
How companies use RethinkDB in production - TheMissingPiece
http://rethinkdb.com/blog/case-studies/
======
robert-zaremba
At AgFlow ([http://www.agflow.com](http://www.agflow.com)), we've been using
RethingDB for 2 years (since version 1.3 to 2.0). Eventually we migrated to
PostgreSQL. The query language from RethinkDB is very powerful. But it's
nothing compared to SQL when it goes to expressiveness and performance (at
least on PostgreSQL). ReQL is deceptive. It performs well as long as you don't
embed JavaScript or don't do sophisticated joins (even based on indexes). When
doing more complicated queries it becomes very ugly and slow.

Our main motivations for migration was:

    
    
        * transactions
        * performance  
        * tool kits around SQL  
    

We are very happy after migration. Backup process is way faster. I think there
is only one place where RethinkDB is better then PostgreSQL: replication +
automatic failover. If your data is not in TB, then I wouldn't recommend
Rethinkdb. World with relational DB, transactions, pl/sql, pub/sub, GiS, data
constrains, stability... offered by PostgreSQL is way easier, reliable and
offers better performance.

~~~
vruiz
> I think there is only one place where RethinkDB is better then PostgreSQL:
> replication + automatic failover.

I was about to ask. Are you guys running a single server deployment? Because,
while I haven't used RethinkDB yet, it appeals to me precisely because
PostgreSQL is an absolute pain to operate beyond single node setups. I've
heard citusdb tries to tackle this, I don't know if they succeeded but still
it doesn't look nearly as friendly as RethinkDB.

~~~
neumino
I tried pg_shard a few months ago and after a few hours, I gave up. I somehow
remember that partitioning MySQL was easier, and that's not a compliment.

~~~
spathak
Sumedh from Citus Data here. I'd love to hear what difficulties you ran into,
or any feedback you may have on pg_shard. My email is in my profile if you
want to drop me a note.

We are also actively working on making our products easier to use and would
love to get more user input along that way.

~~~
neumino
It was mostly a lack of docs. Most of the documentation assumes citusDB, and
how to get things work without citusDB is left out.

------
MoOmer
I'm torn between supporting open source businesses, and calling this and
almost all of your previous submissions spam.

~~~
codexon
Rethinkdb was seeded by ycombinator and Andreessen Horowitz.

There is no way these posts would ever get removed even if most people did
feel it was "spam".

~~~
coffeemug
Dang is incorruptible (which is why YC put him in charge of HN). He couldn't
care less if someone was funded by YC, A16Z, or POTUS. If enough people flag
something as spam (or he felt something is spam), the post would removed
faster than we could blink.

~~~
codexon
Isn't he being paid by YC though? And there are frequently special hiring
threads for YC companies.

Anyway there's a very thin line between spam and not spam, and is generally
based on whatever people want to see at the time.

~~~
TheMissingPiece
Totally agree. Which is why I'm telling you this isn't spam :) I wanted to
post something to answer a lot of people's questions, plus it's a fun project
to work on. If people want to watch it, that makes me happy. If they don't,
then don't click, ya know?

~~~
SamReidHughes
It totally is spam. It's three short commercials. Hell, it's spam for multiple
companies at once, it's like, quadruple-spam.

