written any other way (short of using multiple temporary tables which is so icky I won't even begin to go there). Especially where you're trying to exclude items from a set - you need a 'where not in' clause which simply can't be done with a join.
Yup.. And I seem to choose the second one before either choice is popular.
Rod Taylor
Some versions of MySQLGUI will crash if the database has a long text field with newlines. Scrolling doesn't work right. And about half the time, the program won't connect to the database because it's little state machine for connection is out of sync. None of this should be hard to fix. But this is the sort of thing that makes a good program look broken.
Without InnoDB's betasoftware, does MySQL do:
-Transactions? No.
-Nested transactions? No.
-Savepoints in transactions? No.
-Triggers? No.
-Nested triggers? haha... No.
-User defined types? No.
-User defined functions? No.
-Views? No.
-Indexed views? Haha... No.
-Partitioned views (i.e. a view created from subviews retrieved from nodes in a cluster)? No.
-Subselects? No.
-Stored procedures? No.
-Role based security? No.
In other words: it's nice when you don't need all the stuff above, but trust me, every decent mission critical application does need some or all of the stuff above. So a thread to big database vendors?
No Fscking Way.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Furthermore, the lack of subselects [mysql.com] makes everyday activities such as multi-table UPDATEs [mysql.com] a little arcane. (Read the "it can't be done this way" comments on the bottom to see what I mean.
I couldn't find that message. Could you possibly supply a slashdot URL? Thanks.
Table-ized A.I.
You can delete columns.
no sig.
MySQL
Fast. Free. Easy. Lacks features.
PostgreSQL
Slow. Free. Difficult. Better feature set.
Damn, where does all of this FUD keep coming from? PostgreSQL is not much slower than MySQL in the single digit user area and blows it away once you start updating/inserting and get alot of users hitting the DB.
5 to 10% slower is not slow. Yes, 3 or 4 years ago it was, but not now. 7.3 (in CVS), will kick some serious butt..
BWP
Yes, especially as the platform and the database are supposed to become one in the Windows "Longhorn" release, meaning that the file system runs on top of the database.
It would be fun to imagine that developers might plan to unite, say, PostgreSQL and ReiserFS in anticipation but unfortunately Strategy is not Open Source's strong point. Like the dithering between supporting Java on Linux, cloning Dotnet or doing something new, by the time any clarity emerges Linux-the-platform will have given away a lot of ground.
The point is that employers aren't advertising for people to use this technology, and the numbers aren't growing. It would be good if they did, but I suspect many employers are simply ignorant of the skills that they could use.
Here are the numbers for mysql on DICE over the past few months:
6/12: 52
7/25: 39
8/17: 49
I would be happy if the numbers were going up (there's a reason I searched for this term), but there's no indication of major growth that I can see. It's the usual chicken and egg situation.
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
Benchmark rhetoric + $0.90 = Tim Hortons.
I'm confused.. first you say that you have "real-world case" saying something, then you say that it's not worth anything. (You posted benchmark rhetoric, then you posted that benchmark rhetoric isn't worth anything.)
FWIW, I've used both, and for simple inserts/retrieves (which seems to be what you're using it for) MySQL is faster (which it should be, as that's what it was designed for).. but for real world DB use - complex retrieves, views, many multiple users - Postgres blows it away.
Is your PostgreSQL database tuned?
Have you vacuum analayzed the database since you loaded it?
Do you have indexes on the proper columns?
Have you checked for any SQL gotchas?
How much shared mem does Pg have? Sort mem?
This type of statement comes up a couple of times a week on the mailing lists. It sounds more like an untuned database more than anything else. If PostgreSQL was that slow NO ONE would use it!
Lets see some real world open source site examples:
Is SourceForge slow? (Pg)(Only the mailing lists are DB2 right now)
Is PHPbuilder slow? (Pg)
Most likely they have more than 400k rows, 12 columns and 60 users at a time. What does this tell you?
BWP
The dirty secret of big databases is that most people don't know how to program them, how to configure them
This is correct.
and don't need most of the features
This is where you're wrong.
They do need the features - they just don't know they need them... so they implement the features themselves in the apps..
I think the main reason MySQL gets more hype than Postgres is because of the interfaces available. When I was dealing with that sort of crap (about 2 years ago) the Python interface to Postgres was very bare-bones, and almost unusable if you didn't know much SQL beyond a basic SELECT statement. The MySQL module for Python, on the other had, had all sorts of "Python-esque" ways to mess with the data without even knowing what an SQL statement is, and as I understand it, the MySQL interface in Perl was even friendlier to the SQL-unaware. The obvious drawback to the Perl interface though, is that then you have to program in Perl.
Best Slashdot comment ever
I've used Postgres in a dozen relational database-backed server projects in the last three years. It installs faster than MySQL, I can do a Postgres install in literally ten minutes to get a functioning basic configuration.
Sometimes, I believe the MySQL advocates are in some kind of strange parallel universe. Postgres is a real Oracle-killer at the low and medium end, and is a breeze to install and maintain.
People might have gotten scared off by the old
buggy Postgres implementations circa 1993 or so, but that code is long gone, the system was totally
rewritten and since 7.0 has been creeping up on
Oracle territory. MySQL by contrast, still lacks basic required stuff like ANSI syntax and tranactions.
Because it is appropriate and proper to black box the database from the front end developers.
Oh, I very definitely see your point.
MySQL gives you no protection from your front end developers, and its use should be restricted to situations where you do not need protection from your front end developers. It's a very different world-view.
They already moved from MySQL to Postgre a while ago, and now are moving from Postgre to IBM's DB2.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
So there is a windows version of Postgres?
Kewl!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
This can happen if you use the serializable transaction isolation level. It is not the default - you have to specify that isolation level for your transaction. And as far as I know, it is the only way to implement that isolation level while still allowing any kind of concurrency. I have never had to re-run a transaction with PostgreSQL, because I use the default transaction isolation level. You might want to read the relevant documentation.
I have seen the "re-run your transaction" message - using MS SQL. Yes, "real" databases do do this. Again, it depends on the transaction isolation level.
Most of your other points don't even apply to PostgreSQL. PostgreSQL has log-based transactions. It does not use one file per table (I can't remember how many files there were in my last PostgreSQL DB, but it wasn't many and certainly wasn't one-per-table). Others have commented on your other points (except XML) so I won't repeat them.
You might want to take another look at PostgreSQL. Don't assume that it is the same as MySQL (if that is where your criticisms are coming from).
I haven't tried MySQL so I really can't comment on it.
And:
What RDBMS are you using? Oracle, Sybase ASE, and MS SQL Server do not behave in such a manner.
Thanks,
--
Matt