Foreign key related issues are very common when dealing with DDL changes in MySQL using Percona toolkit. In this blog post, I will explain how the tool (pt-online-schema-change) handles foreign key constraints when executing a DDL change.

First of all, I would like to explain why foreign keys have to be handled at all before writing more about the “How”. Foreign key constraints are aware of table rename operations. In other words, if the parent table is renamed, the child table automatically knows it and changes the foreign key constraint accordingly. Please have a look at the below example, and you can see the table name is automatically updated in the child table after the rename operation on the parent table:

mysql> show create table prd_details \G
*************************** 1. row *************************** …

The pt-online-schema-change tool has been a workhorse for years, allowing MySQL DBAs to alter tables with minimal impact to application workload, and before MySQL had native online alter capabilities. Although consistently grateful for the tool’s existence, I never liked the messiness of having to use and clean up triggers, and most DBAs have a horror story or two to tell about using any of the online alter methods.

When Github’s online schema transmogrifer (gh-ost; https://github.com/github/gh-ost) was released, then, I jumped on the chance to test it out.

Following are my testing notes. I tried out the flags available to run gh-ost from different locations in a replication setup, both functionally and under load. The load applied was via mysqlslap, using a …

People using OpenStack Trove instances can hit a common issue in the MySQL world: how to perform schema change operations while minimizing the impact on the database server? Let’s explore the options that can allow online schema changes.

Summary

With MySQL 5.5, pt-online-schema-change from Percona Toolkit is your best option for large tables while regular ALTER TABLE statements are only acceptable for small tables. Also beware of metadata locks.

With MySQL 5.6, almost all types of schema changes can be done online. Metadata locks can also be an issue. pt-online-schema-change can still be worth using as it is also online on read replicas.

Regular ALTER TABLE with MySQL 5.5

If you are still using MySQL 5.5, almost all schema changes will require a table …