Knowing which privileges a given account has is easy – just issue SHOW GRANTS FOR user@host.  But what about when you need visibility into privileges from the other direction – which accounts can access specific data?  If you’re a DBA – or perform DBA duties, regardless of your title – you may have been asked this question.  It’s an important question to ask in an audit or compliance review – but it can be a difficult question to answer.    This post will walk through how to assess this, but if you’re impatient and need answers to this question immediately, jump to the end – there’s a simple shortcut.

Things to consider

There are a few things you’ll want to consider about the implementation of the MySQL privilege system as you try to sort out who has access to certain data.

Access type

MySQL can restrict privileges based on operations – somebody who has …

The MySQL server supports a variety of client connection methods. To summarize: you have TCP/IP (v4 and v6) on all OSes (with or without TLS/SSL encryption), Unix Domain Sockets on Unix/Linux, and Named Pipes and/or Shared Memory on Windows.

Each of these connection methods has its own set of pros and cons: speed, security, portability, and ease-of-use.…

Why Should I Be Reading This?

To better understand how the MySQL Server functions, how to monitor the relevant server events, and find out what’s new in MySQL 5.7.8.

What’s Special About the Audit Plugin API?

Picking the right API for your new plugin is probably the most important design decision a plugin author will need to make.…

The MySQL Enterprise Audit plug-in is part of the MySQL Enterprise Edition (available through a paid license). Basically, Enterprise Audit tracks everything that is happening on your MySQL server, and can be used to protect/detect the misuse of information, and to meet popular compliance regulations including HIPAA, Sarbanes-Oxley, and the PCI Data Security Standard.

MySQL Enterprise Audit uses the open MySQL Audit API to enable standard, policy-based monitoring and logging of connection and query activity executed on specific MySQL servers. Designed to meet the …

I’m happy to announce that a new version of the MariaDB Audit Plugin is available. Version 1.1.5 can be downloaded here. As you can see the Audit Plugin is available from SkySQL, who has developed the plugin.

However, now with the Audit Plugin being GA for a couple of months since 7th of November last year and customers using it in production, SkySQL has decided to contribute the Audit Plugin to the MariaDB project and I’m happy to tell you that starting from MariaDB versions 5.5.37 and 10.0.9 the Audit Plugin will be included by default. Notice that these versions of MariaDB aren’t yet released.

The MariaDB Audit Plugin introduces the capabilities of tracking user access to data. By having the Audit Plugin available by default in MariaDB, all users can easily set up tracking in their own systems and follow in real time who’s doing what in …

Zyme, based in Redwood Shores, California, is the global leading provider of Channel Data Management (CDM) solutions to companies selling through indirect channels. For high tech and consumer electronic products alone, over $1 trillion USD worth of goods are flowing through those indirect sales channels every year. However, when companies sell products through multi-tier channel partners and retailers around the world, it has proven to be challenging in acquiring global, standardized channel inventory and sales data cost-effectively. As a result, companies lacking of such critical information often miss the opportunities to make timely and accurate business decisions either to increase revenue, reduce costs or to prevent losses.

Having a vision to solve such channel visibility problems for customers including Symantec, Logitech, Seagate and Xerox, Zyme built its channel data …

Another month has come to an end. If you’re looking to be updated on MariaDB content on a regular basis, don’t forget to be on Twitter (@mariadb), Facebook (MariaDB.dbms), or Google Plus (+mariadb).

There was a question on Quora – Is Facebook considering ditching MySQL in favor of MariaDB like Google did? The best answer really comes from Harrison Fisk, so I’ll leave you to it to read. The older link made its way on social media about Wikipedia_$ mv MySQL MariaDB. …

By going to the download section of  SkySQL website  some users have noticed “MariaDB Audit Plugin”. This auditing feature for MySQL has been requested by more and more customers. Legal constraints make it mandatory for more and more companies to keep logging information about database access and activity.

It is very important for the MySQL [...]

The MySQL Connect content catalog is published, and I’ll be leading a hands-on lab on MySQL Enterprise Features in Practice [HOL9787].  If you have wondered how to get the most out of the features of MySQL Enterprise subscriptions – whether you are an existing Enterprise customer or not – this lab is for you.  We’ll help you understand the benefits of the various components of the MySQL Enterprise subscription as you install, configure, demonstrate and use the …

To only slightly misquote one of the greatest movies of all times:

You keep using that option.  I do not think it means what you think it means.

Perhaps like many users, I had certain assumptions about what max_connect_errors really does – but in looking closely as part of investigating the new PERFORMANCE_SCHEMA.HOST_CACHE table in MySQL 5.6, I learned that some very fundamental elements had escaped my notice.  I’m writing this blog post to help others who hold similar misconceptions of what this option does.

Many, if not most, MySQL DBAs are familiar with “host blocked” errors:

C:\mysql-5.5.27-winx64>bin\mysql -utest_mce -P3307 -h192.168.2.8
ERROR 1129 (HY000): Host …