Lenz Grimmer's blog

Some new MySQL nuggets from blogs.sun.com and elsewhere

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-07-04T09:56:38Z

Thankfully my RSS reader has builtin-search capability, so I can quickly skim the full RSS feed from blogs.sun.com for keywords of interest. I found the following articles quite helpful:

Setting up MySQL Cluster using Solaris Zones by Hashamkha Pathan walks through the steps involved of setting up a virtual MySQL Cluster setup on a single Solaris instance (for evaluation purposes only - this is probably not the best idea for a productive HA environment)
Mixing SQL and shell commands in MySQL by Amit Saha explains how to write scripts that execute both SQL statements and unix shell commands using the MySQL command line client
Improving filesort performance in MySQL by Neelakanth Nadgir provides some background information about MySQL's filesort operation that is being performed when records have to be sorted using ORDER BY.
Ubuntu, PHP, NetBeans - part I by Petr Pisl is the first part of an article series that will explain how to develop PHP/MySQL applications using NetBeans on Ubuntu Linux. This part describes the basic installation of the required LAMP stack components.

If you are would like to learn more on how to develop on NetBeans with using a MySQL Server and how to create web apps that use MySQL as a backend, take a look at these two tutorials:

Over on the Novell Cool Solutions pages (which are powered by Drupal, by the way), I found this introduction on how to set up MySQL replication by Damian Myerscough. It walks you through the steps involved in setting up a classical master-slave replication setup.

Stay up to date with what's cooking@MySQL: RSS feeds galore

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-07-02T21:18:14Z

Did you know that many parts of the MySQL web sites provide news and updates via RSS Feeds? Markus Popp from our web team did a great job on making some of these more visible by adding RSS icons to the respective pages. If you want to keep up with what's happing at MySQL, consider adding the following feeds to your feed reader:

New downloads on dev.mysql.com
New DevZone articles
PlanetMySQL (You probably knew that one already)
MySQL Forge - All New Items
MySQLForge Wiki - Recent changes
MySQL Announcements on Launchpad.net
Branch activity on Launchpad.net
New MySQL Training Courses
MySQL Live Web Seminars
MySQL OnDemand Web Seminars
Latest Quickpolls from MySQL AB
Latest Updates from MySQL AB
Latest Press Articles about MySQL AB
The MySQL Bug database allows you to subscribe to the results of any search using the 'Feed' link that can be found on the search result page.
The MySQL Forums provide an RSS feed for each forum, e.g. the Announcements Forum

Did I miss any? Do you know any other feed? Please let me know.

RSS feed readers exist for a wide range of platforms. I personally use Akregator, which is part of the KDE Desktop environment.

Gallery updates and new camera

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-07-02T14:05:56Z

Last weekend I finally found some time to upload pictures that I had taken during various events that I attended in the past few months. So here are my impressions from the following events:

These are probably the last pictures that I have taken with my trusty old Pentax Optio S4 - I just received my new camera, a Canon PowerShot A720 IS. I have just started to toy around with it, but the first results look promising! The Pentax served me well for several years - I've taken 9745 pictures with it. But it had a few deficiencies, particularly the slow startup and flash recharge time and the bad quality of pictures indoors bothered me for quite a while. But it is very small and handy and the metal housing makes it quite sturdy.

The first picture taken with my new camera: a picture of the old one.

And probably the last picture taken using the old camera: my new Canon.

The mylvmbackup source tree has moved to Bazaar/Launchpad

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-25T19:53:07Z

JFYI: today I migrated the mylvmbackup source tree from my local Subversion repository on http://www.lenzg.org/ to a Bazaar repository on Launchpad.net.

This will hopefully make it easier for contributors to work on the code and share their modifications with others, removing me as the bottleneck for applying and testing patches for new releases. I chose Bazaar primarily because I wanted to get some more hands-on practice with it, now that the MySQL Server source trees have been transferred to it as well (see Kaj's announcement for details).

As mylvmbackup is closely related to the MySQL Server project, it made sense to choose the same platform and enjoy the cross-pollination effects and the infrastructure that Launchpad provides. Additionally, the distributed nature of Bazaar makes it more convenient to work with the code history and commiting changes locally without having to be online and connected to the SVN server.

I am sure that other DSCMSs like Git, Mercurial or darcs would have done the job equally well - nowadays it's very hard to choose

The "trunk" branch is now hosted on Launchpad. I assume that I will soon open up a development branch, that will receive heavier modifications first. I also plan to use the site for bug tracking and keeping track of feature requests (via Blueprints).

To create a local branch of the "trunk" repository, you can use the following command:

bzr branch lp:mylvmbackup

I also maintain a copy of that branch on my home server, just in case: http://www.lenzg.org/bzr/mylvmbackup/

To avoid confusion, I removed the Subversion repository on http://www.lenzg.org. Please use the Bazaar tree on Launchpad from now on. Thanks!

Speaking about Bazaar and OpenSolaris at FrOSCon 2008 in St. Augustin, Germany

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-23T08:49:38Z

While we're on the topic of Bazaar - this week I got informed by the organizers of the FrOSCon 2008 conference that they accepted two of my talk proposals: one session will be an introduction to this source code management system (what a coincidence), the other one will be an introduction to OpenSolaris for Linux users, explaining some of the underlying technologies and how they differ from what a seasoned Linux user may be accustomed to.

And no, I have not given up on using Linux - quite the contrary! I have been very impressed by the latest OpenSUSE 11.0 release and already run it for since quite some time on several of my work systems. In fact, I already convinced several colleagues of mine to give it a try as well! I am amazed by the speed and "out of the box experience" of this version and I actually plan to install it on my Genesi Pegasos PowerPC machine as well, replacing Debian on there. But as a Sun employee, I of course have to familiarize myself with the other products and projects that we're involved in. And on the Server side, Solaris does have a few interesting features that Linux currently lacks. But I digress.

I look forward to speaking at FrOSCon again - it has been a great conference in the past two years. Very well organized, nice venue, a relaxed atmosphere and excellent technical sessions and speakers.

Other MySQLers submitted talks as well - for example, Giuseppe will give a presentation titled "MySQL Community How To", Susanne will give a PostgreSQL tutorial and others will participate in the separate PHP subconference. Don't miss it - this year's FrOSCon will take place on August 23rd&24th in St. Augustin, Germany (close to Bonn). For the first time, we will also try to set up a MySQL project table. So if you are there, make sure to stop by and have a chat with us!

The MySQL source code has moved!

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-19T21:17:13Z

Even though we had been preparing the migration to Bazaar for a while now, today's announcement kind of caught me by surprise. But I am very happy about this move!

While BitKeeper is an excellent tool and served us well the past eight (!) years, I was quite annoyed when BitMover decided to remove the fully functional free BitKeeper client, which effectively put our development back into a Cathedral: even though our source trees remained accessible via bkbits.net, the crippled bk client was only capable of cloning and pulling new revisions from there - it was not possible for an external developer to commit changes locally or to create patches. This turned out to become a severe roadblock for users that wanted to participate in the development of the server. While some of our other internal projects (like the documentation, connectors and GUI tools) moved to Subversion, this was not that easily doable for the MySQL Server source trees. Lots of internal processes and tools had been tightly coupled with the source code management and there never seemed to be the right time to make the switch, which potentially could have disrupted the ongoing development work.

By moving to a truly open, distributed revision control system, it will become much easier for external contributors to work on patches and maintain modifications or enhancements outside of the main MySQL Server source trees. In fact, work has already begun! When I look at the various repositories hosted on Launchpad.net, I already notice several source trees that are not maintained by MySQL Engineers, e.g. Marc Callaghan's Google patches, Percona's work on microsecond resolution or a branch of MySQL 5.0 that is maintained and used by the folks from Wikimedia. I too helped publishing a source tree today - Holyfoot's work on improving the GIS functionality is now also available from there! In addition to the MySQL Server, many other MySQL-related projects are hosted on LaunchPad. And by utilizing services like the fabolous OpenSUSE Build Service, it's actually quite easy to provide readily installable packages of these as well!

I hope this change will significantly lower the barriers for external contributors and make it easier for our own developers to merge and accept changes that have been created by others and received sufficient community testing. This is much more convenient than having to apply a patch that was posted a long time ago and may have already been abandoned by the contributor or suffered from bit-rot. Being able to maintain a patch within a live tree that can be kept in sync with the main repository is one of the great features of distributed revision control (and which I think is one of the technical reasons why the Linux Kernel development model works so well).

Kudos to everybody involved in making this happen!

Sun and MySQL Launch event in Munich, Germany on Thursday, 2008-06-26

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-18T11:12:15Z

If you happen to be in Munich, Germany next week, don't miss out the final Sun/MySQL launch event which will take place on Thursday, 26th of June at the "Sofitel Munich Bayerpost", Bayerstraße 12, D-80335 München.

Simon Phipps will speak about "Sun and Open Source - How it has changed the industry", Kaj Arnö will give a talk about the positioning, strategy and momentum of MySQL as a part of Sun. Other speakers include Donatus Schmidt (Marketing Director Sun Germany) and Ralf Gebhardt (Sales Engineer, MySQL). You can see the entire agenda here, you need to register here if you would like to attend.

Recording and slides of my Security & Backup webinar now available

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-18T10:21:19Z

I've just been informed that a PDF of my slides as well as a recording of yesterday's webinar about MySQL Backup and Security (in German) is already available for replay/review. You can access the files from our on demand webinars page (free registration required). Enjoy!

Webinar on 2008-06-17 (in German): MySQL Backup and Security best practices

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-06-16T22:35:20Z

If you are new to MySQL and would like to get an overview about some best practices for securing a MySQL server and some commonly used backup techniques, consider attending this webinar (in german), held by yours truly. It will take place this Tuesday (2008-06-17) at 15:00 CEST - participation is free of charge! This is my first attempt to perform a webinar, I usually give talks in front of a live audience... Let's see how it goes.

Please give us your feedback by taking the MySQL Magazine Survey!

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-05-27T10:24:54Z

If you are working with MySQL as a DBA or developer, I'd like to encourage you to consider taking the MySQL Magazine Survey, which was compiled by Keith Murphy and Mark Schoonover.

The survey takes around 10-15 minutes to complete and runs until June 16th. The results will be published in the summer issue of MySQL Magazine, due on July 15th. The questions cover a broad range of topics, from details about your MySQL experience and job description over connectors and languages to operating systems and MySQL versions.

Thanks in advantage for your support and input! The results of this survey will be interesting for us as well.

Sun & MySQL at Linuxtag 2008 Berlin (2008-05-28/2008-05-31)

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-05-26T08:00:23Z

From May 28th-31st, the annual LinuxTag will take place in Berlin, Germany. I followed the growth and evolution of LinuxTag from the very early days and I have fond memories of the event back when it still took place at the University of Kaiserslautern and our SuSE "booth" was just a regular table taken from the lecture rooms...

Things have evolved a lot since then. Today, LinuxTag is one of the largest Linux/Open Source Events in Europe and my new employer Sun is a major sponsor this year. In addition to several talks and keynotes, there will be a large Sun booth in the exhibition area (Booth #205) and we will have a dedicated MySQL demo pod! Some of the things we plan to demo there are the upcoming MySQL Server releases (5.1, 6.0 with Falcon and Online Backup), MySQL Workbench, MySQL Enterprise Monitor as well as how to combine these with other Sun products like Glassfish, NetBeans, OpenSolaris or OpenOffice.

Some other stuff that we will be showcasing on the Sun booth:

Be Brilliant Faster with OpenSolaris: Develop, Debug, Deploy Apps Faster with ZFS and Dtrace, OpenSolaris Live CD – Fast, Free, and Easy to Install
Virtualize Your Business with xVM and VirtualBox: OpenSolaris, Windows, Linux & Mac OS X Virtualized, Develop on VirtualBox, Deploy on xVM, Free & Open
Sun Studio Software for OpenSolaris and Linux: C/C++/Fortran Compilers and Tools, x86 and SPARC
Cool New Features in OpenOffice.org 3.0: Importing PDFs and Managing Appointments, now with full support for MAC OS X (Aqua)
Discovering Open High Availability Cluster: Overview about HA Clusters, Community Group Projects, Single Node Cluster – Service Failover between Zones
GlassFish - the Open Source Java EE 5 Application Server: JRuby/ Rails, Ajax & Comet

I look forward to being there! Please contact me, if you are interested in visiting Linuxtag and would like to receive a free pass!

MySQL won the LinuxJournal Readers' Choice Awards 2008!

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-05-05T15:36:04Z

There were free copies of the Linux Journal handed out to attendees outside in the hallways here at CommunityOne and I noticed that they just published this year's Readers' Choice Awards - MySQL was voted as the favourite database by 62.7% of their readers!

MySQL is not only the world's most popular open-source database, it's your favorite as well. Although PostreSGL,
SQLite, Firebird and others registered votes, the competition was not fierce. It doesn't hurt that MySQL runs on more than
20 different platforms.

Thanks a lot to the readers of LinuxJournal, we really appreciate the support!

Hello from San Francisco!

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-05-05T01:25:43Z

Just two weeks after having returned from the MySQL Conference, I just arrived safely in San Francisco again. This time to attend the CommunityOne on Monday and the JavaOne conference from Tuesday till Friday, which should keep me occupied for the rest of the week. I look forward to meeting my fellow MySQL team members (Colin, Giuseppe and Jay will be here, too), as well as many new colleagues from Sun! Shoot me an email, if you would like to meet.

Running Drupal 6 on MySQL 6 using the Falcon Storage Engine

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-04-28T15:22:31Z

This article describes how to install the Drupal 6.2 CMS on MySQL 6.0, using the Falcon Storage Engine. The operating system is a default Ubuntu 8.04 "Hardy Heron" (x86) installation.

I will make a few assumptions here, in order to keep the instructions simple: a fresh OS install, no other MySQL databases or web services are running or have already been installed. Both MySQL and the web server are installed on the same host. You should be able to become root to install packages and to have access to the local file system and the system configuration.

This article will explain how to install and configure Apache/PHP, MySQL 6.0 and Drupal 6.2.

Continue reading "Running Drupal 6 on MySQL 6 using the Falcon Storage Engine"

MySQL gems from Sun bloggers

nospam@example.com (Lenz Grimmer) — 2008-04-25T18:19:22Z

While being subscribed to the full blogs.sun.com feed certainly feels like drinking water from a firehose, every once in a while I stumble over very well-written and useful articles about MySQL. Below is a collection of helpful posts, especially if you run MySQL on Solaris (surprise!). And while I still am an avid Linux user, I must admit that Solaris has a few neat features - particularly DTrace and ZFS are quite intriguing. If only userland would not feel so weird for someone coming from a GNU/Linux background!

From Jenny Chen's blog:

From Ritu Kamboj's blog:

From Krish Shankar's Blog:

More to come in the near future!