What is the best DBMS for the job? [closed]

Question

Just had a discussion at work about the merits of using PostgreSQL over MySQL and vice-versa. Does anyone have any practical experience where there is a valid reason to use one over the other?

Some people were saying that Postgre is better for security purposes whereas MySQL is becoming more feature rich... I'm not sure what to make of it.

Answer 1

Oracle 9i server is very strong RDBMS, and to learn how to use an RDBMS, i think PostgreSQL is a nice choice.

Answer 2

The question isn't which is better, but which is better for the particular use you're intending.

If you don't need transactional consistency, mySQL might give better performance. If you do, PostgreS can be faster. If you need spatial searching, PostgreS. Tables larger than 2GB, PostgreS. Bitmap indexes, PostgreS. INTERSECT, PostgreS.

... this could go on ad-nauseum. And then we get to the question of 'best', and this assumes that mySQL or PostgreS are the only two options. Sometimes, SQLite is the best. Or Oracle. Or even some storage engine that's not an RDBMS.

(and note that I said 'might' give better performance -- just because one's typically faster doesn't mean that it'll be faster for the way you're going to be stressing it)

Answer 3

It can also depend on your point of view...

If you were an employer, you'd want to ensure the highest possible adoption rate so you can find developers that can work on it.

If you're a developer, features, documentation and community are important.

If you're an architect, security, features and scalability are important.

If you're the end user. You don't care!