Re: Best database for web backend on Linux?

Michael Peppler wrote -

> MySQL is fast, but it doesn't have transactional integrity (as far as
> I know).

That's right. While PostgreSQL has support for transactions, MySQL doesn't, and this was one of the major reasons it took quite a while for me to decide which way to go. A work-around for now with MySQL is to use LOCK TABLES / UNLOCK TABLES.

A couple more things that MySQL doesn't do -

o MySQL doesn't do SUB-SELECT and SELECT INTO TABLE. (Can do   SELECT INTO ... OUTFILE... that's the work-around). o MySQL doesn't support VIEWs (this one was hard to take for me). o MySQL doesn't support COMMIT-ROLLBACK. o GRANT in MySQL doesn't do anything. Tweak the privilege table   to modify the grant permissions, instead.

However, I've chosen to go with MySQL because (1) it is real fast, (2) the developer folks on MySQL are very active (so are the folks on PostgreSQL), (3) it has some nice extensions such as AUTO_ICREMENT [at the risk of being incompatible from other SQL92 servers]. A simple configure-time switch allows to support 2-byte characters (so does PostgreSQL). Support by DBI and PHP3 are very good (they support other SQL servers well, too).

• Nobu Toge (toge_at_lcdev.kek.jp) KEK, High Energy Accelerator Research Org. Tsukuba, Japan