

Robert Haas: MySQL vs. PostgreSQL, Part 2: VACUUM vs. Purge - rhaas
http://rhaas.blogspot.com/2011/02/mysql-vs-postgresql-part-2-vacuum-vs.html

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jpitz
The style of tradeoff taken, in both cases, really exemplifies the difference
in engineering priorities for MySQL and PostgreSQL. MySQL optimizes for reads,
at the expense of a higher write load. PostgreSQL optimizes more for writes,
at the expense of in-line bloat and reads.

When you go to scale out a RDBMS, traditionally you do it with single-master
multi slave replication, to scale reads. Today, that's not an inordinately
hard task. Scaling writes is a LOT harder, and I think PostgreSQL made the
better choice, in the end.

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mikeyk
Plus, PostgreSQL built in master-slave streaming replication in release 9, so
scaling out reads is even less of an issue.

