Oracle + Open Source » databasejournal

DBJ – MySQL Character Sets

Sean Hull — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 17:00:39 +0000

In our latest article at Database Journal we talk about Character Sets in MySQL. What are they? How do they affect searching? How do they affect data that is inserted or updated? How can I set and control the for an application or globally in my database? And what pre-tell is collation? We answer all these questions and more.

Database Journal – Understanding MySQL Character Sets

DBJ: MySQL Benchmarking

Sean Hull — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 17:00:58 +0000

Benchmarking is liking running your system through it’s paces. You don’t know how fast your software and hardware are until you’ve put some pressure on them. Benchmarking tools allow you to do just that. We use sysbench to look at the operating system and mysqlslap to run queries in the MySQL database.

Database Journal – MySQL Server Benchmarking 101

DBJ: Inside MySQL Binary Logs

Sean Hull — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 13:00:53 +0000

MySQL’s binary logs are an important part of a properly functioning database. They facility point-in-time recovery, and allow replication to operation. We dig into these files, and look at what’s inside them, and how they work.

An Inside Look at the MySQL Binary Log Files

DBJ – Mult-master MySQL Improves Manageability

Sean Hull — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:00:32 +0000

Multi-master MySQL, with the MMM management software brings a whole host of new features, and manageability to your MySQL deployments. Run backups, alter tables, perform upgrades all without slowing down your production users.

DBJ: Introduction to Multi-Master MySQL

Sean Hull — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:00:10 +0000

This month on Database Journal we talk about multi-master MySQL using circular replication to achieve high availability.

DBJ – Wonders of Maatkit for MySQL

Sean Hull — Tue, 18 May 2010 13:00:38 +0000

If you’re new to the MySQL DBA role, you’ll be excited to learn about the Maatkit toolset. It provides a whole host of valuable functionality and fills many of the DBAs day-to-day needs.

DatabaseJournal – Wonders of Maatkit

DBJ – Exotic Storage Engines for MySQL

Sean Hull — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:00:23 +0000

In our March DBJ article we talked about some of the storage engines to choose from with MySQL. With it’s plugin storage engine architecture, you have a range of options. In our April article we continue to discuss a further selection of storage engines, and what features they offer to the DBA and database architect.

Database Journal – Exotic Storage Engines

Surveying MySQL’s Popular Storage Engines

Sean Hull — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:00:35 +0000

In this month’s Database Journal piece we look at the spectrum of MySQL storage engines available, and examine what some of their strengths and weaknesses are.

View the article here: Survey of MySQL Storage Engines

DBJ – Heartbeat Setup

Sean Hull — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 13:00:52 +0000

In the last of our three part series on MySQL high availability we discuss the Linux Heartbeat project, and how it can be used to automate failover between two MySQL databases.

Heartbeat exposes a virtual IP address for use by the database, and manages it as well. In the event that one server becomes unavailable, Heartbeat will revoke primary control of DRBD from that node, hand over the IP address to the alternate node, mount the DRBD device, and start MySQL. MySQL’s InnoDB engine will then perform crash recovery, rollback uncommitted transactions, and startup.

Read the full article at Database Journal – DRBD & MySQL, Heartbeat Setup

DBJ: DRBD & Virtualbox Setup

Sean Hull — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 13:00:33 +0000

In part two of our article on DRBD and High Availability, we take you step-by-step through setting up Sun’s Virtualbox software, creating a couple of VMs, and then installing CentOS on those. These two virtual Linux boxes then serve as two nodes in our DRBD mirrored disk setup which we use as a platform to install MySQL.

DRBD, MySQL and the Virtualbox Setup – Database Journal

Keep on the lookout for our third part in the series next month. In that issue we’ll explain how the Linux Heartbeat project can be used to control the whole setup, and provide automatic failover in the event that one node goes down.

DBJ: DRBD Makes Excellent Low-cost HA Soln for MySQL

Sean Hull — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 23:49:35 +0000

With all the trouble keeping MySQLs built-in replication running, some folks are looking for alternatives. DRBD provides a distributed block level device, which can provide the sort of database mirroring we need, below the filesystem. That makes it transparent to MySQL, but nevertheless a great complimentary solution. In this article we’ll discuss the pros and cons, and then part two will take you step by step through a basic setup.

Read the article on Database Journal – DRBD and MySQL – Excellent Low-cost HA Solution

DBJ: Scaling Faster & Stronger MySQL

Sean Hull — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 13:00:39 +0000

Sometimes terms like scaling are – as the brits like to say – bandied about, without everyone agreeing on what they mean. That’s because scaling is an insiders term, a technical term thought to carry great weight, but nevertheless often misunderstood.So I wanted to write an article about this interesting and important topic, while sticking to terms that everyone *can* agree on. This is the first in a two part series where I discuss various ways to make your database scale. But I talk in terms of faster, stronger, bigger and better because I think we can all agree that’s what we’re really trying to achieve! Database Journal: Faster & Stronger MySQL

DBJ: 7 Ways To Crash a Database

Sean Hull — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 13:00:13 +0000

With a tongue in cheek, humorous tone, we turn the tables upside down on database best practices, illustrating all of the things you shouldn’t do, and what might happen if you ignore those important tasks.

7 Ways To Crash A Database

DBJ: Five More Dials To Turn

Sean Hull — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 13:00:13 +0000

In this month’s article over at Database Journal we discuss more areas to tune your initial MySQL database setup including InnoDB & MyISAM buffers, hit ratios, index usage and full table scans, security, and logs. With this second article in a two part series we complete our coverage of basic tuning of a MySQL database.

MySQL: Five More Dials To Turn

DBJ – Ten Dials To Set

Sean Hull — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 13:00:07 +0000

This month in Database Journal we start a two part article on tuning the dials of your new MySQL database. After you install and setup your first database, you’ll need to set various parameters in your my.cnf file. These control memory, logfiles, temp table usage, sorting, joins, and a whole lot more. We’ll review some of the more important wants and start you on your way to more nuanced tuning of your MySQL instance.

Read the article: Ten Dials To Set at DatabaseJournal.com