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MySQL Beats Commercial Databases in Labs Test
An anonymous reader writes "Many of the big players now offer free or 'light' versions of their databases, some would call them crippleware. Builder AU compared databases from Oracle, IBM, Microsoft and MySQL, and the open source offering came out on top."
I thought the reason MySQL don't post their own comparisons is because the EULAs of Oracle etc. specifically forbid public posting of benchmark results?
And what about PostgreSQL? It should fare very well.
Sig is on vacation
SQL Server Express is not really meant for any serious production environments. I suppose one could use it for a personal web site here and there, but it is a tool primarily meant for developers.
Instead of having to have access to a full fledged SQL Server, you use SQL Server Express to develop your application and then deploy it to a full SQL Server when that server becomes available.
Since SQL Server Express supports the vast majority of the features that a developer might need, it is very useful during the initial development of an application.
In my experience, SQL Server Express is great for basic projects (like a personal web site or blog) and for the initial phases of development of a "real" project. Once you start getting into the realm of serious applications, where one might need finer grained control of isolation and locking, or when you are at the point where you need to do performance testing of your application, you really do need to move up to the full SQL Server box.
At any rate, I'm not really sure this comparison is all that fair. MySQL makes an attempt to be a database server for "real" applications, where as SQL Server Express is more of a development tool / MS Access replacement that is targeted at personal projects.
The reviewers know databases about as well as my grandma knows sports cars. They seem to mean well, and admit that this comparison was complex and hard. In the end they were unfortunately over their head.
PRODUCT SELECTION
1. where's postgresql? This is the product that the commercial vendors need to be the most nervous about. Sure, they're loosing more low-end revenue to mysql right now, but postgresql is getting picked up by some big players. It is far more mature than MySQL, doesn't have the quality issues, isn't partially owned by Oracle, etc.
2. where's at least a mention of all the various other solutions - from Firebird to Derby (Cloudscape)
FUTURE PROOFING
1. They mistakenly say that mysql doesn't require scaling up to enterprise versions like db2/oracle do. This is incorrect because mysql lags behind oracle & db2 for performance in many situations:
- since it doesn't support query parallelism (which provides near linear performance improves to db2/oracle)
- since it doesn't support partitioning (which can provide 10x performance improvements to db2/oracle)
- since it doesn't have a mature optimizers (which means that queries with 5 table joins can tank)
- since it lacks memory tuning flexibility
Together this means that as your data increases you have to continue moving a mysql database to larger & larger hardware.
In other words, if you need to scan a table with 10 million rows in it, then join that data against 6 other tables - db2/oracle can:
- leverage partitioning so only scan 1mil rows or so instead of 10mil
- split the scan across four cpus
- leverage more efficiently tuned memory (ensuring little tables & indexes stay in memory)
- use the best possible join
and probably complete the query in 1/60th the time that mysql would take. And that means that you could get better performance from db2/oracle on a $25,000 four-way smp than from mysql on a $2,000,000 32-way.
2. They fail to mention that Oracle now owns the most valuable parts of the MySQL solution (Innodb). Oracle has obviously purchased this component (which is how mysql supports transactions, pk/fk constraints, etc) in order to harm MySQL. Since there is no other viable replacement for Innodb the MySQL future is in serious doubt.
3. They probably weren't aware that MySQL is the least ANSI-SQL compliant database in the market. This is means that porting mysql code to another database is a royal pain in the butt compared to code supporting postgresql, db2, etc. Though, to be fair, it is getting much better.
LICENSING COSTS:
1. mysql isn't necessarily free, and can cost more than the commercial alternatives for small distributed commercial apps
2. db2 licensing only provided for DB2 Express- which is the low-cost 2-cpu model. That's often ok, hardly compares to Oracle standard edition also included. Also, I think they may have gotten their db2 costs mixed up between express & workgroup editions.
CONCLUSIONS & MISC
They mentioned some of the great mysql features like clustering and fault tolerance. Sorry, but mysql cluster solution is a separate telecom product that they purchased, that stores your data in memory - limiting your database size to however much memory you can afford. Not a practical solution for very many.
The mysql fault tolerance is really just replication. That's sad.
They mention one strength of mysql is their maximum database size of 64TB - which is nonsense, just because its internal registers and pointers can handle a theoretical maximum of 64TB doesn't mean that it would ever make sense to put more than 20 GB on it. DB2 & Oracle can go to 64TB, but today almost nobody is going beyond 10 TB just due to backup performance, cp
Give me a break. This guy has reviewed databases on the basis of features, with, as far as I can tell, not a single real performance evaluation in different kinds of applications (OLTP, DSS, data warehouse), data volumes, or query complexity.
It gets better. In discussing Oracle, he explains: That is not to say the other databases serve up incorrect data but with some database engines when the workload is high, uncommitted data can be flushed from buffers to disk potentially creating a dirty read. MVRC also ensures that readers do not block writers and visa versa. HUH? I can't speak for EVERY database out there, but for most of them, you'd have to specifically set a "read uncommitted" isolation level to actually read dirty data. The majority of the databases would simply give a lock-and-block situation while the second reader waits for the writer to complete. Oracle's MVRC (and PostgreSQL's scheme) both prevent this lock-block situation. But, really, to say that this would potentially create a dirty read situation is just silly.
He also didn't speak of Oracle's new Express Edition. Yeah, it's limited to 1 CPU and has a cap on its data volume, but you get all of Oracle's core features (including PL/SQL) for FREE.
Nothing to see here, folks. Just move along.