Re: drupal.org MySQL database issues

[Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com>]

Brian, Jeff,

> > I have never understood the purpose of having more than one "backend" to
> > the database.  As near as I can figure, it's only purpose is to allow
> > people to pick the wrong one.

Well, the real purpose of the backend storage engines is to make MySQL into 
more than one kind of database.  MyISAM is for a single-user DB, InnoDB is 
for transactions, NDB is clustered & object, Ericsson is telecom, MemDB is 
in-memory, etc.  It makes up for the fact that MySQL does not excel in any 
one database category if it is percieved to be adequate in all categories.

> In MySQL, changing the "storage engine" can break user queries and
> always requires a full data migration to the new format.

Sure, but MySQL users and potential users don't perceive it that way -- they 
encounter the problems only long after they've made hard-to-revoke decisions 
to adopt MySQL.  MySQL is still much, much better at marketing than we are.

-- 
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL @ Sun
San Francisco