Category Archives: Databases

MongoDB “Too Many Open Files”? Raise the limit

This blog post is intended to supplement the “Too Many Open Files” page in the mongoDB docs. Raising the file limit for MongoDB If you installed from the Ubuntu/Debian package, then there is a simple way to increase the open file limit. … Continue reading

Posted in Databases | Tagged | 3 Comments

MongoDB Sharding

Messed around today with MongoDB sharding on version 1.2.2. It was pretty easy to setup. All I had to do was: Download MongoDB Do this setup Here’s the question that prompted me to try it: does MongoDB only fetch the … Continue reading

Posted in Databases | Tagged | Leave a comment

Database Normalization: First, Second, and Third Normal Forms

I read a great explanation of first, second, and third normal form a few weeks ago. For those that know what database normalization is but haven’t seen the “forms”, the different forms are essentially rules for having a well normalized … Continue reading

Posted in Databases | Tagged | 2 Comments

MySQL Join Performance

Earlier this week I was curious about the performance of JOINs in MySQL. How severe is the performance hit of joins? How much slower is a string join over an integer join? I decided to do some tests, and I’m … Continue reading

Posted in Databases | Tagged , | 3 Comments

On Database Abstraction, PHP, and Ruby

It took me a couple days on my current PHP/MySQL project to get the DB abstraction with proper error handling, input validation, and relational support coded to the point where I’m happy with the model. This was after trying Zend_Db, … Continue reading

Posted in Databases, Ruby, Web Design | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments