MySQL is frequently touted as the world’s most widely used relational database management system. Many of the worlds most well known web applications and web sites use MySQL as their data repository. The popularity of MySQL has continued to grow while at the same time many were taken aback by the lack of many features considered to be essential to a ‘real’ rdbms. Such naysayers have done little to impeed the growth or development of MySQL. The first edition of MySQL in a Nutshell, published in 2005 gave users a handy reference to using MySQL. The second edition published in 2008 with coverage of many new features that MySQL fans proudly proclaim as an answer to all those critics clamoring for a more well rounded rdbms.

O’Reilly’s Nutshell books normally ecompass two types of content; tutorials and command reference. MySQL in a Nutshell is true to that format. In this book though, the line between the two is not as cut and dried as in some of the other Nutshell books. The closest to pure reference is probably the documentation of MySQL functions. But there is always more than just a simple statement of function name and parameters. There are examples and when appropriate, Dyer explains function behavior beyond the inherently obvious. A good example would be when Dyer explains the output of Sleep() in the case of a user interupting query execution with crtl-c.

The tutorials cover all of the basics but extend well into the meat of succesfully administering an rdbms. The book begins with an introduction to MySQL itself, instructions on installation and a brief overview of the basics. These chapters make up the first section of the book and take up 35 pages. This means that the book is not an introduction to sql or using an rdbms. This book is first and foremost a reference for the MySQL user who has already moved past the introductory level. I don’t think one needs to be an expert to use the book but there is no extended hand-holding for the novice. This is a plus in my opinion, rather than the publisher shoving in a bunch of extra material in an attempt to make the book useful to every reader regardless of their level of experience.

The second section, “SQL Statements and Functions”, understandably comprises the majority of the text. This second edition breaks down the categories further, leading to an additional five chapters when compared to the first edition. This is evident with the first chapter, “Security and User Statements and Functions” a chapter that was not in the first edition. Here again the real strength is that the commands are not just documented but they are explained and illustrated with examples.

For the person already working as a MySQL DBA or aspiring to do so, there is excellent coverage beyond the basics. There is documentation on essential skills like back-up, recovery and replication. Another new chapter breaks out database table and schema commands on their own. The brief, but thorough documentation of these features makes this volume extremely useful to the DBA moving to MySQL from another rdbms. One struggle for me, coming to MySQL from Oracle has been that sometimes things are just done very differently than I expect. I don’t need a lot of background, I just need to know the MySQL method and this book makes that quickly available and gets me running until I have time to dig further into the why. I would think that this book is a must on the bookshelf of any DBA responsible for the care of MySQL.

Section three further shores up this use with very thorough documentation of MySQL server and client tools. Chapter 15 covers mysqld and mysql. Chapter 16 covers command line utilities. There are roughly 30 utilities coverd and I am sure that this chapter could be a real life saver for many. The book does not cover the gui tools available for managing and working with MySQL. This is a strength in my opinion. The tools are built on top of what is documented here and knowledge of the command line commands should adequately prepare the user to deal with any of the various gui tools available out there. This may be somewhat disconcerting to anyone coming from a MS SQL Server background. It’s been my experience that folks who have only worked with MS SQL Server struggle when they don’t have gui tools, whatever rdbms they are on. Fortunately for them there are a lot of options available to manage MySQL with a gui, they just aren’t covered in this book.

The second group that could benefit the most from this book, beyond database administrators is the devloper. The documentation of sql statements and functions is of course very useful. The fourth section covers APIs and connectors. It documents the c, perl and php APIs. These chapters follow the same easy flow of mix between documentation and tutorial. The beginning of the chapter covers the basics of connecting, executing statements against the database and the reference follows with the specifics of commands and accompanying examples.

Section five contains three appenices that cover data types, operators and server/environment variables. All three are concise but valuable and cover the information fully. The index does an excellent job of covering not only specific terms but subjects and makes it easy to find what the reader wants, even if they aren’t sure of the specific command they are looking to read about.

The book is based on MySQL 5.0 and makes note of features that will be availble in 5.1 and 6.0. This does not include master-master replication, since I mentioned that the book does cover that topic. But the section on replication will still be of use with that new feature I am sure. There were some formatting issues in my copy. I don’t know if it was isolated or a part of a larger number of copies, I did not see it mentioned on the errata web page for the book. In the chapter on date and time functions, three of the sql examples have formatting errors. The last three characters of the last line of the example are repeated as a fourth line. I’m not sure how this crept in, and it is pretty easy to see that the characters are a typo as opposed to part of the statement but it did throw me for a moment when I looked at them. Anyone typing the command verbatim will get an opportunity to see what their client does with incorrect sql.

I think that this is an excellent book that will aid anyone who interacts with MySQL on a regular basis. There is no fluff, no cuteness and no attempt to do anything beyond providing quick access to key information. The book hits that sweet spot between providing too much or not enough. It does not try to be everything to everyone as I mentioned. It will not do all the lifting necessary to get someone who does not even know what an rdbms is to where they will need to be in order to make good use of this book. It does not dive deep on internals or more advanced topics. But what it covers in that wide middle, it covers very well.

Title: MySQL in a Nutshell
Author: Russell J.T. Dyer
Publisher: O’Reilly Media, Inc.
Pages: 561
ISBN: 978-0-596-51433-4
Rating: 9/10
Tagline: A Desktop Quick Reference

It doesn’t seem like it has been 3 years since the Mambo dev team split and a new content management system, Joomla! was born. Over the last few years Joomla has grown to be very popular and has very strong developer and user communities. Joomla is extremely flexible and a wide array of extensions exist that allow the system to provide many different capabilities. In “Joomla! A User’s Guide”, Barrie North provides everything needed to get anyone up and running with a Joomla based site, even if they have little or no experience with creating web sites or applications.

The book is written with language and content squarely aimed at someone new to the tech side of building and running a web site. The language is very simple and even relatively basic terms are explained. As someone with some amount of experience working with software and the web, I didn’t find it to be tedious. North does not go on at length, but just gives the information necessary so that someone without the background will be able to keep up. He can also be rather sympathetic to the reader, encouraging them with things that he says can be difficult. That did get a little tiring at times, though I would imagine for his target audience these affirmations could be really assuring. If you are someone who just wants to get a jump on how Joomla works, I wouldn’t worry too much about this emphasis on the basic. The book is not overly verbose and so the more basic content does not seem to stretch on forever. North covers a lot of ground in what is a thin book in comparison to much of what seems to dominate the tech book market these days.

While North doesn’t wallow in the most basic material and explanations, he never moves on to the really advanced stuff either. If you are interested in coding extensions, or working with the core code, you wont find much here. If you would like a definitive guide with an explanation for every feature and option that exists in Joomla you wont get that either. What North provides is a guide to the most used and most useful information about how to install, set up and run a Joomla based web site. Probably the most advanced material in the book deals with building templates for customizing the look of Joomla. Along with instructions on working with Joomla itself, North also takes some time to also deal with how to generate traffic to a site. For some that chapter may be a bit uncomfortable, though North does a good job of laying out a basic explanation of how things work, as well as practices to avoid. There is a matching appendix on SEO, which is a dirty word in some places. I think that North approaches it with a nice balance between reaching for visibility while avoiding actions that are less than desirable.

The book ends with 3 example sites that the reader can be built as they work through the book. These cover a nice range of cases with one being for a school, another for a business and the third is a blog. This gives the reader nice opportunities to play with the software while having guidelines that keep moving things forward and give it all some useful context. A nice companion to this is an appendix with six case studies on existing sites that use Joomla. North interviewed someone from each site and gives an introduction to the site, a screen shot of their front page and then the questions and answers about the site. Together this forms very nice coverage on just what kind of possibilities exist from a real world perspective as opposed to keeping everything purely theoretical.

The book tends to lean towards explaining platform specific items, like installation, from the Windows perspective. I think the assumption is that Linux users will probably already know how to install what they need and are quite likely to already have all the supporting pieces in place. North explains the installation of WampServer for windows users, to get them started with a local install for working through the book. Everything is very hands on and while the screen shots are not in color they are clear and easy to understand. There are also highlighted notes that give the reader reinforcement on what is most necessary to take away from a section.

The support for the book outside of the copy itself is very good. The book comes with 45 days access through Safari. North’s site for the book has downloads for the associated files from the book as well as sql dumps from the MySQL databases that correspond to the example sites from the book. Everything necessary to build out the examples in the book, or compare one’s work to the authors should problems creep up.

I consider myself to be somewhat technically proficient and at times I did find myself skimming over material that I didn’t need. But I did want to use Joomla well and gain that skill quickly and this book was very helpful in that regard. I would think for anyone else who didn’t want to waste any time hunting around, this could be a useful guide. Another good use I could see for the book is that it would make an excellent gift to anyone who is not a ‘geek’ but is using a joomla based site. This could be a client that has a new site you just built for them, or a relative or friend who would like to have a site of their own but seem to call you for support a little too often. I know if I hand off a Joomla site to anyone in the future, unless they are already experience with it, they will be getting a copy of this book.

I’ve given the book a final rating of 8 on a scale of 10. I do so for two reasons. The first is that Joomla is constantly under development and it is more than likely that in a couple more years or less these instructions will need a major over haul. The second is that while the information on generating traffic was somewhat interesting, I’d have gladly traded it for more information on Joomla itself. Those are relatively minor complaints and from what I’ve seen, this may be the top Joomla book available right now.

Title: Joomla! A User’s Guide
Author: Barrie M. North
Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR
Pages: 480
ISBN: 0136135609
Rating: 8/10
Tagline: Building a Successful Joomla! Powered Website