Colin Charles Agenda

MySQL has had this Enterprise Monitor around for a while, but I’ve not had the chance to try it. Well, all this changed briefly in July, when I was doing my APAC tour, and folk wanted to see Enterprise Monitor at work. Back then, I showed them some canned screenshots, and in Singapore, Kim Seong (famous on #mysql) from our partners Global Link, had some kind of special login, so they demoed it. It wasn’t until this week that I actually tried it (besides, it wasn’t until the UC-J that it was re-launched with new features), and found some time to play with it. And I was blown away.

An excessive table scan, you say?

With new features for replication monitoring, personally what I find most useful are the pretty graphs (you may not find it useful with one or two machines, but in an enterprise-level install base of databases, graphs are not only pretty, they are useful). On top of the graphs, there’s also advisors, which save you time, so that you can avoid reading the documentation, or finding pain points, yourself. I think this is what Brian really referred to on saving your Jedi’s time. Advisors, are crucial, and I think that’s what differentiates this product.

How to fix table scans… and links to the manual!

The UI is impressive. Its all very modern, looking very Web 2.0. Its Tomcat based on the backend, so the install file is a tad large, and the usual requirements that come with Java applications are present, but I’m pleased to say the server I’ve had access to play with is an under-powered AMD machine. You can set it to auto-refresh in your browser, which can be useful for maybe displaying it on a dedicated screen (think of being in a air traffic control tower, maybe?).

Shiny! Pretty graphs… showing useful information

Installation is somewhat easy (it could be easier, like maybe via apt-get or yum). Support diagnostics are interesting enough, it really does remind me of the sysreport utility in Red Hat/Fedora. It talks to 5.0.x and 5.1.x seamlessly, it doesn’t care what OS they’re on, and I’m unsure if the agent runs against say an older MySQL (though I don’t see why not).

Replication monitor (click for larger image)

The marketing materials on the Web don’t do enough justice for this useful tool. I wish there was an online demo of sorts or maybe the user manual was placed online, or just way more screenshots. Failing which, give the 30-day Enterprise Trial a go. Yes, Enterprise Monitor is not free :( I signed up a couple of days ago, spent about five minutes signing up (three email exchanges! Highly complicated), and got access to everything Enterprise-y.

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I don’t know about you, but the idea behind MySQL University is pretty amazing. It is truly a great way to come learn with us. The sessions are normally done via IRC and voice streaming, which is also recorded, however, seeing it in person at the MySQL DevMeeting, was just fabulous.

There are obviously so many more Uni sessions that I wish I went to, but I’m lucky in the sense that they’re all recorded, so expect to see them online soon. Kudos to the scribes!

I attended a few interesting sessions yesterday:

• How to Create a Test Case by Omer and Matthias – this was highly interesting, as I got a deeper understanding of our test framework. More importantly, I’ve found out that this is obviously an extension to mysql-test, and isn’t online yet, so I’ve pestered Omer to ensure that it reaches mysql.bkbits.net in due time. Of course it can’t be merged as part of MySQL, because it isn’t part of 5.0 or 5.1, but its impressive that you can run tests that help you move from 5.0 to 5.1 and so on. Tests for minor version upgrades are also obviously supported, all in all, cool stuff.
• Following a Query Back and Forth in the Server by Sergei – amazing, seriously. Good explanation, great images, and if you need to grind all the performance out of your queries, you can see where you might find pain points, when they do occur.
• MySQL Proxy Overview by Jan Kneschke – now, all I want to do is play with the Proxy. Its ultimately cool stuff, and if you haven’t been enthralled by it yet, consider taking a look at it now. Its easily scriptable in LUA, which is a language I attempted to learn last night, by reading the Blue PIL book (sounds nicer when you say it :P). Consider checking out Programming in Lua, which I wish was available on my Safari subscription, however, the older version is online…

As an aside, that isn’t exactly MySQL University based, but LUA seems to be the embedded language of choice at MySQL now. Proxy, Enterprise tools, and so on. Looks like its well worth knowing.

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The MySQL Developer’s Meeting has started. The weather is pretty moderately okay, there’s occasional rain, so we’ve all been given rain coats/rain jackets. The hotel is fully packed, and the lobby is generally filled with folk hacking away at things. Plenty of meetings, plenty of sessions, it is highly interesting, and it looks like there’s some team interoperability and we can better understand how to deliver things now.

This meeting has encouraged blogging, but I have a feeling most are too busy to write stuff. There will be meeting notes, and at some stage we should publish them externally. There should be heaps of pictures because I see everyone walking around with cameras (so I’ve conveniently left mine at the hotel).

Oh, and did I mention, its a great way to meet other MySQLers? So many names and nicknames, are now put to faces. So yes, Heidelberg is proving to be fun.

Current sticker theme: “We need foreign keys now!” We also got a good understanding of where we’re headed to in 2008-2009, and our real role which is to serve customers, not necessarily please them. A good quote, on product management: Engineers want to be market driven, but not be driven by marketing! Current free t-shirt count: 4 (though I realistically have to give away two of them).

Its been a while since I last blogged. I’ve shifted through many countries now, since my post on UC-J Day 1. Since then, I’ve updated the set, and there are way more photos, even from Day 2. Day 2 photos are more interesting, because I bothered to take my 70-200/2.8 lens with me (no monopod though, so I bumped up the ISO for stability).

Basically, day 2 went on well, with a little less attendees in comparison to day 1, thanks to the horrendous weather. Most of us took cabs, but some brave souls got an umbrella and walked. Heh. Pictures from many sushi dinners should also make their way online soon. There was a very nice reception later on in the evening, with lots of people winning prizes and so on.

The general consensus from all the attendees is that they found the MySQL User Conference Japan, very useful, and from what I gather this will be a yearly affair, so there’s no one else to thank, besides MySQL KK for organising this great event. Big shouts out to Yoko-san, Daniel, and Larry.

Lachlan, talking to a new support guy and visitor to the booth

Marten, on the panel

Brian, on the panel

Kaj, with a hSenid doll

Technorati Tags: mysql tokyo japan uc-j uc-j2007 photos lachlan marten brian kaj

In this modern Web-based world, I figure I should try and keep things, well, really, up-to-date as quickly as possible. For those of you not in Japan, I do hope the pictures of the UC-J interest (and tempt) you… The master set: MySQL Users Conference Japan (UC-J) 2007.

Some quick snippets follow. I’ve tagged them uc-j (flickr should treat it as “ucj”) as well as uc-j2007 (because, this may be the first, but it’s definitely not the last!).

Mats, Mr. Ruby

Big, big, crowd. Room holds 600. 1,200 registered. Standing room!

Jimmy, Mr. Carrier Grade Cluster

Marten, Disruptor Extraordinaire, giving the State of the Nation

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I haven’t actually written about my amazing Japan trip. Arrived late on Saturday night, spent the whole of Sunday doing tourist-y stuff, visited MySQL KK on Monday, had an amazing dinner later with lots of MySQLers, and today, Tuesday is the first day of the users conference. And boy was it fun!

Larry-san spoke Japanese in the keynote introduction, and boy was it amazing. I absolutely loved the honesty in Yukihiro “Mats” Matsumoto’s talk. It was even funnier that while he spoke Japanese, and people laughed at his jokes, it took a while for the simultaneous translators to catch up with English, and then we’d have delayed laughter :)

I gave my talk today, and was pretty pleased with the attendance. My 35 slides were delivered in a mere 50 minutes, and at parts I was worried I might be going too fast for the simultaneous translators. Then I’d slow down, but feel like falling asleep while standing, so felt the tone needed to be picked up. I didn’t get up-front questions, but at least I got approached after the talk. Guess that’s fine. Met a couple of Aussies (who recognised that I must be from Melbourne/Sydney because of my Crumpler!).

Lunch was interesting. We like to normally disperse, and spread out (the usual rule is that there should only be one MySQLer per table). The moment I sat down, two ladies decided to move, and the others on the table ate quietly, and quickly, and just disappeared as well! Sigh. I turned around, and noticed Stewart sitting alone as well. Seemed a tad odd.

Line of the day: “green tea is not alcohol!” That came later at dinner, which again, was amazing (heaps of sushi). I’ve found a new favourite sushi dish – crab bowels. Well, tomorrow is another great action packed day, and I think I might focus on the camera and documenting it more…

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