MySQL Administrator's Guide

Rating:
Summary: extensive documentation
Review: With what appears to be stunning speed, the open source relational database known as MySQL has been installed on many thousands of sites. Of course, the cost-free nature is its best selling point. With its rise, so too is the necessity for books like this.

Its bulk should be reassuring. The MySQL company has put a lot of sweat into making the manual as extensive as possible. Not light reading. But the individual sections should be within your grasp, if you have some sysadmin experience. For example, the introductory sections that deal with installations are on a par of complexity comparable to installing GCC or Tomcat. Not a one click installation. Because MySQL offers a lot of configuration options, if you go with a source distribution.

The toughest part may be later, when you have a populated database and you want to optimise it. Unsurprisingly, you will need good prior background in SQL. Take note that this book does not teach you SQL, per se. That is properly the remit of another text.

By the way, the book mentions that (finally) stored procedures are implemented. In version 5. Other database vendors, like IBM and Oracle, have had this ability for years, and have hammered on MySQL for its lack. Here, the book could do with an expanded discussion of how to use these procedures. It just has a cursory note. Hopefully, the next edition will improve on this. Because stored procedures are an important performance optimiser in many large databases.