For the past many years, there’s been a conference in April, at the Santa Clara Convention Centre where the topic has been MySQL and the surrounding ecosystem. The first year I went, I gave a talk on the new features in MySQL Cluster 5.1 to a overflowing room of attendees. For me, it’s an event that’s mixed with speaking about something I’ve been working on and talking to other attendees about everything from how a particular part of the server works to where we can escape to for nearby good vegan food.

So, I thought I’d share some of the sessions that I’m really looking forward to. My selection is probably atypical, but may be interesting to others. I’m not going to list the keynotes, although they are often of a lot of value. I’m also going to attempt to avoid listing a few really awesome well known speakers simply because there are other really interesting sessions that also need exposure!

• …

We had the privilege this past week to be invited to be part of the 2012 O’Reilly Strata “Making Data Work” Conference. Some of our photos from the event are here. At the event, we were excited to have Tokutek described in front of the approximately 2,500 attendees during the keynote sessions.

Overall, the diversity of topics discussed at the conference was impressive, spanning databases, developer tools, data visualization techniques, customer stories, and business implications. The full agenda is here.

For those who missed it, here are …

Ensuring sufficient disk I/O to catch copyright violations at network speed. Evidenzia GmbH & Co. KG

Issues addressed:

• Storage growth, including maxed-out disk I/O utilization
• Performance issues and business impact due to slow selects
• Inability to revise data schema on the fly

The Company: Evidenzia GmbH & Co. KG is one of the leading partners of the software, movie and music industry when it comes to tracing copyright infringements and illegal file sharing activities in peer-to-peer networks. Evidenzia helps copyright owners in protecting their intellectual property. Their powerful technologies enable …

This year, I have the pleasure of returning to the MySQL Conference & Expo as a speaker. Percona have picked up the torch that O'Reilly had held as the conference organizers, and they're putting together a 3-day conference this year. I am co-presenting a tutorial with Yves Trudeau from Percona.

read more

This year, I have the pleasure of returning to the MySQL Conference & Expo as a speaker. Percona have picked up the torch that O'Reilly had held as the conference organizers, and they're putting together a 3-day conference this year. I am co-presenting a tutorial with Yves Trudeau from Percona.

<

p>

read more

So there I was, gesticulating in front of the chalkboard, lecturing to 120 students. Topic: the beauty of advanced data structures. The door opens and the department chair walks up the aisle onto the stage and comes up to me. 242 eyes follow her progress through the room. She whispers to me that I must stop speaking in English. Officially, the course must be conducted entirely in Spanish.

Entirely in Spanish… I turn back to face the students. 120 students are waiting for me to speak. I realize that I don’t even know how to say simple constructions like “x plus y” let alone “advanced data structure” or “order log log amortized time complexity.”

Is this a newfangled anxiety dream? Can this replace the tried and true: I’m in front of the class but I forgot to put on my pants? Can this replace the classic: I’m back in high school and have one just more class to take; but I haven’t been attending and don’t know …

While it might not have been New England’s weekend on the Big Gridiron, it was certainly New England’s day for Big Data at the New England Database Summit on Friday at MIT.

The summit was well attended, with 350 registrants and keynotes from prominent MySQL users such as Mark Callaghan. The coverage was quite broad, with presentations running the gamut from grad students (complete with bodyguards and intimidating academic advisors) to established companies such as StreamBase. The sponsor list was an …

The MySQL DevRoom at FOSDEM is ready. The schedule has been voted. Thanks to all who have participated. Now, let's make sure that the event is successful. The schedule is juicy, and not only because I have three talks in it!

I see so many posts on what happened to company X, product Y and dream Z that I couldn't resist the temptation to summarize this great year for MySQL. At the end of 2010, Oracle did an announcement we were all waiting for: MySQL 5.5 is GA! Another year has passed since then and it's time to reflect on what has been done.

I know this is a long post. I tried to rewrite it at least 10 times to make it shorter, but I couldn't condense the list. Hence, I wrote a summary in the beginning for those who don't want to read it all.

I believe that 2011 was an exceptional year for MySQL and I really enjoy being part of this team. I wish all of us a lot of success and fun in the years to come!

Summary:
Oracle released many  …