MySQL, Second Edition: Visual Quickstart Guide

I. Introduction

In the midst of the Information Age, where more and more data is being stored on computers, the need for high-speed, reliable databases has increased dramatically. For years, large companies, such as Oracle, Microsoft, and IBM, have been providing high-end data warehousing applications for mission-critical work. These programs were used primarily by Fortune 500 companies, which can afford their extreme cost and personnel demands. Meanwhile, within the open-source community, a new wave of small, reliable, and inexpensive database applications came to the market. Such software, of which MySQL and PostgreSQL are the best examples, gave common users and developers on a budget a practical database choice.

MySQL, fortunately, has left ...