

Red Hat ditches MySQL, switches to MariaDB - Tsiolkovsky
http://www.itwire.com/business-it-news/open-source/60292-red-hat-ditches-mysql-switches-to-mariadb

======
easy_rider
I also dumped MySQL and started using and recommending MariaDB in production
since i've seen it resolve a lot of my hard fought battles with super complex
nested joins and index overloads. Queries that took 4.5s went to 450ms just by
dropping in this beauty. From then on I was on the bandwagon. Slow Wordpress
site with a ton of plugins that tries to solve everything? Now it can do it
within a timeframe thats acceptable. Ok your bottlenecks will still be there
somewhat.. abeit less apparent. But it just is faster and scales way more
predictable imo with hardware adapted configs.

~~~
rz2k
Did you also change the storage engine for a better fit with your data?

------
fhd2
It's pretty similar to the Hudson/Jenkins situation (also something acquired
by Oracle). Kind of sad when the original author has to fork his own project
to keep evolving it, but I'm glad they're apparently able to take a
considerable amount of users with them.

We also switched to MariaDB in production a while ago. Was absolutely
seamless.

~~~
dredmorbius
_Kind of sad when the original author has to fork his own project_ But pretty
awesome that Free Software gives him (or her) the right to do so. It used to
be you abandoned your code when acquired.

------
JimmaDaRustla
Not surprising since MariaDB is a drop in replacement for MySQL; daemon names
don't even change.

Not sure how the original developers can create a fork of a product they sold
for 1 billion? Oh well, better in their hands than Oracle's.

~~~
leef
> Oh well, better in their hands than Oracle's.

One might think that but it has surprisingly not been true.

Oracle, already the owner of InnoDB, now owning the entirety of mysql has been
able to stop fighting with Sun and push out awesome features at a high rate.
Just to name a few since Oracle took over:

* Big performance improvements for multi-core.

* Performance Schema

* Full-text engine for InnoDB

* Thread pools

* Improved support for SSD

* Online schema updates

MariaDB forked at 5.5 and is going to be missing lots of really nice features.
They can back port some of it but they aren't going to be able to keep up very
well. They have their own implementation of some of these features which,
given their small user base, I do not trust as much as the versions
implemented in MySQL proper.

Also given that MariaDB was forced to merge with SkySQL to survive I just
don't see a bright future for MariaDB as long as Oracle continues to improve
MySQL like it has been.

~~~
kryptiskt
> given their small user base

All the distros are switching to MariaDB.

~~~
gaius
... Which means nothing in and of itself. Where's the money coming from? If
you say nothing else for Oracle, say that they know where their bread's
buttered.

------
lotsofcows
When we first started to worry about mysql, we looked at the alternatives and
chose Percona. However, if this is in the base repo...

~~~
dredmorbius
Percona are part of the MariaDB foundation, though so far they still seem to
be based off of Oracle's MySQL sources.

Red Hat's announcement wasn't much of a surprise (Fedora had adopted MariaDB
some time ago, as has most of the rest of the known universe). A lot of
enterprises rely on Percona for support and consulting, however, and should
they make a switch, that's likely lights-out for MySQL. Though there's a low
probability Oracle would consider transferring the name to a community
foundation outside its control (the codebase really doesn't matter as it's
GPLd) and the name could continue forward.

It's a pretty powerful message of how branding isn't the end-all in Free
Software.

------
binarycrusader
In somewhat related news, I wonder how much longer MariaDB will be a "free for
all" given Monty's view on open source and open development seems to have
changed:

Fluffy summary:

[http://readwrite.com/2013/05/31/mysql-co-founder-wants-
you-t...](http://readwrite.com/2013/05/31/mysql-co-founder-wants-you-to-pay-
up-for-open-source)

Original interview:

[http://www.zdnet.com/open-source-its-true-cost-and-where-
its...](http://www.zdnet.com/open-source-its-true-cost-and-where-its-going-
awry-by-monty-widenius-7000016024/)

------
JeremyMorgan
The move from MySQL to MariaDB is one of the easiest decisions an admin can
make. I expect it to obliterate MySQL in short time.

------
sturadnidge
Also mentions MongoDB making it into RHEL 7... pretty interesting as well,
although I can't seem to find any other sources for that currently.

~~~
csears
They've announced [1] that RHEL 7 will be based on Fedora 18. Based on the
package updates list for mongodb [2], it looks like it will using MongoDB
version around 2.2.4. The source should be available via Fedora's normal
repos.

[1]: [http://www.h-online.com/open/features/Red-Hat-s-
RHEL-7-roadm...](http://www.h-online.com/open/features/Red-Hat-s-
RHEL-7-roadmap-1631791.html) [2]:
[https://admin.fedoraproject.org/updates/mongodb](https://admin.fedoraproject.org/updates/mongodb)

------
josephlord
The interesting question at this point is who is still using MySQL rather than
one of the alternatives?

I'm sure there are many that use the distribution default but I wonder if
anyone is actively choosing MySQL still.

~~~
Jagat
Twitter uses MySQL for all their data. They forked it and made tons of
improvements. Here's their blog [https://blog.twitter.com/2012/mysql-
twitter](https://blog.twitter.com/2012/mysql-twitter) and here's the project
[https://github.com/twitter/mysql](https://github.com/twitter/mysql)

~~~
justincormack
That's a fork, not sure it counts as using mysql unless they largely follow
upstream...

------
chiph
Do the current 3rd party tools work with MariaDB - SqlYog, etc.?

~~~
sehrope
Yes existing MySQL tooling works with MariaDB. The wire protocol is still the
same so existing MySQL drivers work to connect to MariaDB as well.

The reverse situation is also useful. The MariaDB client drivers can connect
to both MariaDB and MySQL instances yet are licensed LGPL (vs GPL for the
MySQL client drivers) which is great for closed source commercial products
(and general license compatibility).

We use it in the in house deployed version of our product (database client in
your browser[1]) and will be switching the cloud hosted version over to it
soon as well. No issues with it so far.

[1]: [http://www.jackdb.com/](http://www.jackdb.com/)

------
ciderpunx
I use MariaDB in production. It was totally trivial to drop it in as a MySQL
replacement and usually gets slightly better performance. Not to mention not
relying on Oracle who one can imagine might not want to give MySQL as much
love as it needs given their other database. So I can see why Redhat would
want to do that.

As for the name, MySQL was named after Monty's daughter My. MariaDB was named
after another daughter Maria
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Widenius](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Widenius)).
I think its sort of sweet. Maybe someone has a kid called Postgre? ;-)

~~~
selectnull
I wonder how My feels right now?

~~~
danso
At being slower than Maria? Or being completely interchangeable with her?
Family dinners must be awkward :)

On the other hand, both Maria and My are going to be celebrities at any
computer science department/startup incubator.

------
tzaman
Not judging the book by it's cover, but _MariaDB_ doesn't do the DB any
justice with this crappy name.

~~~
JimmaDaRustla
Ya, I don't like the name either, I think he named it after his kid?

~~~
modokode
Yes, well, he named MySQL after a daughter called My, too.

------
dschiptsov
It is not that MariaDB is any better, it is that Oracle is much bigger.)

Edit: It is all about InnoDB engine, which is _now_ developed and fixed by
Oracle. Others, notably Percona, have its own set of patches which adds some
features to what Oracle releases, while MariaDB is _mostly_ re-branding.

~~~
mathnode
MariaDB right now has working Multi-Source replication and GTID failover in
the MariaDB 10.0.3+ alphas.

They are also working on a new table discovery engine, which will bring
Transactional DDL to MariaDB, this to me makes MariaDB far more superior to
MySQL. They are innovating, and they are open about it.
[https://mariadb.atlassian.net/browse/MDEV-3808](https://mariadb.atlassian.net/browse/MDEV-3808)

Oracle have only innovated on the niggles of Mysql, like the unencrypted
~/.my.cnf files to appease their "Enterprise" customers.

