Sun Gives MySQL A Query AnalyzerSun Gives MySQL A Query Analyzer

By moving the sorting out of the database and back into the application, plus putting a limit on how many stories would be returned to any first request, Freund watched query execution time drop from an average 5.27 seconds down to 2.54 seconds. In other words, Clickability chopped 48% of the time it took to execute each query out of his overhead.

The new tool "gave us a snapshot. We learned more about query usage in two minutes than we could gain in two years of ad hoc log analysis and guessing," he said.

Freund acknowledges the savings was reduced in cases where users wanted more stories than the bounded query returned, and they performed a follow-up query, but more than half of all users were satisfied by the bounded query.

"Database performance is incredibly important. Databases are the core platform. The performance and capacity we get out of them determines how much we have to spend on operations," he said. By solving the "top sports stories" bottleneck, he believes his firm has pushed its next purchase of up to eight database servers "out by 6 to 9 months," he said.

"I always like to look at tools like this. The question is, how quickly can you get value out of them?" he added. The product version of Query Analyzer will be available with gold- and platinum-level subscription versions of MySQL Enterprise 5.1, due out Dec. 6. The gold subscription is priced at $2,999 per physical server; platinum, $4,999 per server. Any number of instances of the database may run on the server.

Those prices compare to the basic edition of MySQL, which lists for $599 per physical server. The silver edition, which includes the Monitor management console without Data Analyzer, is priced at $1,299. The pricing structure illustrates how MySQL is attempting to build more value into its product and charge for high-end add-ons, a process that started before the firm was acquired by Sun in April.

Asked to comment on whether MySQL staffers were caught in Sun's planned cutbacks, Mickos said he was restricted from commenting and corporate public relations personnel would have to handle the question. Then he added that the emphasis CEO Jonathan Schwartz made on Sun's open source software strategy "should give you an answer to your question."