Category: MySQL

The packages of MySQL 5.5.20 are now available for Debian 6.0 “Squeeze” on both amd64 and i386 architectures, with the following changes :

• the mysql-common package should now work with MySQL 5.1 packages without any problem (unknown configuration variables in /etc/mysql/my.cnf have been commented out)
• mysql-server-5.5 now supports Linux native asynchronous IO

As usual, please read the full Changelog carefully before upgrading.

The packages of MySQL 5.5.19 are now available for Debian 6.0 “Squeeze” on both amd64 and i386 architectures. They fix some annoying issues that Dotdeb users kindly reported :

• the mysql-common package, in its 5.5.19+ version, “breaks”  mysql-server-5.1 and mysql-client-5.1 (as APT means it – it won’t actually break your server into pieces). Freezing it will prevent any issue (the introduction of unknown configuration variables in their /etc/mysql/my.cnf, for example)
• the MySQL client now uses the system’s readline library instead of the bundled editline wrapper
• missing header files and libraries are now included in the appropriate packages

As usual, please read the full Changelog carefully before upgrading.

MySQL 5.5.18 has been released by Oracle yesterday. The packages for Debian 6.0 “Squeeze” are now available on Dotdeb for both amd64 and i386 architectures.

As usual, please read the full Changelog carefully before upgrading.

Please also note that Oracle now provides .deb packages on their download page. That’s a great thing, but they’ll have to be improved :

• no repository is available to ease the future updates
• they’re monolythic and do not separate libraries from headers or binaries, configuration from server or client.
• they do not take care of the official Debian naming convention

Some months after MySQL 5.5 being released as GA, I’m proud to announce that MySQL 5.5.17 is now available on Dotdeb, for Debian 6.0 “Squeeze”, for both amd64 and i386 architectures.

Focusing on compatibility with previous and future official Debian packages of MySQL, Dotdeb’s ones are based on the great work provided by the official Debian maintainers. Many thanks to them! I really hope that MySQL 5.5 will be part of Debian Sid soon.

Here are the main changes and benefits from MySQL 5.5, from the user point of view :

• a recent InnoDB as default storage engine (replacing MyISAM),
• the performance schema,
• the semisynchronous replication,
• the pluggable authentication,
• better performances…

First of all, please read carefully the full list of changes in MySQL 5.5 and the migration guide to MySQL 5.5 before any further move.

I also strongly advise you to test these new packages by upgrading your development servers first, then to backup your whole databases before considering your production servers. Dotdeb is not responsible for any damage or loss of data.

Here are some more important considerations :

• Both MySQL 5.5 and MySQL 5.1 are available on the main Dotdeb repository, respectively named mysql-server-5.5 and mysql-server-5.1… mysql-server is just a meta-package depending on the most recent version (5.5).
• Even if you stick to mysql-server-5.1, the mysql-common package will be upgraded to version 5.5.17. It’s no big deal, just comment the lc-messages-dir setting in /etc/mysql/my.cnf or your MySQL 5.1 server will fail to start.
• Providing a fork of Oracle’s MySQL Server, such as Percona Server or MariaDB, is something I’d like to do, but it requires a lot of work.
• If you’re using the Pinba storage engine, you should still stick to MySQL 5.1. The switch to MySQL 5.5 will be possible later.
• There’s no plan to release these packages neither for Debian 5.0 “Lenny” nor for Ubuntu. Sorry.

I really hope you’ll enjoy this major MySQL release.