What is this - how you say - database transaction?

Remember back in college when we were taught that all "real" databases had transactions and foreign keys.

Remember when all those Postgress fanboys would make fun of anyone using MySQL because it was inferior since it lacked foreign keys?

Turns out they were all wrong.

Running without databases transactions can even be really fun. It's a bit like driving 120 Mph down the highway on a motorcycle without a helmet. Just don't crash and you'll be fine! This is how I stopped worrying and learned to love the auto commit.

With the recent Scaling eBay PDF I think we can put the final …

Useless Utilities #1

[Update 12/30/2006: Added Macworld Info and a Donation Button.]

[Update 12/20/2006: Added a small FaQ based on feedback.]

I created Keyboard Cleaner. It comes in handy when you want to clean your keyboard, but you are afraid you might trigger a command or change or delete some of your current work beyond repair and undo. Of course you could save and close everything. Sometimes however, it is just not what you want.

Enter Keyboard Cleaner. It shields your desktop and intercepts every keystroke you might accidentally make — except for Command-Q.

Needless to say that this was an educational project for me. While trying to create something like …

The MySQL Symposium will be organised from 5-7 March next year in Amsterdam

Next to me relating on my experiences with Cluster , there will be a lot of interresting speakers such as David Axmark , Ann Harrison , Mike Kruckenberg , Peter Zaitsev , Lenz Grimmer , and others

This is the European MySQL event not to miss next year !

mysql podcast

This week’s feature talks about ACID compliance, what it is, and how MySQL achieves it.

If folks have ideas or suggestions for content, please let me know by e-mailing podcast@sheeri.com or by leaving a comment.

You can Direct download all the oursql podcasts at:
http://technocation.org/podcasts/oursql/

Direct play this edition at:
http://tinyurl.com/yy7pgz

News
Download MySQL Turbo Manager Free Edition at: http://www.mentattech.com/themes/mentat/download.html

Wireless …

I’m involved in the authoring of two books at the moment - both using different tools, neither of which would be my choice if it was up to me. One is using DocBook, writing raw incredibly verbose XML… which honestly, isn’t that much fun. The other is in Microsoft Word (well, OpenOffice.org Writer for me). The last time I really used Microsoft Word really seriously was probably around 1998/1999 with Office 98 on the Mac. It was a pretty awesome suite of software actually. Especially after the update that fixed a few crashing bugs :)

One thing I do notice though is the collaboration tools in OOo Writer are nowhere near good enough. The notes are small yellow rectangles where you either have to hold the mouse cursor over them to read them (ick, slow) or double click them and scroll right forever to read the whole or in conjunction with the last way, use the object browser.

Also, track changes doesn’t really …

“How can you manage your cross-cultural teams at MySQL, with people from over 25 different countries, with a variety of nationalities, native languages, religions, political beliefs, and value systems? And how can you get anything done when four out of five MySQLers work out of their home office, not meeting regularly face to face?”

I would lie to you if I said that the above issues are easy. They aren’t. And that is why people frequently ask me those questions. Yet, the main challenge is not cultural diversity or virtual offices. The main challenge is timezones.

My direct reports work in my own timezone (Central Europe), but also on the US East Coast, on the US West Coast, and in Australia. This covers most of the timezones I actively work with, with the exception that I also have frequent calls with my colleagues in Finland (on Eastern European time), and sometimes with the …

One exercise in our MySQL 5.0 for Developers asks for the list of country names where people speak French but not English. Of course, the world sample database is required for this.

The typical solution which we also provide in ouur training material goes like this. SELECT Country.Name FROM Country JOIN CountryLanguage ON Country.Code=CountryLanguage.CountryCode WHERE CountryLanguage.Language='French' AND CountryLanguage.CountryCode NOT IN (SELECT CountryCode FROM CountryLanguage WHERE Language='English');

You can also use subselects only. SELECT Name FROM Country WHERE Code IN (SELECT CountryCode FROM CountryLanguage WHERE Language = 'French' AND CountryCode NOT IN (SELECT CountryCode FROM CountryLanguage WHERE Language = 'English'));

This weeks class came up with a simple solution not using any subselect at all.

Sql Server 2005 has a command line tool named sqlcmd. MySQL has a command line tool named mysql. Oracle has a command line tool called sqlplus. They can all be used for interactive query processing and batch scripts processing. They do similar things, albeit in different ways. They are functionally equivalent.

For Sql Server 2005, when in interactive mode of sqlcmd, use

:r c:MyFolderMyScript.sql

to read and execute a script file. You may have to type

go

afterwards, if the last line of the script file does not end with the word go.

To use sqlcmd in batch mode, that is, to run a sql script and then get out, use:

sqlcmd -i c:MyFolderMyScript.sql -S MyServerName -E

Replace -E with -U LoginName if you use Sql authentication

For MySQL, while in interactive mode of mysql, use

. c:MyFolderMyScript.sql (on Windows)

Note there should be a backward …

SugarCRM Announces 1,000 Customers and 1,000,000 Open Source Downloads, SugarCRM (Press Release)

solidDB for MySQL Sets Performance Record in Public Benchmark, Solid Information Technology (Press Release)

Scalix and SugarCRM Integrate Messaging and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) for Linux and Open Source Customers, Scalix / SugarCRM (Press Release)

Alfresco Announces First Embedded Enterprise Content Management System, Alfresco Software (Press Release)

Solegy …

Now, I should probably be a good Planet MySQLer and check the MySQL Forge at http://forge.mysql.com, but Dean Swift’s “mystery festive stored procedure” linked at http://deepselect.blogspot.com/2006/12/merry-christmas.html is a pretty good interview question for a candidate. I would include the hint that it’s a Christmasy stored procedure.

I laughed out loud when I figured it out. I didn’t actually run it, but read the stored procedure to see if I could puzzle it out. And so I did. It took a few minutes, and I had to copy and paste it to a buffer that used word wrap and format it properly.

But this will show how good someone is under pressure. If you give it to them and walk away, there will be less pressure. Either way, …