Re: What can we learn from MySQL?

On Fri, 23 Apr 2004, Bruce Momjian wrote:

> Here is a blog about a recent MySQL conference with title, "Why MySQL
> Grew So Fast":
>
> http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/4715
>
> and a a Slashdot discussion about it:
>
> http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/04/20/2229212&mode=nested&tid=137&tid=185&tid=187&tid=198
>
> My question is, "What can we learn from MySQL?" I don't know there is
> anything, but I think it makes sense to ask the question.

My immediate rhetorical response is "What could the Tortoise learn from
the Hare?"

I think we all know which is which in my question.

> Questions I have are:
>
> o Are we marketing ourselves properly?

I'm never sure about this. I think the best marketing is experienced
users selling pg to their bosses one at a time. While our MSSQL servers
at work have died under load innumerable times, our small collection of
postgresql servers (one's so old and embedded it's running 6.4) have been
very reliable. So, slowly but surely, PostgreSQL is proving itself here.

> o Are we focused enough on ease-of-use issues?

Enough for me, but I don't think databases should necessarily be all that
easy to use by people who don't understand basic relational theory. So
for me, ease of use means things like transactable DDL and well indexed,
well written documentation. I suspect ease of use for my boss is
something entirely differnt, and may have to do with why he bought the EMS
postgresql manager packages he did.

> o How do we position ourselves against a database that some
> say is "good enough" (MySQL), and another one that some
> say is "too much" (Oracle)

Hey, we're like the porridge in goldilock's, just right... :-)

dba folks don't pick MySQL, because it's so limited and basically has
so many bugs (it's a feature that we don't bounds check data!) And it's
pretty easy to get an Oracle guy to play with postgresql when you show him
things like transactionable DDL.

> o Are our priorities too technically driven?

I don't think so. But I'm a database / coder geek. :-)