in reply to Re: Database File Advice
in thread Database File Advice

Please stop suggesting MySQL for new starts. Read the MySQL gotchas about the failures.

If you want very fast and simple, use DBD::SQLite. If you want fast and full-featured, use PostgreSQL. MySQL just doesn't cut it any more. "MySQL is sooooo 90's".

-- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker
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Re: •Re: Re: Database File Advice
by chromatic (Archbishop) on Jan 13, 2004 at 21:14 UTC

    You know, that same site has PostgreSQL gotchas too.

    If someone said "Perl is soooo 90s, use Python instead", you'd likely object. Rightfully so — I would too.

    There are good reasons to use either database (and I've used both on different projects), but "it's soooo 90's" is not one of them. People who ask "which database should I use?" deserve better answers.

      In fairness to both of you, while chromatic is correct, and there is a PostgreSQL gotchas, it only has two entries, while the MySQL gotchas is a lot longer.

      MySQL is highly optimised for data retrieval, and is often the best choice for write-once read-many databases. This is what I ususally have, so I use it a lot. It is not necessarily the best choice for other situations. However, if you know it well, it is quite well-behaved.

      PostgreSQL is closer to something like Oracle in functionality, but that assumes that Oracle is what you want. Sometimes you do, but quite often you don't.

      There's a nice discussion from Philo Vivero has an interesting (and similar) perspective.

      --

      Anthony Staines

Re: •Re: Re: Database File Advice
by CountZero (Bishop) on Jan 14, 2004 at 07:32 UTC
    Everyone's mileage varies.

    I use MySQL a lot (indeed in "write once read many"-situations) and I'm quite happy with it, so I will keep suggesting it and you are free to tell people they should do something else.

    CountZero

    "If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll get a 4-pass compiler." - Conway's Law