[Discuss] Rob Conery's critique of MySQL?

[warlord at MIT.EDU (Derek Atkins)]

Mark Woodward <markw at mohawksoft.com> writes:

> That being said, my personal opinion is that *anyone* who chooses
> MySQL without a clear and present "Only MySQL will with our apps"
> requirement, is not much of a DBA and a terrible engineer.

This sounds like a relugious argument, not a technical argument.
Replace "MySQL" with "Python", or "Shell" above and it can read just as
vitriolic.

> I've been using PostgreSQL for over 15 years and it is one of those
> tools that I keep in my belt because it is just amazing at how easy it
> makes otherwise difficult tasks. Every year it keeps getting better. I
> have been on far too many projects where some guy chooses MySQL
> because everyone else does and stuff that would be trivial in
> PostgreSQL are a nightmare.  On the flip side, I have yet to see
> something that would be easy with MySQL that isn't equally as easy
> using PostgreSQL.

And I have the inverse.  I've been using MySQL for over 10 years, I'm
comfortable with it.  The one or two times I had to interact with PG I
had no idea what it was doing or how to talk to it.  IIRC I couldn't
even figure out how to get it to simply give me the list of tables in a
database, let alone quit out of the client!  With MySQL it's a simple
"explain <table>;".  I'm sure PG has some way to do it, and *ONCE YOU
KNOW IT* it's simple.  However once you've spent 10, 15 years with a
tool then you don't want to spend another 10-15 years learning another
tool just to get as comfortable as you are now.

> As I tell my son, "You have to own your opinions. Merely accepting
> someone else's opinion isn't good enough. Believe what you want, but
> make sure you understand what you believe and why."

Sure, and there's a lot to be said for using tools with which you are
comfortable.

Like everything, it's a tool.  The key is using the right tool for the
job.  Just because you need an RDBMS does NOT imply that PG is *the*
right tool.  It is *a* right tool.

There are other choices, and those other choices *are* valid.  It all
depends on the requirements.  Without knowing the requirements all other
discussion is purely rhetorical or religious, neither of which belong on
a technical list.

-derek

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
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