You might have noticed that this blog changed name and URL. Instead of having one single blog for everything, I decided to split my blogging activities in two separate blogs.

If you're interested in MySQL, Oracle, Databases, Business Intelligence, Open Source, Cloud, etc. this is the place to be. Blog's new name is Data & Co.
A big "Thank you!" to David Stokes who moved all the planet.mysql.com references to the old blog to this new one.

On the other hand, if you'd like to read about communication, marketing, advertising, PR, soft skills, etc. feel free look at Publicime.  Please see the introduction of my new blog …

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  …

The MySQL council is looking for candidates for 2012.  Based on community feedback, this will be an open nomination process (and you can nominate yourself).

The MySQL council advocates for the MySQL community, and needs community leaders to help address issues such as keeping the bug database open and keeping the user conference from fragmenting.  The council tries to help solve issues that the community faces with Oracle, IOUG, or anyone else.  The council comprises four to six members representing a mix of consultants, volunteers, community activists, developers, and vendors.  The council is not meant to replace any existing grass roots organizations, rather it may be helpful for gaining visibility for their issues.

As a council member, you would be asked to participate in meetings (they’ve been about once a month by phone, but there may be a face-to-face meeting).  You will also be asked to help …

A year ago I posted a blog on The state of MySQL forks: co-operating without co-operating. (Also Giuseppe wrote about the topic at that time, and Peter Zaitsev covers it in his conference keynotes.) So I've been wondering if it would be good to write an update on the topic now, and in that case what to write.

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It's that time of the year where MySQL would be speakers are called to action. As usual, the main event is the MySQL spring conference, this year hosted by Percona. The call for participation to the MySQL Conference And Expo 2012 is still open until December 5th. To submit a proposal, you should register as a speaker and then fill in the form.
There is a conference committee which is already busy evaluating the proposals that have been submitted so far. The committee is demanding (I know for a fact, since I am in it!) and therefore, if you want to submit something, be very critical with yourself and polish your …

I am happy to announce that MySQL 5.5.18 is now available via Debian native packaging.  We have gotten many requests for this and our build and release teams have pulled together to ensure that our DEB packages are delivered with the highest quality. 

You can download MySQL 5.5.18 Debian 5 and 6 packages from the MySQL Community Download page or from the My Oracle Support portal.

As always, thanks for your continued support of MySQL!

I am happy to announce that MySQL 5.5.18 is now available via Debian native packaging.  We have gotten many requests for this and our build and release teams have pulled together to ensure that our DEB packages are delivered with the highest quality. 

You can download MySQL 5.5.18 Debian 5 and 6 packages from the MySQL Community Download page or from the My Oracle Support portal.

As always, thanks for your continued support of MySQL!

There's now 2 weeks left of the Call for Papers for Percona Live MySQL Conference and Expo (Santa Clara, CA). This weekend I've been finalizing my abstracts for submission and I trust many of you are doing the same. (If nothing else, do it for the free entrance! Or because you're passionate about MySQL, yeah, that's what I meant...)

This is the main annual MySQL event, so I thought it is worth the bandwidth to use these two weeks for some discussion and brainstorming. We are the MySQL community, it's up to us to make this a great conference now! This year I'm on the program committee, so I'm looking forward to reviewing many, many great proposals. At the same time, I'm interested to hear what you, dear readers - and hopefully future conference visitors - are interested in seeing at the conference? I'll share my ideas here and you can share yours in the comments …

Working with replication, you come across many topologies, some of them sound and established, some of them less so, and some of them still in the realm of the hopeless wishes. I have been working with replication for almost 10 years now, and my wish list grew quite big during this time. In the last 12 months, though, while working at Continuent, some of the topologies that I wanted to work with have moved from the cloud of wishful thinking to the firm land of things that happen. My quest for star replication starts with the most common topology. One master, many slaves.

It looks like a star, with the rays extending from the master to the slaves. This is the basis of most of the replication going on mostly everywhere nowadays, and it has few surprises. Setting aside the …