One of the first steps when addressing a MySQL performance tuning problem is to perform a system audit of the physical hardware resources, then identify any obvious bottlenecks in these resources.

When dealing with CPU, a quick audit should include identifying the number of CPU cores your server has, and the types of these cores. The key file on Linux systems is /proc/cpuinfo.

Number of cores can be found via the command cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep “^processor” | wc -l

You need to look more closely at the file to determine the type of CPU (e.g. below the model name shows Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3220 @ 2.40GHz. The combination of knowing the number of processors (cores) listed and physical id and siblings helps identify how many CPUs and how many cores per CPU exist.

$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor       : 0
vendor_id       : GenuineIntel
cpu family      : 6
model …

Check out the ideas from MySQL for Google Summer of Code 2009!

These are specially-selected projects for students who are looking to do some coding in a real, open-source, highly-adopted software environment. 

The learning experience will be tremendous given that MySQL engineers will be mentoring them. 

Some student stipend is provided by the Google Summer of Code. It is intended for students to gain "exposure to real-world software development scenarios and the opportunity for employment in areas related to their academic pursuits."

Check out the ideas from MySQL for Google Summer of Code 2009!

These are specially-selected projects for students who are looking to do some coding in a real, open-source, highly-adopted software environment. 

The learning experience will be tremendous given that MySQL engineers will be mentoring them. 

Some student stipend is provided by the Google Summer of Code. It is intended for students to gain "exposure to real-world software development scenarios and the opportunity for employment in areas related to their academic pursuits."

The annual MySQL Conference & Expo will be held in this year on April 20-23 in Santa Clara, California with a double twist.

Not one, but *two* FREE additional MySQL Conferences are running at the same time, in the same hotel. If you on the west coast you can effectively get a free conference with many MySQL experts speaking at them. I am speaking at all three on three different topics.

The first announcement was the 2009 MySQL Camp organized by Sheeri K. Cabral - The She-BA in line with the O’Reilly approach of having a smaller un-conference within a conference such as with Web 2.0 NY last year.

However the big news was the …

One of the things that has made MySQL grow a lot is the easy setup of replication on Internet sites. This has allowed them to grow from one database server to many reasonably easily. Configuration of replication is quite simple and replication itself is extremely fast. That makes it ideal for most people.

However at a point in time you begin to notice some of the weaknesses in the current design. Here are a few comments providing ideas on what I would like to see in MySQL replication and why they are features which are important to anyone who’s database requirements grow outside of a single database instance.

My list of current issues is as follows:

1. MySQL only allows replication from 1 to N servers.
2. Some important aspects of MySQL Configuration are not dynamic.
3. Replication is part of the mysqld server, not a separate process.
4. It’s not easy to configure table replication (config …

In a Financial Times report today about RedHat's quarterly earnings, Sam Ramji of Microsoft takes note of MySQL and its influence as a key component in the general move towards open-source software:

Larger deployments of open-source to firms that already run the technology in a small way might be the most that happens, due to the fact that recessions make IT managers worry about risk. For the same reasons, a recession is not the time to switch a workforce to a new technology.

Microsoft is counting on that, while accepting that every leading company will soon be running at least some open-source software.

“It’s a heterogeneous world,” said Microsoft’s Sam Ramji. While Microsoft continues to warn about the legal and economic perils of relying on Linux and similar systems, Mr Ramji’s role is to make sure …

A few interesting KPIs about certified people and their current location (the fact that many people travel from one country to the other for work is very popular these days especially in the IT sector): Before starting to read, I am hereby assuming the MySQL list of MCDBAs is on a residence basis not citizenship. There are [...]