First, a bit of background information… MySQL has a variable called tmp_table_size which is used whenever a temporary table is needed for many types of operations, but it’s mainly used for ORDER BY and GROUP BY. The tmp_table_size variable (in correlation with the max_heap_table_size variable) decide at what point to convert an in-memory (that is, HEAP storage engine) temporary table to an on-disk (that is, MyISAM) one.

So, if the result of your query will end up greater than the lesser of tmp_table_size or max_heap_table_size, once it reaches that point, it will be automatically converted to a MyISAM table, on-disk (in tmpdir, incidentally).

Here’s a scenario: You have a SELECT query, nothing particularly special. It isn’t any more complex than another query on the same tables, but it performs a bit worse. You put some load on it, and it performs miserably, even putting the server in pain in the process. You check what’s …

No, this isn't about our multi-year extension of the InnoDB agreement with Oracle...  Instead, Apple has said that they will enable intel Mac users to run Windows.  Ok, they are doing it in an unsupported fashion with a bootloader called "Boot Camp" and customers need to install their own copy of Windows XP.  But still, it's a significant change of mind from Apple.  Well done guys!  Maybe Dvorak was right all along.

What's next?  Will Microsoft give a keynote at LinuxWorld?  Actually that happened this morning also, with Bill Hilf, General Manager of Platform Strategy.  …

The GUI tools team at MySQL has been working hard on a number of new releases including an update to the Migration Toolkit that provides many bug fixes as well as support for a broader range of source databases.  You can use the Migration Toolkit to go from any JDBC-supported database to MySQL 5.0 and there are also optimized migration modules for several versions back as well as the most recent versions of Oracle10g, Oracle XE, SQL Server 2005 and Access.

You can get the latest Migration Toolkit 1.0.25 below:

• MySQL: Migration Toolkit Downloads (1.0.25)
• MySQL: Migration …

This week at the EclipseCon in Santa Clara we announced that MySQL joined the Eclipse Foundation.  Admittedly, I wish we would have joined a long time ago (like maybe the first hundred times Mike and Donald asked us) but we finally got our ducks in a row.  To me Eclipse is one of the most successful and intriguing open source projects to date.  The entire process of open sourcing Eclipse was a masterpiece of strategy led by IBM that enabled them to create the best extensible tools platform.  There are really only two development tools platforms that matter: Eclipse and Visual Studio.  While both are open and extensible, only one of them is oopen source and cross-platform.

In fact, Eclipse has garnered support from more than 130 member firms and there are now more than 1000 Eclipse plug-ins and more than 60 projects …

At MySQL we've made a signficiant investment in expanding the community team.  This team is led by intrepid VP and multi-linguist Kaj Arno, and includes people on 3 continents who go out and spread the word of MySQL, help energize open source projects using MySQL, organize meetups, write occasional articles, and otherwise help make MySQL ubiquitous.  But there's always more that we could do.  Since we don't always know the answers, we thought we'd ask the community!

So here's an opportunity to influence things by letting the community team know your priorities.  There's a new quick poll on the MySQL developer zone asking quite simply: "What do you think the MySQL community team should focus on?"

• MySQL: Quick poll

Hacking the latest storage engine? Working on a fancy new SHOW command? Hunting for a bug in mysqld? This is for you!

Once you’ve got MySQL compiled, how do you test your mysqld binary? You’ll need to get it started. Stop! Don’t make install it!

1. Set up your sandbox

   $ mkdir ~/t
   $ vi ~/t/my.cnf
   

   Add the following to ~/t/my.cnf (modify to taste):

   [mysqld]
   basedir=sql
   datadir=/Users/jcole/t
   port=3307
   socket=/Users/jcole/t/mysql.sock
   skip-grant
   skip-innodb
   skip-bdb
           
   [client]
   port=3307
   socket=/Users/jcole/t/mysql.sock
   

2. Build your source
3. Set up a symlink for share

   $ ln -s . sql/share/mysql
   

   This, combined with the basedir=sql in my.cnf means that MySQL will be able to find its error message and character set files, so that the release you’re building doesn’t have to match the release installed on the …

The MySQL GUI team, under the leadership of graphical guru Mike Zinner, has posted a new beta version of MySQL Workbench.  This is a brand new graphical tool targeted to DBAs giving them a powerful graphical environment for modeling and managing database schemas.  This is an awesome tool that makes it easy to reverse engineer huge database schemas, maintain the model graphically, and it provides complete 2-way synchronization between the graphical model and the underlying database schema.  It provides automatic layout, customizable views, drag and drop capabilities and more. 

MySQL Workbench runs on …

Ok, I just had to laugh.  The Oracle FAQ site OraFAQ runs on... MySQL!   I guess it just goes to show how cost-effective open source is.  Here's some quotes from a thread on their discussion forum:

"Interesting - we don't run an Oracle database. But I suppose we ARE a free site so are probably a bit short of cash.

David "

...

"What cash? Every penny we make goes back into running and developing this site. There is no way we would be able to raise the money required to buy a commercial Oracle license.

Best regards.

Frank

To be honest, it's not a surprise.  There are tens of thousands of web sites that run MySQL ranging from the mega sites like Yahoo, Google, Craigslist, Travelocity, to many ecommerce sites, blogs, forums, and discussion sites.  After all, …

MySQL 5.0 has a ton of new features. In fact, several tons. Many people and companies were waiting endlessly for some of these features. Some of the new features include: Views, Stored Procedures and Stored Functions, Triggers, and some extra optimizations. Hoorah.

However, not all is peaches. In fact, there are few peaches to be found. Consider the rest of this post a bitch/complaint session and a call for a return to sanity. Let’s take a look at some of the major features of MySQL 5.0:

Views — Views are a …

In my long-running obsessive quest for the ultimate pocket PC, I was able to check out the OQO.  Peter Harvey, hot shot MySQL developer focused on ODBC, has one of these and he was gracious enough to give me some time on this thing.  (Frankly, he could have charged me $10 an hour.)  The OQO (pronounced just how it looks "oh-quo") was designed by some gurus out of Apple who developed the PowerBook laptops and have now focused their efforts on a super-portable Windows device that weighs less than a pound and fits in an inside jacket pocket. 

The latest version is the OQO+, which you can think of as OQO 1.1.  It's a minor update to the hardware with more memory …