Differences between PostgreSQL and MySQL

Friday Jun 20, 2008

As I promised my first series here will be the difference between PostgreSQL and MySQL.

Prolog

The Open Source idea:

The open source idea is that you have multiple products on the market where the user can/should choose of his/her own what is the best for him/her or for his/her software or for his/her needs.

What does it mean: 

This means: blaming each other is not even not gentle it is totally against the open source idea.

There is no better or worser open source product.

There are just different open source products.

PostgreSQL isn't better then MySQL neither is MySQL better then PostgreSQL.

Consider you have one pair of shoes for dancing in a ballroom and one pair of shoes for climbing through mountains.

Here also you never would make a comparison:

My ballroom shoes are better then my climbing shoes. 

Maybe you will say:

My climbing shoes are not very good for dancing and I feel more comfortable dancing in my dancing shoes then in other shoes.

Or vise versa:

My ballroom shoes are not very good for climbing and I feel more familiar wearing this kind of climbing shoes then another kind.

This is the same with open source products and especially here with relational database management systems (RDBMS).

What is the best for me?

For figuring out what is the best for your issue, you have to consider lots of factors.

Of course you have to analyse your needs and which system will solve all your problems most easy for you and best way for you.

Also it depends on yourself.

There are still people outside who feel more familiar in a ballroom with sneakers then with high heels.

It's the same here as with your ballroom shoes.

You are very familiar with dancing on 12 cm high heels but your girlfriend feels lots of more comfortable dancing with only 6 cm high heels. You both will get really bad dancers and maybe break your legs when you just switch shoes.

What is the best system for you is always besides looking to features and needs depending on your individual character.

Behaviour:

It's only natural and human that product contributors always try to recommend their own product first.

But they always will accept when you say something like this:

"Thank you, it's a nice product but I think for me and my needs another product is better"

or that:

"Thank you, it's a nice product but I feel more familiar with the other product".

Open source product contributors and communities never should blame other open source products.

Blaming others is something that is frowned upon at the open source area.

Appeal:

Please, 

 - never blame here.

 - always try to be fair and gentle.