Articles about MySQL

Featured Articles

MySQL Network and You (2005.02.15)
by Arjen Lentz
As news about MySQL Network is presented in the press, MySQL's Community Relations Manager Arjen Lentz explains what it all means for you, the MySQL Community, including developers.
MySQL Cluster: Two webserver setup (2005.02.08)
by Alex Davies
This HOWTO was designed for a classic setup of two servers behind a loadbalancer. The aim is to have true redundancy - either server can be unplugged and yet the site will remain up.
Securing a MySQL Server on Windows (2005.02.01)
At the end of January 2005 a new worm-like malware named Forbot spread across the Internet, targeting poorly configured MySQL installations and exploiting them to gain access to the Windows host machines. MySQL takes security very seriously and we are working on a set of proactive services to help alert you to bugs, security issues and new features.
Security Alert (2005.01.27)
Please read the security alert about the UDF Worm that can infect MySQL servers running on Microsoft Windows with poor firewall and password security. MySQL takes security very seriously and we are working on a set of proactive services to help alert you to bugs, security issues and new features.
Interview: Oleksandr "Sanja" Byelkin (2005.01.09)
by Arjen Lentz
Behind the software of MySQL AB are of course the people. The MySQL developers, and the many other colleagues around them, are the ones who are making it all happen: new features, bug fixes, support, etc. Some of you may have met a few of them already, either at a previous MySQL Users Conference, or another occasion. As Community Relations Manager, I recently had the privilege of meeting all our developers at an internal company meeting in Malta, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to start some interviews. In this series, I aim to show you the faces of at least some of these people.
What Makes a Good Product (2004.12.22)
by Arjen Lentz
It often appears that proponents of open source believe that open source does not actually require much in terms of marketing effort or product development. Seen as a form of evangelism, the open source message is regarded to be so compelling that, once delivered, the audience will "see the light" and convert. In this article, Arjen Lentz explores open source in the real world.
Creating a new storage engine for MySQL (2004.12.09)
by John David Duncan
The MySQL database server features a distinctive modular architecture. The core "upper level" features of the server, such as the network layer, SQL parser, and query optimizer, are separated from the underlying data storage by a well-defined interface. Adding a storage engine to MySQL is a fairly straightforward task, and in this article John David Duncan explains how to get started with your own storage engine.
Recovering from Crashes (2004.11.24)
by Guilhem Bichot
Guilhem Bichot shows how to use mysqldump and the MySQL binary log to take incremental backups that can be used to recover from various catastrophes that may disrupt your database server.
New in 4.1: All the Little Features (2004.11.24)
by Trudy Pelzer and Jim Winstead
We've covered the major features in 4.1, now we wrap up our 'New in 4.1' series with an article about all of the little features. But don't let their small size fool you, some of these features may be just what you've been needing from your database server.
New in 4.1: Structure Means Subqueries: Nesting SELECTs (2004.11.18)
by Trudy Pelzer
Subqueries are another way to get data from multiple tables using a single query, and MySQL 4.1 includes support for this standard SQL construct. Trudy Pelzer explains what this allows you to do, along with examples.
MaxDB & PHP - Ready for the Web! (2004.11.15)
by Ulf Wendel
MaxDB is ready for the Web! Or should I say ready for beginners? PHP is known as the “basic of the web”. Rasmus Lerdorf, the inventor of the popular web scripting language PHP used the comparison with BASIC to describe some of the strengths of PHP, the ease of use and the ease of learning. On MySQL ComCon Europe in Frankfurt (8-10.11.2004) a native PHP extension for MaxDB was announced that brings the power of MaxDB to all PHP users. So far MaxDB could only be accessed from PHP via ODBC, but now PHP has gained access to the full power of MaxDB through the new MaxDB extension.
New in 4.1: Temporal Functionality (2004.10.07)
by Trudy Pelzer
We continue our tour of new and improved features in 4.1 with a look at the changes to the temporal (date and time related) functionality, including support for fractional seconds, time zones, and a small army of new functions for slicing and dicing temporal information.
New in 4.1: Prepared Statements (2004.10.01)
by Harrison Fisk
In another look at a new 4.1 feature, Harrison Fisk explains the benefits (and trade-offs) of the new server-side prepared statements and the support for it from various programming languages.
Migrating to MySQL - Eliminating Risks and Hidden Costs Using Specialized Migration Software (2004.09.22)
For successful migration of enterprise databases running on Oracle, SQL Server, Informix and Sybase to MySQL, you have to choose tools that automate the entire migration process and avoid the risks and hidden costs associated with partial conversion. Dmitry Tolpeko of Ispirer Systems Ltd. explains the issues in migrating to MySQL, and takes a look at some tools to help the process.
New in 4.1: The all-new MySQL Server Windows Installer (2004.09.22)
A new feature just introduced with MySQL 4.1.5 is a totally revamped installer for the Microsoft Windows platform. Michael G. Zinner explains the new installer and how you can use it to get MySQL up and running even more quickly on Windows.
New in 4.1: Unicode and Other Funny Characters (2004.09.17)
We continue our tour of new features in MySQL 4.1 with a look at the extended character set handling, including support for Unicode. The article by Jim Winstead also includes a technique for handling UTF-8 data in web forms that copes with broken browser implementations.
New in 4.1: GIS and Spatial Extensions with MySQL (2004.09.09)
In this article, Anders Karlsson takes a look at the new spatial extensions in MySQL 4.1, which allow for easier manipulation and storage of spatial data in geographic information system (GIS) and non-GIS applications.
Interview: Catching up with Monty (2004.08.19)
Michael "Monty" Widenius is the CTO and co-founder of MySQL AB, and the original developer of much of the MySQL code base. Before Monty went into hiding to dive into work on new features for MySQL 5.0 (and spend time with his newborn daughter), we caught up with him on MySQL 4.1 and the state of the company from his point of view.
MySQL Tutorial, Chapter 10: Using Transactions with InnoDB Tables (2004.08.11)
by Luke Welling and Laura Thomson
In this sample chapter from MySQL Tutorial, published by MySQL Press, authors Luke Welling and Laura Thomson explain the basics of transactions, and how the InnoDB storage engine can be used to achieve ACID compliance.
The Full-Text Stuff That We Didn't Put In The Manual (2004.08.06)
by Peter Gulutzan
Peter Gulutzan takes a behind-the-scenes look at the full-text searching features in MySQL 4.1, including features and quirks not (yet) documented in the reference manual, and the complete default stopword list.
Database Migration from FileMaker to MySQL (2004.07.19)
by David Simpson (www.dotcomsolutionsinc.net)
David Simpson describes the procedures involved with migrating a FileMaker 6 database running on Windows to a MySQL database running on any platform. Additional info is included regarding changes to this procedure which are required to convert FileMaker 7 to MySQL.
Migrating from Microsoft SQL Server and Access to MySQL (2004.07.07)
by Mike Hillyer
Developers often ask for tools that can be used to convert an Access database to MySQL (or convert an MSSQL database to MySQL), without realizing that there is more to migrating an application to MySQL than simply converting data. This article covers the basics of migrating an application from an Access or SQL Server database to MySQL. You can also discuss migration issues on the beta MySQL Forums.
An Open Pre-Compiler for Embedded SQL (2004.06.18)
by Alan Walker and Mike Benzinger
Alan Walker and Mike Benzinger of Sabre Holdings share a new pre-compiler for writing C/C++ applications with embedded SQL they developed when making MySQL part of their open source strategy for the leading travel reservation system in the world.
An Introduction to Database Normalization (2004.06.02)
by Mike Hillyer
Normalizing your data is the most effective way to decrease storage requirements and increase data integrity. In this article, MySQL AB's Mike Hillyer covers the basics of data normalization.
High Performance MySQL, Chapter 7: Replication (2004.05.26)
by Jeremy Zawodny and Derek Balling
This sample chapter from High Performance MySQL covers Replication.
High Performance MySQL, Chapter 6: Server Performance Tuning (2004.05.19)
by Jeremy Zawodny and Derek Balling
This sample chapter from High Performance MySQL covers server performance tuning.
The MySQL SET Datatype (2004.05.12)
by Mike Hillyer
In this article, Mike Hillyer explains the SET datatype, one of the less-well-known MySQL datatypes that could help you optimize your applications. The SET datatype is a string type, but is often referred to as a complex type due to the increased complexity involved in implementing them. A SET field can hold any number of strings from a predefined list of strings specified during table creation.
MySQL Storage Engine Architecture, Part 3: Details and Comparison (2004.05.05)
by Arjen Lentz
In this part of the series, we compare key aspects of the most popular storage engines, and provide you with guidelines and practical examples to help you decide which engine may be best suited for a particular purpose.
MySQL Storage Engine Architecture, Part 2: An In-Depth Look (2004.04.28)
by Arjen Lentz
MySQL Server features a concept called storage engines, or table types. The server and, in fact, the developer, can choose how and where a database table is to be stored. Programmatically this is nothing special; it is normal practice to divide a program into modules and layers. But it is unique for a DBMS (Database Management System) because a developer or, even, a DBA (Database Administrator) is traditionally insulated from the physical storage methods that the database server may employ. How the data is stored really does not concern them, as the server just takes care of everything. That being the case, a developer or DBA could benefit from knowing a bit more about such things as it may help them to optimize applications. This is an angle that may be applied to many aspects of database servers, but in this article we'll focus on the storage engines.
MySQL Storage Engine Architecture, Part 1: An Overview (2004.04.06)
by Arjen Lentz
MySQL Server features a concept called storage engines, or table types. The server and, in fact, the developer, can choose how and where a database table is to be stored. Programmatically this is nothing special; it is normal practice to divide a program into modules and layers. But it is unique for a DBMS (Database Management System) because a developer or, even, a DBA (Database Administrator) is traditionally insulated from the physical storage methods that the database server may employ. How the data is stored really does not concern them, as the server just takes care of everything. That being the case, a developer or DBA could benefit from knowing a bit more about such things as it may help them to optimize applications. This is an angle that may be applied to many aspects of database servers, but in this article we'll focus on the storage engines.
Visual Basic / MySQL Datatypes (2004.01.22)
by Mike Hillyer
Visual Basic can be very loose with it's data types. If you want to avoid worrying about which type of data is coming from your database, you can simply not specify a datatype when you declare a variable, which defaults the datatype to variant. The variant should be avoided whenever possible, as it can be very CPU and memory intensive. This article demonstrates the different MySQL and VB6 datatypes and how they correlate.
CursorTypes, LockTypes, and CursorLocations (2004.01.22)
by Mike Hillyer
One of the most common sources of trouble for the beginning VB / MySQL developer seems to revolve around which cursor location to use. Related to the cursor location problem is the choice of cursor type and lock type. The purpose of this article is to assist the Visual Basic developer in choosing the proper cursor location, cursor type, and lock type to use when programming Visual Basic (or VB) applications that use MySQL as a back-end database through ADO and Connector/ODBC (MyODBC).
Why VB/MySQL (2004.01.22)
by Mike Hillyer
Mike Hillyer explains why he thinks Visual Basic and MySQL are an ideal combination for application development, and the motivation for his continuing series of articles on the subject.
Accessing MySQL BLOB columns using Visual Basic 6 (2003.12.02)
by Mike Hillyer
Mike Hillyer explains how to work with BLOB columns using the ADO 2.5 stream object.

Articles on MySQL.com

Employee interviews

MySQL articles elsewhere

Connecting the MySQL GUI Tools to a Remote Server through a Firewall by Mike Hillyer, December 2004.
HP ProLiant server configurations for MySQL in a scale-out architecture, Hewlett-Packard Development Company, September 2004.
Database Templates with MySQL by Russell Dyer for O'Reilly ONLamp.com, March 2004.
Using MySQL from PHP, Part 1 (and Part 2) by John Coggeshall for O'Reilly ONLamp.com, February and March 2004.
Implementing High Availability in MySQL, KarKomaOnline, January 2004.
Open Database Connectivity in Jaguar by Andrew Anderson for O'Reilly MacDevCenter.com, June 2003.
OpenOffice.org 1.0, ODBC, and MySQL 'How-to' by John McCreesh, April 2003
Secure MySQL Database Design by Kristy Westphal for Security Focus, February 2003
HOWTO - Migrating from Microsoft Access to MySQL by Paul DuBois, January 2003
How to use Access 2000 as a database front end by Sanders Kaufman, Jr. for Builder.com, October 2002
Six Reusable PHP/MySQL functions by Sanders Kaufman, Jr. for Builder.com, July 2002
MySQL Performance Tuning: Making sure your MySQL server flies by Jeremy Zawodny for Linux Magazine, December 2001
MySQL Performance Tuning: How to Write Efficient MySQL Applications by Jeremy Zawodny for Linux Magazine, June 2001
MySQL on Mac OS X by Jay Greenspan for Apple Internet Developer, November 2002

Slides from conference presentations

Scaling MySQL and PHP by Jeremy Zawodny, presented at the 2002 PHP Conference
Managing MySQL Replication by Jeremy Zawodny, presented at the 2002 O'Reilly Open Source Conference
MySQL Backup and Recovery by Jeremy Zawodny, presented at the 2002 O'Reilly Open Source Conference
MySQL Optimization by Jeremy Zawodny, presented at the 2002 O'Reilly Open Source Conference

Sites offering MySQL related articles (new items appear regularly on these sites!)

We are always looking for interesting articles about MySQL! Have you written something and would like to it published here? Please contact us via feedback form »

Articles about MySQL

Featured Articles

Articles on MySQL.com

Employee interviews

MySQL articles elsewhere

Slides from conference presentations

Sites offering MySQL related articles (new items appear regularly on these sites!)

Related pages: