ORDBMS and Reusable Design: Why PostgreSQL on Your (Next) Project

One of the classic songs during the British invasion of America through music is "I'm Henry the Eighth, I Am" by the Herman's Hermits. The main character of the song is a man named Henry about to marry a widower who married seven times before. All the groom she married were named Henry. Probably the lady in the song found some particular trait(s) found in every Henry she met.

I hope you'd allow my fancy for the moment and share the perspective when we take the case of Object-oriented Programming (OOP) and Object Relational Database Management Systems (ORDBMS), given that, like Henry the Eighth in relation to his bride's previous husbands, they have the same first name. Would it be possible that design and/or code reuse, one of the great tenets of Object-oriented programming be applicable to Object relational database systems? Am I dragging your leg? Read on and find out.

Reveries on Database Systems and Hiring

First, an apology is in order, I have to admit I've been on blogging hiatus for over a month, and hopefully you'd understand that my enthusiasm for blogging has not waned. My blogging hiatus is just that, a brief hiatus (and tons of events happened since then, like I'm in between jobs as of this writing, enjoyed the Westlife concert with my better half, had an opportunity to step back and see where I am and where I want to go to, Apple's Steve Jobs passed away a day after my birthday, and most importantly, got me Dr. Dobb's Essential Books on Algorithms and Data Structures CD-ROM Release 2 CD as gift for my birthday from my youngest sister), and what better way to blog actively again than to talk about my favorite IT infrastructure, the database system (could even be the most important!) and since I'm currently in between jobs, about hiring IT professionals.

But first let me relate an incident about a friend's newly bought desktop PC, built from choice components, you can consider this computer a bazooka to kill a fly off the wall. The problem was that my friend later updated the BIOS firmware and the new PC has since had mysterious behavior like shutting down for no apparent reason. In short, that BIOS firmware upgrade cost my friend wasted time bringing the rig to the shop to be fixed, good thing the PC is still within warranty and replaced. Moral of the story is: if it isn't broken, you have no reason to fix it, so don't mess with it, same goes with the database back-end of your application.

AppArmor and Server Security

I was tasked recently at work to create a new instance of MySQL in a server where there were two (2) instances already existing and running. This task should have been a breeze and done in no time. Unfortunately, I was working on a GNU/Linux distribution, okay Ubuntu, with AppArmor activated with security profile for MySQL, and I figuratively banged my head on the wall for almost a week why the steps I follow doesn't work, I already stripped the config file to the minimum and the setup still won't work. Turns out AppArmor is in my way in it's objective to secure the system it runs on.

What You Should Learn About Database Systems

If IT meant Information Technology, then arguably and syntactically having relevant information is first and more important than the technology that delivers it. Information may be stored in a text file, a word processor document, a spreadsheet, a presentation, or an XML file, but for easier, faster and reliable search and retrieval, the database management system rules.

Unfortunately, I have observed that most books available in local stores in my so-called third world country tragically lack the fundamentals that should be learned to maximize the beneficial use of database management systems or (DBMS). Worse, many are tied to proprietary systems like Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server, which are usually tied to particular (and usually expensive) platforms (i.e. Windows or Solaris only), will almost cost you your soul to put into hands on practiality, and worst, subject to whimsical changes and features that the vendor may deem important to differentiate their product from the rest; resulting to obsolete skills for outdated systems.

Michael Jordan didn't become the greatest basketball player by just going straight for the hoop and shoot the second he has the ball on hand. By the same principle, what should you learn about database systems?

My Oh My! This is How MySQL Daemon is Done in OpenBSD

If you were to setup a secure Unix-like server, don't walk, run for OpenBSD, probably the most secure operating system on the planet. On databases, I frankly have personal and professional bias for PostgreSQL, but for the benefit of the uninformed masses, most prefer MySQL.

Putting two and two together, one way or another, being a systems administrator, you will one day need to setup an OpenBSD to house a MySQL server. As of this writing, OpenBSD is version 4.8 going to 4.9.