Resources for Postgres and MySQL comparison presentation?

I'm giving a talk at a developer conference in May titled, "Move over
MySQL, make room for PostgreSQL". I've gone through the PG advocacy
site and searched around for relevant content on top of what I've
already come up with. I was hoping folks here might have links to
recent content or talks?

It's aimed at convincing people to give PG a try for projects on which
they currently use MySQL. I think I have a good base so far but I'm
always interested in great resources to make it better.

Thanks!

Brian

On 3/22/09 6:30 PM, Brian Ghidinelli wrote:
>
> I'm giving a talk at a developer conference in May titled, "Move over
> MySQL, make room for PostgreSQL". I've gone through the PG advocacy site
> and searched around for relevant content on top of what I've already
> come up with. I was hoping folks here might have links to recent content
> or talks?

Where is the conference?

> It's aimed at convincing people to give PG a try for projects on which
> they currently use MySQL. I think I have a good base so far but I'm
> always interested in great resources to make it better.

My advice is *not* to try to convince people. Instead, just say,
"here's the things which PostgreSQL is good for, and the reasons why
you'd want to use it." Trying to convince people PostgreSQL is "better"
just gets their back up.

--Josh

Hi Brian,
Sounds like an interesting talk. I assume you are including one of the more
compelling reasons for PostgreSQL vs. MySQL, which is licensing:

MySQL: GPL 2.0. Free but with some very strict obligations.
PostgreSQL: BSD 2.0. Free and with very simple obligations.

This is not an important issue for developing software for personal or
in-house use, but a critical decision for the development of any software to
be distributed or sold outside one's own organization.

Cheers,
Dennis Clark

On Sun, Mar 22, 2009 at 6:30 PM, Brian Ghidinelli <brian(at)pukkasoft(dot)com>wrote:

>
> I'm giving a talk at a developer conference in May titled, "Move over
> MySQL, make room for PostgreSQL". I've gone through the PG advocacy site
> and searched around for relevant content on top of what I've already come up
> with. I was hoping folks here might have links to recent content or talks?
>
> It's aimed at convincing people to give PG a try for projects on which they
> currently use MySQL. I think I have a good base so far but I'm always
> interested in great resources to make it better.
>
> Thanks!
>
>
> Brian
>
>

--
Dennis M. Clark
OSS Analyst
http://www.nexb.com
http://www.EasyEclipse.org

> My advice is *not* to try to convince people. Instead, just say,
> "here's the things which PostgreSQL is good for, and the reasons why
> you'd want to use it." Trying to convince people PostgreSQL is
> "better" just gets their back up.

Most effective means of discussing MySQL vs. PostgreSQL is citing
organizations who have moved from MySQL to PostgreSQL and why.

Most people project out their own current database limitations through
association with others who have dealt with similar problems. The
wide range of "why" would be interesting to catalogue but my
experience has been that it's the usual suspects for mysql: table
locking, query planner, slow roll backs, frequent data corruption,
performance of interleaved reads and writes, performance on large data
sets and lack of table inheritance.

A recent surprise motivator for someone to switch was PostgreSQL's
EXPLAIN ANALYZE and the value that provided their engineers in terms
of feedback.

Talking about why someone should is often interpreted as "you made the
wrong decision" and leads to defensiveness.

Good luck! -sc

--
Sean Chittenden
sean(at)chittenden(dot)org

Josh Berkus wrote:
> Where is the conference?

It's cf.Objective() in Minneapolis, a conference for ColdFusion/Java
developers in May.

> My advice is *not* to try to convince people. Instead, just say,
> "here's the things which PostgreSQL is good for, and the reasons why
> you'd want to use it." Trying to convince people PostgreSQL is "better"
> just gets their back up.

That's the tack I'm taking, but we *are* trying to convince them. :)

Dennis Clark wrote:
> MySQL:� GPL 2.0.� Free but with some very strict obligations.
> PostgreSQL:� BSD 2.0.� Free and with very simple obligations.

Thanks Dennis - I had touched on the PG license but hadn't specifically
compared it to MySQLs!

Is there a repo of people who have switched from MySQL to PG? I have
seen the "who is using" list that includes Hi5, etc, but there aren't
really many details associated with it. A couple of off-the-cuff
conversion stories with some numbers associated would be useful.

Thanks for all of the feedback!

Brian

We switched from MySQL to PostgreSQL at Redfin. Here are a couple posts
from some other developers (perhaps a little dated and/or naive, but
potentially helpful).

http://blog.redfin.com/devblog/2008/02/mysql_to_postgres.html

http://blog.redfin.com/devblog/2007/11/elephant_versus_dolphin_which_is_faster_which_is_smarter.html

-Mose

On Mon, Mar 23, 2009 at 11:41 AM, Brian Ghidinelli <brian(at)pukkasoft(dot)com>wrote:

>
> Josh Berkus wrote:
>
>> Where is the conference?
>>
>
> It's cf.Objective() in Minneapolis, a conference for ColdFusion/Java
> developers in May.
>
> My advice is *not* to try to convince people. Instead, just say, "here's
>> the things which PostgreSQL is good for, and the reasons why you'd want to
>> use it." Trying to convince people PostgreSQL is "better" just gets their
>> back up.
>>
>
> That's the tack I'm taking, but we *are* trying to convince them. :)
>
> Dennis Clark wrote:
>
>> MySQL:� GPL 2.0.� Free but with some very strict obligations.
>> PostgreSQL:� BSD 2.0.� Free and with very simple obligations.
>>
>
> Thanks Dennis - I had touched on the PG license but hadn't specifically
> compared it to MySQLs!
>
> Is there a repo of people who have switched from MySQL to PG? I have seen
> the "who is using" list that includes Hi5, etc, but there aren't really many
> details associated with it. A couple of off-the-cuff conversion stories
> with some numbers associated would be useful.
>
> Thanks for all of the feedback!
>
>
> Brian
>

Oops, sorry, that maybe sounds like I'm calling people naive... I just mean
these posts were written with only a few months of Postgres experience, and
database expertise is a long and winding road we are all still trudging
down.

-Mose

On Mon, Mar 23, 2009 at 11:42 AM, Mose <mose(dot)andre(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:

> We switched from MySQL to PostgreSQL at Redfin. Here are a couple posts
> from some other developers (perhaps a little dated and/or naive, but
> potentially helpful).
>
> http://blog.redfin.com/devblog/2008/02/mysql_to_postgres.html
>
>
> http://blog.redfin.com/devblog/2007/11/elephant_versus_dolphin_which_is_faster_which_is_smarter.html
>
> -Mose
>
>
> On Mon, Mar 23, 2009 at 11:41 AM, Brian Ghidinelli <brian(at)pukkasoft(dot)com>wrote:
>
>>
>> Josh Berkus wrote:
>>
>>> Where is the conference?
>>>
>>
>> It's cf.Objective() in Minneapolis, a conference for ColdFusion/Java
>> developers in May.
>>
>> My advice is *not* to try to convince people. Instead, just say, "here's
>>> the things which PostgreSQL is good for, and the reasons why you'd want to
>>> use it." Trying to convince people PostgreSQL is "better" just gets their
>>> back up.
>>>
>>
>> That's the tack I'm taking, but we *are* trying to convince them. :)
>>
>> Dennis Clark wrote:
>>
>>> MySQL:� GPL 2.0.� Free but with some very strict obligations.
>>> PostgreSQL:� BSD 2.0.� Free and with very simple obligations.
>>>
>>
>> Thanks Dennis - I had touched on the PG license but hadn't specifically
>> compared it to MySQLs!
>>
>> Is there a repo of people who have switched from MySQL to PG? I have seen
>> the "who is using" list that includes Hi5, etc, but there aren't really many
>> details associated with it. A couple of off-the-cuff conversion stories
>> with some numbers associated would be useful.
>>
>> Thanks for all of the feedback!
>>
>>
>> Brian
>>
>
>

The biggest one is transactional DDL for me.

http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Transactional_DDL_in_PostgreSQL:_A_Competitive_Analysis

Miho Ishikura

On Sun, Mar 22, 2009 at 6:30 PM, Brian Ghidinelli <brian(at)pukkasoft(dot)com> wrote:
>
> I'm giving a talk at a developer conference in May titled, "Move over MySQL,
> make room for PostgreSQL".  I've gone through the PG advocacy site and
> searched around for relevant content on top of what I've already come up
> with.  I was hoping folks here might have links to recent content or talks?
>
> It's aimed at convincing people to give PG a try for projects on which they
> currently use MySQL.  I think I have a good base so far but I'm always
> interested in great resources to make it better.
>
> Thanks!
>
>
> Brian
>
>