Following my implementation of UltimateLAMP, read heaps more at this thread, I undertook to provide customisations of a MediaWiki Installation. Here is the first lesson that you can undertake if you wish to beautify the default MediaWiki Installation.

For the purposes of this demonstration, I am going to help out Jay & Colin and propose a restyle the MySQL forge to fit in with the default Home Page. Hopefully you will see it there soon!

For the full lesson Read More Here

Lesson 1 - Updating the default Monobook.css

There are several different ways to make style changes, the simpliest is to customise the system …

As I discussed earlier in A picture can tell a thousand words, I outlined briefly what the intention of UltimateLAMP was for. Let me spill the beans so to speak.

What is UltimateLAMP?

UltimateLAMP is a fully functional environment allowing you to easily try and evaluate a number of LAMP stack software products without requiring any specific setup or configuration of these products. UltimateLAMP runs as a Virtual Machine with VMware Player (FREE). This demonstration package also enables the recording of all user entered information for later reference, indeed you will find a wealth of information already available within a number of the Product Recommendations starting with the supplied Documentation.

My executive punch line with the “right” buzz words is:

You have heard of all the hype in …

I’m a keen advocate of MySQL. However, while I use it and promote it within my limited IT circles, I often wonder how MySQL can get better traction and exposure, especially within both the industry sectors and physical locations where I am presently.

This presents a dilemma, it’s almost like the term that has been used in Venture Capital, and in the well named book, Crossing the Chasm. I see and believe that MySQL already has good penetration within certain industry sectors, specifically Internet Based, Startup Based, or Small Based segments. However, I’m sure within other commercial sectors, MySQL has either a token exposure or little to no exposure at all, at least in the circles I mix with.

So how can MySQL the product and MySQL AB the company get both better exposure and …

I’ve started now to actively use more of the MySQL Workbench, MySQL Administrator and MySQL Query Browser and MySQL Migration Toolkit. I am traditionally a very command line person, and it’s important that these skills are never put on the back burner. For all those budding Developers and DBA’s you need these skills, expecially for any MySQL Certification.

To indicate my indent, I’ve even created a new blog category specifically for MySQL GUI Products.
As I’ve mentioned previously, Mike Zinner from MySQL AB really …

I don’t get to the MySQL Developer Zone main page often enough. In thinking about what pages I view everyday or regularly, it doesn’t rate as high as Planet MySQL, MySQL Forums or even the MySQL Forge.

I was most dissappointed in the results of a recent poll What did you think of the 2006 Users Conference?. The top response was I had no idea there was a Users Conference. That’s not good to see this.

An interesting poll What are you most looking forward to at the MySQL Users Conference (April 24-27)?, the clear …

Jay Pipes is a co-author of the recently published Pro MySQL recently spoke at Google on MySQL Performance Tuning Best Practices

You can check out a video of the presentation on Google Video

There is also a good video from Google called The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less.

riteshn asked me about books I would recommend people to read to learn more about database design. This list is not all that original, but when I find that I am looking for a reference book these are the books I constantly return to:

Readings in Database Systems : Fourth Edition
Database Systems: The Complete Book
…

Finally back home after some R&R at Yosemite before leaving the US. In conclusion, to sum up my experience of the 4th Annual MySQL Users Conference “Excellent”.
Here’s my take. Friends, Functionality & New Features, the Future.

Friends

I’ve used MySQL now for over 6 years, and full time for a number of years, yet I’ve only become active in the MySQL community, particularly Planet MySQL in the past 6 months. Over that time, I’ve read a lot from members, and heard from many people. It was great at the conference to meet many of these people for the first time. The list includes: Community Members - Frank Mash, …

Round 2. Question 2? From the MySQL Quiz Show. (you had to be there)

Another one of the sessions at the MySQL Users Conference I attended was Tuning MySQL5 SQL and Stored Procedures by Guy Harrison from Quest Software. A global company with 6000+ customers.

Guy has written a number of Oracle Performance Books in the past. His work now is on the “Spotlight” product family - Database diagnositic tools converting data to graphical representations. For these products, MySQL 5 and InnoDB only is necessary, simply due to accessing the right internal information for presentation. There are Freeware MySQL product downloads.

In this presentation he stated, nothing he was talking about specifically was relatively new. He did make quite a funny comment, “He is now seeking refugee status in the MySQL …