To the original poster: Is this a loaded question just to see what kind of
response you might get?
The application that requires a database server was not mentioned as far as
I can tell, but that will influence your decision on what backend to choose.
If you need every feature set under the sun go get Oracle. It is really
nice. It is also really expensive and you need some massive hardware to run
it (to run it well anyway). And dont for get to hire that Oracle DBA while
your at it for an additional $60k (US) per year.
If you need a fast reliable database server MySQL will do nicely for most
applications. I'll bet there is NO WAY that you can even pay for access to
the actual developers of the commercial database systems. You get that
access right here in this list. You can also pay them (yes everybody needs
some type of income) for different levels of support.
check it out. RTFM.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Steve Edberg" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Boget, Chris" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2001 11:36 AM
Subject: Re: Downsides of MySQL?
> Urgh...I've been fortunate enough to avoid things like this myself
> until recently, when some of my PHP/MySQL/Apache stuff is getting
> tossed out in favor of Cold Fusion/MS-SQL Server/MS-IIS. Anyway, my
> 2c:
>
>
> At 8:35 AM -0500 8/16/01, Boget, Chris wrote:
> >Good morning.
> >Recently, we presented MySQL as a database option for a website that
> >we might be working on. We've used it as our database in the past and
> >we plan on using it in the future as possible.
> >With that said, I confess I don't have as intimate a knowledge of mySQL
> >to address some of the things in the email that was sent to me. I'd like
> >to hear what some of you have to say/think about this. I know some
> >of the things said below aren't entirely correct, but I'm not 100% sure
> >about some of the others.
> >
> >--Begin Quote--
> >
> >MySQL - as I said at our meeting, we would not be comfortable with this
> >as an enterprise strength solution. MySQL is unsupported freeware and
> >lacks enterprise management functionality.
>
>
> Do these people even know what they mean by 'enterprise management
> functionality', or did they just crib from an Oracle brochure? DO
> they have any specifics about what they require?
>
>
> >It has a small limited feature
> >set compared to ORACLE, DB/2 and is lacking the functionality to support
> >data replication and has little capability for generating management
info.
>
>
> No surprise that these folks haven't been following MySQL development
> for quite a while, and probably don't know about its replication
> features. I haven't used 'em myself, though, so I can't vouch for
> their robustness.
>
> As far as the feature set & manageability, it's true - there's a
> lotta things MySQL made a conscious decision to leave out (unions,
> views, triggers, stored procedures, subselects [i know, coming soon],
> foreign key support, etc.) in favor of speed/small memory footprint.
> And you have to go to third-parties for
> reverse-engineering/diagramming tools.
>
> If your application requires such, then maybe MySQL _isn't_ the right
> solution; however - depending on your app - Oracle/DB2/whatever might
> be sheer overkill. Administrative overhead for systems like those
> might far outweigh any advantages they have for you.
>
>
> >There are question marks around the scalability of the product, I'm not
> >sure of the locking algorithms used (whether row level or record level) -
> >the
>
>
> It depends on table type; AFAIK, it can be table (ISAM/MyISAM),
> page-level (BDB), or row-level (InnoDB). See:
>
> http://www.mysql.com/doc/L/o/Locking_methods.html
>
> http://www.mysql.com/doc/T/a/Table_locking.html
>
> http://www.mysql.com/doc/I/n/InnoDB_Next-key_locking.html
>
> You've got a choice! This used to be considered a good thing...
>
>
> >fact that it is not generally used in multi-user solutions is a good
enough
> >indication that this is not accepted database technology for
> >industrial-strength
> >multi-user systems.
> >The fact that it is unsupported freeware would mean that an end user
would
> >potentially be "held to ransom" by a DBA with specific knowledge.
>
>
> This kinda of statement is beginning to REALLY rile me when I hear
> it. Even if you discount the fact that this mailing list provides
> better support than the majority of PAID support programs, if you
> want to, the MySQL folks would be more than happy to take a large
> amount of your $$$ to provide excellent support:
>
> http://www.mysql.com/support/arrangements/types.html
>
> - this can include customizing MySQL for you! There are also
> individual consultants & firms that will support you as well. How
> anyone could actually back up a claim of MySQL being 'unsupported' is
> beyond me.
>
>
> >The mySQL
> >security model is also not sufficiently developed for any system that
> >involves
> >money.
>
>
> I dunno, with some combination of encrypted fields, database server
> behind a firewall, SSH-tunnelled communication and good DB/system
> administration, you'd have a plenty secure system. After all, I don't
> think any of the recent and not-so-recent credit-card number thefts
> have been on MySQL systems.
>
> OK, back to work for me. But first, some Mountain Dew...
>
> -steve
>
>
> --
> +------------------------ Open source questions? ------------------------+
> | Steve Edberg University of California, Davis |
> | [EMAIL PROTECTED] Computer Consultant |
> | http://aesric.ucdavis.edu/ http://pgfsun.ucdavis.edu/ |
> +----------- http://pgfsun.ucdavis.edu/open-source-tools.html -----------+
>
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