Looking for a database

[Uno Engborg]

Paul Smith wrote:
> On 1/30/06, Uno Engborg <uno at webworks.se> wrote:
>   
>>>> Could someone please recommend a nice and well documented database
>>>> program for a person who has never used a database?
>>>>         
>>> That's not much to go on when asking for a recommendation.
>>> The obvious choices on fedora will be MySQL and postgresql
>>> and between those, postgresql follows the sql standards
>>> more closely and has a less restrictive license.  Mysql
>>> might be slightly faster if your usage is mostly read-only.
>>>
>>>       
>> MySQL being faster is than postgresql is mostly a myth. It may be true
>> if you have very simple queries or very few connected users. In general
>> Postgresql is significantly faster.
>>
>> The MySQL is faster myth, goes back to the MySQL 3 days when that
>> actually was the  case,
>> mostly because MySQL back then didn't support transactions, or
>> referential integrety
>> checks while Postgresql did. (MySQL still doesn't fully support
>> referential integrety).
>>
>> As an example, I created a table containg absolute paths to filenames in my
>> filesystem, the file size and the md5 sum of the file. I then made a query
>> to group the files by the md5 sum, and ordering these groups by file size.
>> On my filesystem that took 12 minutes in postgresql 8.1, and over 16 hours
>> using mysql 5.
>>
>> To make it worse, MySQL doesn't have the richness in SQL that postgresql
>> offers. This often makes queries to MySQL more clumsy. E.g. try do a
>> relational
>> division without using "exept".
>>
>> Another factor in the choice between MySQL or Postgresql is the fact
>> that Oracle have bought the innodb
>> storage engine that is the main the one you need to use if you want to
>> come even close to the feature set of
>> postgresql does. In my mind, this creates some uncertainty for the
>> future. It gives a competitor the means
>> to shut down commersial licensing or raise the prices. That can never be
>> good.
>>
>> If I was to chose between Postgresql and another free database it would
>> be between Postgresql and Firebird,
>> where I would go for firebird for embedded solutions or when I needed to
>> have databases that resided in
>> just one file. Just like Postgresq, Firebird is very close to the sql
>> standard, but it is not as feature rich as Postgresql
>>     
>
> Thanks, Uno, for your very detailed explanation.
>
> As desktop databases for Linux, I guess one can only find OpenOffice
> Base and Kexi, is not it?
>
> Paul
>
>   
Is kexi a database in its own capacity? That was news to me. I thaught 
that it was
used as frontend to other databases, much as you can use OpenOffice to 
connect
to anything with ODBC  or JDBC.

If you count desktop frontends, you could also check out Rekall
http://www.thekompany.com/products/rekall/

If you are looking for an Access replacement, Firebird combined with 
OpenOffice Base,
Kexi, Rekall might do it.  Just like in Access, a in Firebird a database 
is just one file that you can store anywhere you
like in the file system (the Firebird engine must still be installed 
though).

Using Postgresql, would be more comparable to MS-SQLServer.
Unless you really don't need the one file feature of Firebird, I would 
suggest you go for postgresql, as it has much better free documentation, 
and better support in free other free software applications.

Regards
Uno Engborg