Re: Open Source Database Routs Competition in New Benchmark Tests

At 11:12 AM 8/15/00 +0200, Kaare Rasmussen wrote:

>This is the first benchmark saying that PostgreSQL is actually faster
>than MySQL. And as we all know, benchmarks can be stretched any way you
>like it, so that's why I'd like some comments before I go out and
>advocate too strongly :-)

Good scaling characteristics are a lot more important than raw speed
for the web environment, at least, where short, quick queries to
personalize content, etc are the rule. If only a couple of folks
are using the site simultaneously, who cares if it takes an
extra 50 milliseconds to return the page? If I've got a hundred
users on my site, though, and the database engine "starts falling
apart around 40-50 users", then I'm in deep doo-doo.

In practice, MySQL users have to implement the atomic updating of
a set of tables "by hand" using special locking tables, etc. All
the cruft surrounding this is not very likely to be more efficient
than the built-in transaction code of a real RDBMS. When people
talk about the raw speed of MySQL they forget that working around
its table locking granularity and lack of transaction semantics
is a pain that costs CPU as well as programmer cycles.

I came back to Postgres after rejecting it for website development
work when I heard that MVCC was replacing the older table-level
locking model. I've never been excited about MySQL for the same
reason (among many others).

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <dhogaza(at)pacifier(dot)com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, Pacific Northwest
Rare Bird Alert Service and other goodies at
http://donb.photo.net.