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Ask Slashdot: Which OSS Database Project To Help?
DoofusOfDeath writes "I've done a good bit of SQL development / tuning in the past. After being away from the database world for a while to finish grad school, I'm about ready to get back in the game. I want to start contributing to some OSS database project, both for fun and perhaps to help my employment prospects in western Europe. My problem is choosing which OSS DB to help with. MySQL is the most popular, so getting involved with it would be most helpful to my employment prospects. But its list of fundamental design flaws (video) seems so severe that I can't respect it as a database. I'm attracted to the robust correctness requirements of PostgreSQL, but there don't seem to be many prospective employers using it. So while I'd enjoy working on it, I don't think it would be very helpful to my employment prospects. Any suggestions?"
You will probably be happier in the fewer postresql shops. Think about it do you want to get it done quick and dirty or the right way?
No sir I dont like it.
I actually love MySQL, but FWIW, someone noted a while back that Salesforce.com has announced intent to hire about 50 top gun PostgreSQL guys in the coming year. It seems obvious that they are preparing to unhook the money siphon leading to Oracle. Assuming Salesforce follows through, all the herd-following executives in the U.S. will want to do the same. So I predict that demand for PostgreSQL talent will be pretty good for many years.
First I should probably burn some karma and say "what a load of garbage". The headline asks what OSS database to HELP with, but the article summary might as well read "Which free SQL-compatible database to learn to use". And on top of that it contains the answer already, along with questionable dirt-showing on MySQL which makes it read like a guerilla-ad for PostgreSQL.
But in any case, it makes a major, huge difference whether the question is "which database codebase to contribute improvements to" or "which free database to learn for best amployment chances". Sounds like it's the latter, and in that case a follow-up question is what kind of employment. The one correct answer is "whichever database your employee is using" - don't expect to be able to choose a job on the basis of what database engine they happen to be using in one of the departments at the time. Second best answer is go with both; and again it makes a huge difference whether it's for self-employed web-site design or financial analysis for stock brokerage firm.
And if you actually went with MySQL, next question is which database engine. Huh, you ask? Well you see, MySQL is not a single database engine, in actuality it's a front-end to pluggable database engines. The stock release fetures at lest MyISAM, InnoDB, Heap, BDB, NDB and Archive (and few variations). In general it's a choice between MyISAM or InnoDB which are whole different story. When most people say "MySQL has such and such problem" they're actually talking about MyISAM, but MySQL has defaulted to InnoDB engine for years.
But the third and best answer is "none of the above". In most cases everybody seeking employment in relevant job will be fluent in SQL and have at least some experience with both MySQL and PosgreSQL, and it'll be rare for the employer to be at all interested in your ability to actually "hack" the database source. NoSQL databases offer ample opportunity to differentiate both on the job-market, and on the business competitiveness arena by improving the source-code (and in most cases as long as the binaries stay in-house, so can the source which makes bosses happy, but consult your OSS license).
Get a VPS from Linode. Install postgreSQL.
The simplest way to say it is that MySQL is really more of a data store than a database. You can store stuff in it, and it'll get the data back reasonably efficiently, but in terms of actually operating as a proper compliant database for critical information it just isn't designed that way. It works great for storing the back end for your web server, but if you wanted to store complex data in it and needed it to be 100% accurate, transactional, and reliable, the product just doesn't fit the bill. For all that it's got a paid "enteprise" edition, it's really more in the space of something like SQLite or SQL CE than it is in the space of Oracle, and again it's not an issue of whether it can scale or whether it's buggy, it just simply isn't designed to be compliant to the required level. That's largely the reason it works so well as a LAMP back end and is so easy to administer, but it just isn't fit for purpose for much more.