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MySQL 5.1 goes GA, Monty not happy

By Sean Michael Kerner on December 1, 2008 3:24 PM

From the "better late than never" files:

MySQL 5.1 is now out, but not everyone is happy about this oft-delayed open source database release.

I've been hearing about MySQL 5.1 since at least 2006 and over the last two years there have been a few dates I've been told when it would be released. Earlier this year the plan was for it to be out by June , then that got bumped back. Last month, a Sun spokesperson told me the release would be generally available (GA) on December 9, but apparently MySQL 5.1 is now already generally available.

One of the reasons, I've been told over the years as to why MySQL 5.1 has been delayed is to ensure the quality of the release and to learn from mistakes made in the MySQL 5.0 release. It's an argument that MySQL founder Monty Widenius now disagrees with.

"The reason I am asking you to be very cautious about MySQL 5.1 is that there are still many known and unknown fatal bugs in the new features that are still not addressed," Widenius blogged.

Widenius argued that there are still at least 180 serious bugs in the MySQL 5.1 release - (as evidence of his allegation he points to a bug tracking page that shows many of the bugs). He also lists a litany of other errors that in his view should have been caught and corrected prior to a generally available (GA) release. The reason for the flaws is not due to developer dedication, according to Widenius, but rather due to the conditions in which the developers work.

Widenius argued that there were too few development releases of MySQL 5.1, which didn't provide the MySQL community enough opportunities to test MySQL 5.1. He also alleged that the release criteria for MySQL server has not been followed in the lead up to declaring 5.1 GA.

"One would have thought that MySQL AB (now the MySQL department at Sun) should have learned something from our too early release of MySQL 5.0 but unfortunately this is not the case," Widenius blogged. "The main argument I have heard for why MySQL 5.1 was declared as GA now is that it's better than MySQL 5.0 was when it was declared as GA. In my opinion, this is not a good reason to declare something GA, especially as 5.0 GA was in terrible shape when it was released."

This is one looong rant from the MySQL founder and he makes a lot of points that are very interesting.

What the net result will be is that he's either proven right (and vindicated) or proven wrong and fired from Sun.

As a MySQL user myself, I've never upgraded to a bleeding edge MySQL Server release and I suspect that's a similiar modus operandi for a lot of users. Yes there are bugs - and yes I would hope they get fixed. Whether or not it was too early to declare MySQL 5.1 GA or not is a matter still open to vigorous debate for sure - and I'll be curious to see who wins.

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