Continuent Announces New uni/cluster 2008 for PostgreSQL and EnterpriseDB

Continuent, Inc., the leading provider of commercial open source middleware solutions for database high availability, today announced Continuent™ uni/cluster 2008. This newest version of Continuent's uni/cluster software provides the highest levels of availability and scalability for database applications built using PostgreSQL and EnterpriseDB™ Postgres Plus databases.

Continuent uni/cluster offers a multi-master approach to replication. Data is committed and available to all nodes in the cluster simultaneously, effectively eliminating data latency and providing increased reliability through redundancy. Continuent uni/cluster includes a build-in load balancer, which allows any database server to be used to process user queries, providing near-linear scalability, and optimal resource utilization, throughput and response time.

New features in Continuent uni/cluster 2008 include:

• Simplified installation and configuration,
• Faster performance by supporting for more than two cluster controllers,
• Better management tools with new platform-independent Adobe® AIR™-based GUI, and
• SUN Solaris™ support and Red Hat® 5 certification.

"I'm very glad to see Continuent uni/cluster now available on Solaris," said Josh Berkus, the leader of Sun Microsystems' PostgreSQL team. "High availability is often the highest priority of our PostgreSQL for Solaris customers, and the new uni/cluster gives them another powerful tool for 99.999% uptime."

"We are pleased to have Continuent in our new Blade Partner Program," said Bob Zurek, CTO of EnterpriseDB. "Built-in failover and redundancy are essential in today's scale-out data centers that run Web 2.0 applications and demand unparalleled availability and scalability."

"With Continuent uni/cluster 2008, organizations have insurance against outgrowing the capacity of their system," said Eero Teerikorpi, CEO of Continuent. "They can add new database servers on the fly and take advantage of uni/cluster's load balancing, where database activity is directed to the least busy server. This can be vital to maintaining continuous data availability for maximum productivity and meet customer expectations."

For more information about Continuent products, visit http://www.continuent.com. For information on Continuent's involvement in the open source community, visit http://www.continuent.org. More information about the Postgres Plus family of database products is available at www.enterprisedb.com.

About Continuent
Continuent provides continuous data availability. Continuent develops and markets commercial Continuent uni/cluster products and services based on Sequoia, a database-neutral, open source database-clustering project (www.continuent.org). Continuent's commercial open source solutions are currently available for EnterpriseDB™, MySQL® and PostgreSQL. Continuent's Sequoia open source solutions are available for Microsoft® SQL Server, Oracle®, IBM® DB2®, and Sybase®. Continuent is headquartered in San Jose, CA, with research labs in Finland and France. For more information, please visit www.continuent.com.

Source: PRWeb

PostgreSQL Version 8.3 Released

The PostgreSQL Global Development Group today announced the release of version 8.3 of the high-performance object-relational database management system. This release includes a record number of new and improved features which will greatly enhance PostgreSQL for application designers, database administrators and users, with more than 280 patches by dozens of PostgreSQL contributors from 18 countries.

"The continued evolution of the open source PostgreSQL database gives users the option of deploying a non proprietary database, allowing them to save money, improve performance and increase productivity. PostgreSQL 8.3 is an impressive new release and we encourage customers around the world to explore it," said Rich Green, executive vice president of Software at Sun Microsystems.

Version 8.3 provides greater consistency of performance than previous versions, ensuring that every user can depend on the same high performance demonstrated in recent benchmarks for every transaction, whether in peak hours or not, seven days a week, 52 weeks per year. Major performance enhancements include:

• Heap Organized Tuples (HOT), which eliminate up to 3/4 of the maintenance overhead of frequently updated tables
• Spread checkpoints and background writer autotuning, which reduce the impact of checkpoints on response times
• Asynchronous commit option for much faster response times on some transactions

These changes also significantly accelerate transaction processing throughput, between 5 percent and 30 percent, depending on the workload.

"PostgreSQL just got smarter," said Bruce Momjian, PostgreSQL Core Team member.

PostgreSQL is the first open source database to implement Synchronized Scan, which greatly reduces I/O on large data mining databases. The Windows team has enabled Visual C++ compilation of PostgreSQL, improving stability and performance on Windows, as well as accessibility to the project to Windows contributors. New logging options have been added and the overhead of the statistics collector has been diminished in order to make it easier to monitor your servers.

Of course, this wouldn't be a proper PostgreSQL release without providing lots of new features for application developers, among them:

• ANSI-standard SQL/XML support, including XML export
• Text search: our advanced full text search tool, TSearch2, has been merged into the core distribution with better management and new dictionaries and languages
• GSSAPI and SSPI authentication support
• New data types: UUIDs, ENUMs and arrays of composite types

"We process over 18,000 queries per second on over 300GB of user data on our PostgreSQL servers, and those numbers go up every month," said Gavin Roy, CTO of social networking site MyYearbook.com. "We're very excited about HOT, shared buffer scan improvements and integrated tsearch indexing. Preliminary testing shows that 8.3 will improve our database load profile while decreasing response times. We're really looking forward to it."

In addition to the many new core features, several new optional components have matured and released 1.0 versions during the 8.3 release cycle. These include SNMP support, horizontal scalability options such as PL/Proxy, pgPool2 and Bucardo, a graphical debugger for stored procedures, and a scalable connection pooler called pgBouncer. These add to the rich set of accessories already available.

Download PostgreSQL from our download page: Downloads

Source: PRWeb

Continuent Announces Database Performance Test Tool

Continuent, Inc., the leading provider of commercial open source middleware solutions for database high-availability and scalability, today announced the release of Bristlecone, a new open source framework for load testing of databases and database clusters.

Bristlecone includes two easy-to-run tools designed for comparative evaluations of database performance:

• Evaluator generates mixed loads of inserts, updates, deletes, and selects. Output can be built-in graphics, HTML, XML, or CSV.
• Benchmark runs performance test cases with systematically varying parameters. Output can be HTML or CSV.

Bristlecone includes support for multi-threaded tests, can generate new tests quickly with simple configuration file changes, and has the ability to perform systematic tests across different database implementations. Bristlecone has been tested against PostgreSQL, MySQL®, and HSQLDB.

"Bristlecone is the principle load-testing tool for Continuent's uni/cluster, a commercial database clustering product based on the Sequoia open source project," says Robert Hodges, CTO at Continuent. "Bristlecone is a great tool because it can work easily with many types of databases. We are also working with the open source community as well as advanced clustering research projects like GORDA to develop off-the-shelf benchmarks of database clusters that anyone can set up and run quickly in their own environments."

Bristlecone is available at http://bristlecone.continuent.org

For more information about Continuent products, visit http://www.continuent.com For information on Continuent's involvement in the open source community, visit http://www.continuent.org

About Continuent
Continuent provides continuous data availability. Continuent develops and markets commercial Continuent uni/cluster products and services based on Sequoia, a database-neutral, open source database-clustering project (www.continuent.org). Continuent's commercial open source solutions are currently available for EnterpriseDB™, MySQL and PostgreSQL. Continuent's Sequoia open source solutions are available for Microsoft® SQL Server, Oracle®, IBM® DB2®, and Sybase®. Continuent is headquartered in San Jose, CA, with research labs in Finland and France. For more information, please visit www.continuent.com.

Source: PRWeb

Rack up the Hits with PHP/PostgreSQL Bootcamp, February 25-29, 2008

Big Nerd Ranch, Inc. announces an exciting new training class for web designers and database administrators looking to expand their skills into web development, the new PHP 5/PostgreSQL Bootcamp slated for February 25-29, 2008. The class reflects Big Nerd Ranch's continuing quest to create high quality training classes that provide an in-depth understanding of the technology. PHP 5, which has rapidly become one of the most prevalent web development languages in the market, is the perfect platform for moving beyond simple web sites for clients into full-featured database-driven web applications. By combining PHP 5 with PostgreSQL, the most robust and scalable open-source database available, students will master the tools necessary to develop full-featured web solutions.

By placing more emphasis on the database component of web application development, the PHP 5/PostgreSQL Bootcamp offers a more realistic approach to how web applications actually work. Students learn how HTML, CSS, PHP and a back-end database all integrate together to provide something useful and compelling to users. Ultimately, this will improve the skills of developers seeking to rise above the competition in the web development services they can provide.

Mark Fenoglio, class instructor, commented about the new class, "Students will be surprised how much easier it is to learn database concepts when they are applied in the context of a working web site. Why columns of particular tables are needed. Why the primary key is so crucial in database design. How different pieces of information fit together to provide a useful dataset for a web page."

Upon completion of the class, students will be able to:

• Use PHP and PostgreSQL to build a complete CRM website and application
• Understand how to integrate PHP and PostgreSQL with complementary web technologies (e.g., CSS, XML, pdf, AJAX) to produce professional web solutions
• Implement security measures to prevent the most common kinds of attacks in a web environment
• Understand how to integrate third-party libraries (e.g., PEAR) into PHP applications, dramatically reducing development time

To read the complete class description, please visit http://bignerdranch.com/classes/php5_pgsql.shtml

To register for the class, please visit: http://bignerdranch.com/register.php?cid=1042

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers and system administrators in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access, and ground transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit www.bignerdranch.com.

Source: PRWeb

AquaFold Releases Enterprise Sybase, MS SQL, Oracle, Server Database Administration Tools for Windows, Linux and OSX

AquaFold, Inc. has released Aqua Data Studio 6.5, a powerful upgrade to its already versatile, multi-platform application that provides complete database administration and query tools for Oracle, DB2, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Sybase, Informix, and PostgreSQL on Linux, OSX and Windows. Within this single application, database managers can save time and money in the design, development and maintenance of enterprise relational databases.

Version 6.5 includes new Source Control Support for Subversion and CVS. With Source Control, multiple users can store, check in and update scripts and other files from within Aqua Data Studio, eliminating the need for other versioning software. This will free system memory, and create a more efficient server update process. ADS also now has a SQL Debugger for Sybase and Oracle which allows users to locate and eliminate problems in SQL statements, eliminating the rigorous searching usually required to locate and correct errors in Sybase and Oracle.

One of the most powerful new features added to the Query Analyzer is its Excel supported Grids, Pivot Grids and Graphs/Charts which allow the grouping and summarizing of selected columns and rows of data into reports. Pivot Grids and Graphs display on multi-level split-panes which allow full control over size configurations persisting over multiple runs of the same query in the same query panel. Their configurations are saveable and reloadable into existing pivot tables for quick and efficient access later. The results can be visualized in three dimensional, fully rotatable graphs, and can be exported directly to, and from, Excel.

Version 6.5 includes a complete set of enhancements for Schema, Directory and File difference tools, including Object Permissions, Filtering by File Size, Background Processing, Refresh, Data Compare, Save as HTML, Preview in Browser, Difference Count and, for File Diff, the ability to Drag & Drop files into the tool. There is also a new Results Difference tool which gives users the ability to view differences between two result sets obtained from either the same or two different queries. The Results Difference tool also allows users to view where columns and rows have been added or deleted and where cells have been edited in different result sets.

In addition, there is now support for auto-completion across multiple databases which allows users to complete a table in a database other than the one they are currently working in. Users can now share the autocompletion schema data across different query windows through the new Global Auto Completion Cache which increases speed by minimizing memory consumption. There are a variety of client side command enhancements which are supported by Query Analyzer scripts, and a new Morph to Delimited List which allows users to convert a block of text into a delimited list with the appropriate options for completing a query or other documentation.

Aqua Data Studio 6.5 is available for immediate download at http://www.aquafold.com/downloads.html A complete list of new features and descriptions may be viewed at http://www.aquafold.com/features_6_5.html The cost of a single-user commercial license is $399(USD). Multi-license purchase discounts are also available and can be viewed here http://aquafold.com/licensing.html

About AquaFold, Inc.
AquaFold, Inc. is a provider of software tools for relational databases. More than 300,000 users from over 90 different countries use AquaFold's products to design, develop and administer databases in Oracle and other popular programs. For more information visit http://www.aquafold.com

Source: PRWeb

Continuent Ships uni/cluster Connector for PostgreSQL and MySQL

Continuent, Inc., the leading provider of commercial open source middleware solutions for database high-availability and scalability, today announced the Continuent uni/clsuter Connector.
Continuent uni/cluster is a suite of middleware software that delivers high-availability and scalability clustering for virtually any mission critical database application.

Continuent uni/cluster Connector is a key part of the Continuent vision of transparent database clustering using off-the-shelf databases and commodity hardware. The Connector allows applications that use MySQL's or PostgreSQL's native database APIs to connect directly to Continuent uni/cluster (uni/cluster for MySQL Enterprise, uni/cluster for PostgreSQL and uni/cluster for EnterpriseDB respectively) without changing libraries or making code alterations.

"Continuent uni/cluster Connector makes database clustering deployments simpler and faster -- customers can focus on deploying the cluster and just switch client connections when they are ready to move." says CTO Robert Hodges anc continues "Another great feature of the Connector is that standard database clients such as 'mysql' and 'psql' can work directly with the cluster. So users preserve not only current client applications but also can continue to use familiar administrative tools as well. Finally, the uni/cluster Connector is fast and consumes few system resources. It minimizes resource impact of deploying Continuent uni/cluster in new environments."

This version of uni/cluster Connector supports all API calls except for use of prepared statements. Continuent is working on these now and expect to provide support in the next release.

Continuent uni/cluster Connector is available in September 2007 and it is free for all Continuent uni/cluster customers. The pricing for Continuent uni/cluster starts at $3,600.

For more information about Continuent products, visit www.continuent.com, and for information on Continuent's involvement in the open source community, visit www.continuent.org.

About Continuent

Continuent increases application reliability by ensuring continuous database availability. Continuent manages a database-neutral, open source database-clustering project Sequoia (www.continuent.org). Continuent also develops and markets commercial Continuent uni/cluster products and services based on Sequoia technology

Continuent's commercial open source solutions are currently available for MySQL® (Continuent uni/cluster for MySQL Enterprise) and PostgreSQL (Continuent uni/cluster for PostgreSQL). Continuent's Sequoia open source solutions are available for Microsoft® SQL Server, Oracle®, IBM® DB2®, and Sybase.

Continuent clustering solutions are designed to provide high-availability and performance scalability services for databases. These solutions are applicable to, and can be transparently added to, a wide range of client/server and internet, especially Web 2.0 applications.

Continuent is headquartered in San Jose, CA, with sales offices in UK and Finland, and a research lab in France. For more information, please visit www.continuent.com.

Source: PRWeb

Minq Software Ships DbVisualizer 6.0

Minq Software today announced the general availability of DbVisualizer 6.0, a world leading, cost effective, cross platform database tool that increases user productivity by providing a single solution to speed development, testing and administration of relational databases. DbVisualizer offers a robust set of features to assist database developers and DBAs perform tasks such as object browsing, creating, running SQL statements and SQL scripts, viewing and editing data. Additionally, this tool includes features such as a the powerful table references graph, query builder, SQL formatter, result set charting and SQL bookmarks feature.

DbVisualizer supports all major commercial databases including Oracle, DB2, Mimer, SQL Server, Sybase ASE, Informix and open source alternatives such as MySQL, PostgreSQL and JavaDB/Derby. DbVisualizer is optimized for the Windows XP, Mac OS X and Linux/UNIX operating systems.

The new release adds the Table Data Navigator which is powerful tool to navigate foreign keys based on data selections. This is useful when browsing normalized tables with keys to other tables, click an entry in one table, choose the link to follow and the target table will be displayed with the matching data. The new Table Editor supports visual creation and editing of table definitions including columns, indexes, primary, foreign keys, constraints and non standard features specifically for the supported databases. The Data Editor is a central feature that has been revised from ground up, and now supports multiple row operations, transaction control, easy copy/paste with the most popular spreadsheet applications, enhanced filtering, sorting and printing. In addition, this new version is optimized for Windows Vista, DB2 version 9, Java 1.6 and comes with an option to install JDBC drivers for MySQL, PostgreSQL, Sybase, SQL Server, DB2, Mimer and JavaDB/Derby.

"The new features and changes are sweeping and I think we've done a great job putting it all together, still keeping the tool focused and consistent", says Roger Bjärevall, product manager for DbVisualizer at Minq Software.

Availability and Pricing
DbVisualizer is available in two editions, DbVisualizer Free and the commercial DbVisualizer Personal edition starting at $149 per user.

For more information, visit http://www.dbvis.com

About Minq Software
Minq Software is a Swedish software company developing, marketing and selling database software, performance assurance and response time monitoring products. Founded in 1998, it has been a successful provider of load testing and database solutions.

Source: PRWeb

Beat the Summer Heat with a Big Nerd Ranch PostgreSQL Bootcamp Retreat

Big Nerd Ranch, Inc., leading provider of system administration and programming training classes, announced today the summer dates for its popular PostgreSQL 8.2 Bootcamp for July 9-13, 2007. PostgreSQL 8.2 Bootcamp has become one of the cornerstone Big Nerd Ranch classes and is taught by Chris Campbell, experienced Big Nerd Ranch instructor and expert PostgreSQL developer. The class has been designed to address the needs of database administrators and project managers seeking a robust, scalable, and flexible database solution. PostgreSQL 8.2, the best open-source database available on the market, provides that solution.

"One of the aspects of the PostgreSQL Bootcamp at the Big Nerd Ranch that commends it over other PostgreSQL training classes, is the in-depth understanding of PostgreSQL that instructor Chris Campbell provides," commented Aaron Hillegass, Big Nerd Ranch founder. "The scope of PostgreSQL instruction offered in class far surpasses even what is presented on the syllabus. Chris has a keen sense for zeroing in on the needs of his students and adapting the curriculum to make it relevant to their real-world challenges."

The five-day, intensive class provides superior instruction in essential PostgreSQL topics; with twenty-five units broken into easily digestible lecture and development time. In just the first day, students will have learned to install PostgreSQL and mastered its server configuration. By the end of the class, students will demonstrate mastery in the fundamental principles of PostgreSQL installation and administration, including, but not limited to:

• psql, pgAdmin and phpPgAdmin
• creating databases, schemas, users and access control
• Security, backups and OpenSSL
• Slony-I replication, SELECT and JOIN
• PL/pgSQL
• Query plans and basic optimization
• pgpool, libpq and DBI

The complete syllabus provides more information about the class and instructor Chris Campbell.

While no previous experience with PostgreSQL is required, it is helpful to have some basic familiarity with it. Students are expected to have experience with the Unix command line, basic Unix administration, simple SQL statements, and basic programming concepts.

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access, and ground transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit Big Nerd Ranch.

Source: PRWeb

Don't Be a Slave to Your Database, PostgreSQL Bootcamp- April 23-27, 2007

Atlanta, GA - January 15, 2007 -- Big Nerd Ranch, Inc. announced the first in the line-up of 2007 dates for the industry's premier PostgreSQL training, the PostgreSQL Bootcamp from April 23-27, 2007. The five-day intensive class, taught by PostgreSQL expert and experienced instructor, Chris Campbell, sets the industry standard in PostgreSQL training by providing the most comprehensive class available. After five days, novice students emerge fully skilled in the ability to design and administer a PostgreSQL database environment.
Over the course of five days, Chris navigates students through an exhaustive examination of PosgreSQL 8.2; from building and installing a PostgreSQL server to advanced level functions such as Slony-I replication, pgpool and more. The class is structured into approximately 30 unit0s of short lectures followed by immediate hands-on practice of lesson content. Key topics include:

• Creating a cluster with initdb
• Configuring, starting and stopping the server
• pgAdmin and phpPgAdmin
• Creating databases and schemas
• Security and OpenSSL
• Slony-I replication
• PL/pgSQL and C functions
• Full-text indexing, views, triggers and rules
• Query plans, optimization and benchmarking
• pgpool, libpq (C client library) and DBI (Perl client library)

To view the complete class syllabus, please visit http://bignerdranch.com/classes/postgresql.shtml

For students to achieve the maximum results from the class, it is highly recommended that students attending the class be familiar with the UNIX command line, simple SQL statements and basic programming concepts.

"PostgreSQL is rapidly becoming one of the key technologies for the Open Source developer," commented Aaron Hillegass, Big Nerd Ranch founder. "Whether you're developing a web application using any of the major frameworks or developing a standard, database-driven application, PostgreSQL's robustness and scaleability adeptly handles any database challenge. Database administrators and developers receiving PostgreSQL training at the Big Nerd Ranch will be able to immediately leverage their knowledge into any database project."

Chris Campbell came to the Big Nerd Ranch in 2002 after having developed an impressive track record working for Cisco systems as a programmer and system administrator supporting the 12000-series GSR routers. In addition, he worked for an Atlanta-area IT consulting firm honing his skills solving cross-platform and networking challenges. Since assuming his role as PostgreSQL Bootcamp instructor, Chris has developed and fine-tuned the curriculum and instructional materials into one of the flagship courses in the Big Nerd Ranch schedule of classes.

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access, and transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit www.bignerdranch.com.

Source: PRWeb