Interview with Geir Høydalsvik
MySQL Goes to 8!
Geir Høydalsvik will give a talk about MySQL Goes to 8! at FOSDEM 2020.
Q: Could you briefly introduce yourself?
I have been working with the MySQL Database team since 2008. For the last 10 years I have been responsible for the development and maintenance of the MySQL Database. In this period we have released the MySQL 5.5, MySQL 5.6, MySQL 5.7, and MySQL 8.0 major releases. Before MySQL, I worked for the database startup company Clustra Inc. on the Clustra telecom database and for Sun Microsystems on Java DB (Sun’s brand of the Apache Derby project).
Q: What are the highlights of MySQL 8 that you will talk about?
The uptake of MySQL 8.0 has been more rapid than any other version in the past. There are some very good reasons for this. This talk will highlight what is new. MySQL 8.0 delivers significant improvements on all fronts, such as dramatically improved SQL, GIS, and JSON support. The talk will also cover the MySQL Document Store (MySQL = NoSQL + SQL) and MySQL InnoDB Cluster (HA out of the box) as well as MySQL Shell which ensures power, freedom, and flexibility for the Developer.
Q: What do you hope to accomplish by giving this talk? What do you expect?
In general, I hope that people will learn what MySQL is today and where we are heading. For existing users I hope people will get an understanding of what 8.0 brings to the table and that they will be encouraged to move to 8.0 as soon as possible.
Q: Could you give us a short retrospect: what has changed over the last 20 years for MySQL?
MySQL has changed a lot over the last 20 years. Looking back 20 years MySQL was working on the 3.23 release and we are now releasing 8.0.19. It feels like traveling 20 light years in distance. Nowadays, MySQL is fully transactional with the InnoDB storage engine and it comes with a transactional data dictionary, a strong replication story with row based replication and global tranasaction IDs, as well as Group Replication, a native HA solution with built-in automatic distributed recovery, conflict detection, and group membership. Furthermore, MySQL now offers modern SQL with Window functions and Common table expressions and has advanced its SQL execution to hash joins. MySQL can also be used as a Document store, allowing the developer to work with CRUD operations on JSON documents in Javascript.
Q: 2020 marks the 20th anniversary of (F)OSDEM. What contributions has FOSDEM made to the advancement of FOSS in the databases domain, and how did MySQL in particular benefit from FOSDEM?
The main contribution of FOSDEM is cross project participation and pollination. In other conferences there is often a single technology or at least fewer technologies. What is so great about FOSDEM is that you can follow up on a wide set of interests and widen your horizon, both across database projects and across other technologies.
Q: Have you enjoyed previous FOSDEM editions?
I attended FOSDEM last year and I really loved the open format which distinguish FOSDEM from other conferences I have attended. Last year, my main focus was on the MySQL Devroom track but I also attended general sessions as well as talks in other devrooms such as Geospatial and Javascript.
Creative Commons License
This interview is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Belgium License.