Embedded SQL thoughts

[Andrew Gould]

On Mon, Oct 18, 2010 at 12:23 PM, Bill Campbell <linux-sxs at celestial.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 18, 2010, Roger Oberholtzer wrote:
>>I am gearing up to make a spec for a database app. We have decided that
>>the database will be accessed via SQL. For various reasons, we want to
>>be able to run the database either as an embedded database (direct file
>>access - no server), or via a server. This will depend on user
>>requirements. The database must allow stored SQL procedures.
>>
>>We are looking at MySQL/MariaSQL. I am curious if anyone here has any
>>opinions of using either of these to run an embedded database. I am sort
>>of sure they support this ability. But has anyone here done that? I
>>recall that there are a few database pros out these. I, on the other
>>hand, am not such a creature. So experiences and suggestions are very
>>welcome.
>
> I'm very suspicious of anything related to Oracle (e.g. MySQL) given their
> history with open source.  The most recent disappointment for me was their
> changes in OpenSolaris.
>
> We use postgresql for most things, but that's not an option for embedded
> systems that can't depend on an external server.
>
> Bill

MariaDB is the new, non-Oracle, forked version of MySQL by some of
MySQL's original developers:
http://mariadb.org/

I prefer PostgreSQL to MySQL due to some of MySQL's oddities:
1.  You have to use functions to do date math in MySQL (whereas you
use date fields in math formulas in PostgreSQL and MS Access).
2.  The last time I checked, I was able to enter February 30 as a
valid date in MySQL.

I stopped looking at SQLite when I read that it uses "manifest typing"
instead of forcing each field to contain only one data type.
http://www.sqlite.org/different.html

Happy Monday!

Andrew