May 21, 2009 at 3:52 pm
I work for a software company that develops an application written in cobol that stores the data in an ISAM format known as Vision 3. We also have a few customers utilizing SQL Server 2000/2005/2008 and Oracle for the data instead of the ISAM format.
We are making the move to Java, and as such will have to change the default format we store the data in. We are weighing a couple options with 2 clear front runners: MySQL vs SQL Server Express.
Our biggest concerns are:
1: Performance
2: Ease of distribution
3: Ease of support
4: Functionality
I've watched a couple of webinars from MySQL, that obviously claim it's superiority, and read the white paper from Microsoft expressing SQL Server's superiority.
We don't have anything yet to test, so one of the biggest factors in all of this will be a benchmark comparison between the two.
I'm curious if there are any ISV's out there that send their systems out with either of these platforms and why you decided to on the system you are using.
The obvious things:
MySQL is not free for ISV's, but it's cheaper than SQL Server Standard.
SQL Server Express is free, but has limits placed on it (4 GB DB size, 1 Processor, 1 GB Memory).
MySQL has a lighter footprint and can be embedded with apps easier (about 70 MB when installed).
SQL Server is bigger and has a lot of pre reqs (Windows Installer, .NET framework, administrative rights)
MySQL has cross platform support (Mac,Linux etc), but seriously, I think this will be the exception.
SQL Server is Windows only.
We have customers using SQL Server Standard/Enterprise, so it'd be easier to teach tech support how to manage one type of RDMBS instead of 2 or 3.
It'd also be easier to migrate from SQL Server Express to Standard/Enterprise if a customer wanted to do that.
May 21, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Do any of the items above matter to you? Limits on SQL Server? Windows only?
If not, what do you have more expertise in from a development standpoint?
May 21, 2009 at 7:02 pm
Josh Turley (5/21/2009)
We have customers using SQL Server Standard/Enterprise, so it'd be easier to teach tech support how to manage one type of RDMBS instead of 2 or 3.
I believe that answers the question.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
June 8, 2009 at 3:18 pm
For SQL2008 there is a web edition that is licensed to 4 CPUs. It sits somewhere between SQL Express and Standard Edition but with considerably cheaper licensing.
Having just gone through extensive testing of MySQL and SQL2008 all I have learnt is that you can't trust benchmarks.
Both sides promote their product with religious zeal and have a mutually antagonistic priest hood. I think I have found one relatively unbiased comparison but that was out of date.
If you are used to Microsoft and are using 64Bit editions on Windows 2008 then I doubt that you can get MySQL to run as fast on any platform.
If you are using 32bit SQL on an older flavour of Windows then it is too close to call.
If you go with MySQL I would recommend you go for InnoDB for any transactional stuff.
The parent company of MySQL is Sun and Sun have just been bought out by ORACLE. Not sure what the long term future for MySQL is as yet, particularly as several key staff have jumped ship and the original founder has started a development fork for MariaDB which looks interesting.
I can't imagine ORACLE developing MySQL to the point where it performs as well as ORACLE.
If you are dealing with data of any decent size in MySQL then InnoDB is the only engine with a decent backup. MyISAM just generates SQL Scripts. Try backing up a 1/2TB database using MySQLDump!!!
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