Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2004 07:51:08 -0400
From: Andrew Sullivan <ajs@crankycanuck.ca>
To: pgsql-general@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: Replication
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On Tue, Apr 20, 2004 at 11:26:24AM +0200, Pailloncy Jean-G?rard wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I just see that Mysql will propose at the end of the month a full 
> synchronous replication system with auto-recovery.

Well, sort of.  It seems to be yet another 80/20 Solution From MySQL
(tm).

It looks like it's based on a new table type.  It stores everything
in memory, and then writes out asynchronously.  This strikes me as
pretty dangerous from the point of view of reliability: what if the
box dies before the write is complete?  (And don't tell me about
super-redundant high-availability hardware.  I _have_ all that.  All
hardware sucks; HA stuff just sucks less often at a higher price.)
Also, it doesn't support the other table types.  I don't want to
contemplate the horrible mess you'd have to clean up if you had a
transaction crossing three table types and get a hardware failure. 

I'm afraid I agree with the recently-posted Oracle Veep interview:
this does not represent any serious challenge to the core ORAC
market.

> I use PostgreSQL and I would appreciate to have the same features in 
> PostgreSQL.

Sure, so would I.  Talk to Jan Wieck about what he plans to do
about it, and maybe consider supporting that development work too ;-)

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan  | ajs@crankycanuck.ca