It was time to try something new in our DOAG Database Community. And please, please just not another frontal conference: twenty guys look forward, one looks back, like eight-oars-and-coxswain. I don’t know if DOAG invented it, but it was a success: The Noon2Noon Event.
How does it work? It’s like 24 hours of BarCamp, starting with a lunch, having a topic-of-the-day, lasting overnight, with winter barbecue, compatible for elders (thus, with Hotel and beds, no after-midnight hacking 🙂 ). Ah, forgot to mention: One single talk being completely away from the topic, but somehow related to our work.
This first time, topic was “MySQL versus Oracle Database”. Johannes Ahrends and Oli Sennhauser as “headliners” ignited discussions about features, technologies and strategies known from Oracle, and how they are (or aren’t) in MySQL. And vice versa, but less. Participants came from all over Germany, plus Denmark and Switzerland. End users, consultants, technocrats, “boys” who go ahead and fail, and “girls” who test and succeed…
I greatly enjoyed the open format – listening, talking, drawing, discussing, swaggering, ignoring, pushing, pulling – the full repertoire. 🙂
From the technological aspect, it was great to learn something about MySQL – how consistent reads, clustering, and lots of other stuff works, that we never ever thought that it could be done different from the way the Oracle Database works. And that MyISAM isn’t the norm, but just another PITA. 🙂 Go for InnoDB. What is MariaDB? And what the fork is Percona Server?
Martin Dombrowski of Imperva enriched the database-centric group with lots of cool information about security nightmares – how thieves protect themselves against fraud, and how deceivers make legal money with letterboxes. Wow, in my opinion, every IT guy should hear such a talk at least once a year. There’s a clear and present danger for the security of… all of us. he can tell you. Bravo Zulu for an hour of eyes wide open, and more than hundred fingers clenched.
Some minor things will be better next time, most of all the content and time of the invitation, to give more information what to expect and more time to think about it.
Thank you very much to Oliver and Andreas for their work, effort, the fun and the success in Nürnberg!
My conclusion: Yes, it was cool. “I’ll be back.”
Martin Klier