I thought I would ask, since i havent had any problems with this myself but a colleague of mine "insisted" that MySQL had some sensitive issues, such as database corruption where the data becomes un-recoverable. (complete loss)

And if your MySQL implementation crashes then your entire server needs a reboot??

Im just wondering if each of these points are important when considering MySQL and any other points which affect a MySQL implementation, id be interested in hearing your comments and experiences with this software good or bad and any alternative packages.

Cheers

Originally posted by xtstrike
I thought I would ask, since i havent had any problems with this myself but a colleague of mine "insisted" that MySQL had some sensitive issues, such as database corruption where the data becomes un-recoverable. (complete loss)

And if your MySQL implementation crashes then your entire server needs a reboot??
We use MySQL on all of our servers, and love it. As a developer, I have also become somewhat fond of the program. It is a decent SQL database program, and best of all - it's free.

As far as data being un-recoverable goes, you might want to check out Gemini tables instead of ISAM tables:
http://www.mysql.com/doc/G/E/GEMINI_Overview.html

Hope that answers your question.

Best Regards,
Matt Lightner
mlightner@site5.com

interesting, thanx Site5-Matt

ive just read up on the GEMINI tables and that would indeed seem to counter the claims my colleague has of the systems reliability.

id be interested in getting a fairly heated conversation going here based upon everyones interractions and experiences with the software, so far my colleague is the only person i have heared claiming this of MySQL but i havent heared much about it really.

MySQL is fantastic as long as you're aware of its limitations. Nothing I do requires transactions, so I haven't had a chance to try the new table types.

As for reliability - I have been using MySQL for three years now. I have never - and I mean NEVER - had it crash. It has also never corrupted data on me. I've had a couple instances where the server MySQL is running on has crashed (through no fault of MySQL.) Databases don't like being uncleanly shut down, but all I had to do was run the table checker/repairer, and all was well, with no data lost. Of course, transactions make the likelihood of data loss during a crash even lower.

Just know what you're getting when you use MySQL - if it does what you need, you'll be very happy with it.

im kinda guessing nobody else on this board uses MySQL? 4200 members and only 2 people use MySQL, that certainly doesnt say much for MySQL does it?

aloha,
never had a prob with it ??

I've been using MySQL with both Perl/CGI and PHP for a while now and never had any problems with it. It does so much for your website. You just have to love it! :love:

:D

so i guess what you people are trying to tell me is that MySQL is probably one of the most stable SQL servers out there ?

xstrike: you should visit the http:/www.vbulletin.com forum, I think they have a long thread about SQL (and mySQL), saying that mySQL is going to go away when Red Hat will ship with (another)SQL as standard. And that mySQL isn`t a very flexible app.
(I got this info from the board, I know nothing about this)

yeah, I am hearing more & more about MySQL is not as good as it seems. (From VB support forum.)

I've been using php/MySQL for about a year now. Mostly discussion forums and news/polls etc. Never had a problem with it.

OTOH, I'm a DBA by profession and I have a real problem with no transactions.

PostgreSQL seems to be giving MySQL a real run for it's money as far as performance goes. I believe PostgreSQL supports transactions. PostgreSQL seems to be becoming more popular as an options for most hosts.

For the scripts that I write, I've been using ADODB as an abstraction layer. With ADODB it's "relatively" easy to switch the underlying RDBMS w/o changing a lot of code.

Frank

Originally posted by klisis
yeah, I am hearing more & more about MySQL is not as good as it seems. (From VB support forum.) well, no problems using mysql on my vB forums and i get up to 2,200 posts/day and 45 - 330+ users at a time -> http://animeboards.com :D

Originally posted by eva2000
well, no problems using mysql on my vB forums and i get up to 2,200 posts/day and 45 - 330+ users at a time -> http://animeboards.com :D

I knew you were gonna say that :stickout:

As a programmer, that MySQL has such a pathetic implimentation of SQL is annoying. Yes. it does some nice things which are not standard ANSI SQL92 such as AUTO_INCREMENT but these don't make up for lack of foreign key integrity, sub-querieries (they are my main gripes).

Well, I haven't used MySQL (yet) for any web-sites where performance becomes an issue (such as multiple concurrent queries) or for fancy transaction commits/rollbacks. For such web sites I have made the decision to change over to PostrgreSQL because of its better implimentation of SQL.

One of the members of www.sitepointforums.com , MattR, runs a vBulletin site which is extremely popular (can't remember what it is). They hit a brick-wall with MySQL and encountered whole tables being corrupted when MySQL was under stress. They have ported vBulletin over to Sybase. If you go to sitepoint and do a search for posts by MattR (especially in the "Server Side" and "PHP/MySQL" forums you will find some of the lengthy discertations he has writen on the topic and the surrounding debates. If you find any post written by him therre, you will see that in his signature he has placed links to the threads I mention.

As for Gemini tables, I will read that article. The last I heard their implimentation in MySQL was in beta. I know that they are used in the www.Nusphere.com port of MySQL.

Guess who! :D

Originally posted by MattRog
Guess who! :D

Matt, your signature dont work here :P :)

boo! What is up with that??>

Matt,

WHT has decided to remove the URL and any sortta link support in the singatures. :rolleyes:

Originally posted by MattRog
Guess who! :D LOL ... poor sig :D

Originally posted by MattR
Guess who! :D

yo

Hi everybody!
(Hi Dr. Nick!)

That is unfortunate but I'm sure there was a good reason.. There had *better* be a good reason for my beautiful sig to be destroyed! :)

But on the topic of MySQL:
I think it is a bunch of bunk.

Get PostGRES, Interbase, Sybase, etc. -- those are all free and much more in line with what you need I think.

If you say is true don't you think it all depends on what you need it for?

I do believe this board works fine with MySQl but if I'm wrong here please correct me.

Next you say is that we all need an Oracle database ;-)

But ok, not fair. you did only mention the other free versions wich you think/know are better.

I'll stick with MySQl and when I exceed 10 million pageviews a day I'll consider something else or just quit because the site gave errors because of the MySQL failure.

Hmm, so what about those reds?

Originally posted by Domenico
If you say is true don't you think it all depends on what you need it for?

I do believe this board works fine with MySQl but if I'm wrong here please correct me.

Next you say is that we all need an Oracle database ;-)

But ok, not fair. you did only mention the other free versions wich you think/know are better.

I'll stick with MySQl and when I exceed 10 million pageviews a day I'll consider something else or just quit because the site gave errors because of the MySQL failure.

Hmm, so what about those reds?

I dislike Oracle about as much as I do MySQL. Oracle is needed by *very few* people -- most get it because of the marketing. (e.g. pointy-haired boss syndrome). :cartman:

But yes if the majority of your traffic is read-only then you'll do fine with MySQL. Shared read locks are no problem.

However, if someone wants to write to your DB then they will have to wait to get exclusive access then all those readers will also have to wait.

MySQL is great for something like a news system in which you have few writes but a lot of reads. (e.g slashdot).

Last summer (around this time) we had far fewer than 10 million pageviews a day and MySQL corrupted tables on a regular basis. Some could be fixed by 'isamchk' and some table isamchk would report:
2500 rows deleted

That was really nice to see, especially since it was our user table.

And yes, I know (with the exception of Interbase) that those are better. ;)

Those Reds are always up to something. I hate commies.