MySQL 5.5.39 was recently released (it is the latest MySQL 5.5, is GA), and is available for download here:

http://downloads.skysql.com/archive/index/p/mysql/v/5.5.39

This release, similar to the last 5.5 release, is mostly uneventful.

There were two “Functionality Added or Changed” and 24 bugs fixed.

The “Functionality Added or Changed” changes are:

• CMake support was updated to handle CMake version 3.
• The timed_mutexes system variable has no effect and is deprecated.

Out of the 24 bugs, most seemed rather minor or obscure, but here are the ones I think are worth noting (crashing, security, wrong results, deadlock):

• InnoDB: Opening a parent table that has thousands of child tables could result in a long semaphore wait condition.
• …

I’m frequently tracking semaphores waits, and if you’ve examined them before, it can be a little matching up the threads listed in the SEMAPHORES section with the transactions in the TRANSACTIONS section.

Semaphore waits are related to internal synchronization between threads in mysqld, and not directly to row locks or other items associated with user queries, so that’s why the SEMAPHORES section only reports the OS thread id.

Fortunately, the TRANSACTIONS sections also reports the OS thread handle, but in hex format.

Here is an example semaphore wait:

--Thread 1079654736 has waited at ibuf0ibuf.c line 3549
for 943.00 seconds the semaphore:
X-lock (wait_ex) on RW-latch at 0x7f2a48830bf8 '&block->lock'
a writer (thread id 1079654736) has reserved it in mode wait exclusive
number of readers 1, waiters flag 1, lock_word: ffffffffffffffff
Last time read locked in file buf0flu.c line 1318

So how do …