Again, OSCON 2010 was a great and fun show. We were lucky to be invited to present our project at Community booth 122. During the two days of the expo, we had the opportunity to explore a lot of possible use cases, and gained valuable insight into what people are using BlackRay for and where future uses are most probable.
At this point, we are making good progress on the 0.11 release. Mike has completed a full refactoring of the Index Functions (Issue 75) and is currently under way to redo the SQL using Lemon and Quex (Issue 77). This is very exciting and makes it a lot easier to actually use BlackRay for common database tasks that require more SQL compliance than the 0.10 release could offer.
Additionally we have identified two major features that must either make it into 0.11 or 0.12, either one of which would also make a GA release candidate once we support this.
Online Updates
BlackRay would be able to replace traditional disk-based databases in many cases when a true online update is implemented. This feature is complex and will take time, but it needs to be evaluated soon.
SQL Aggregate Functions
In order to make BlackRay a suitable choice for analytical workloads, we need Aggregate functions as well as the GROUP BY clause in our SQL. This feature is significantly less complex to implement, and would make BlackRay a prime choice in many data warehouse and statistical setups.
Last Minute Changes! BlackRay will be present at the O’Reilly MySQL Conference April 12-14 in Santa Clara, CA with both a presentation and a booth!
At booth 112, there will be a chance to chat with some developers and maybe, if you mention you saw it on the Blog, a chance to snatch a BlackRay T-Shirt.
We’d be happy to see you guys in Santa Clara and maybe go for a beer after the show! Feel free to contact us if you want to schedule a talk with us or if you have any comments!
It has been quiet on the blog lately, but things behind the scenes have made quite som progress. After the long hours preceding our Mid-December Release of the 0.10 version most members of the team used the quiet time over Christmas to get some rest. And, of course, to think of new and exciting stuff for the upcoming 0.11 release. While no date has been set for the release, we anticipate something around MySQL Con Mid April.
SQL Engine Rewrite
Mike has investigated some new tools to rewrite the SQL Engine. The issue has been extensively discussed on the mailing list and is being tracked on the Forge as Task #78. We welcome all feedback anyone may have on Lemon, Quex or related technologies.
Related to this effort, also the function backend is being refactored. The refactoring will allow the BlackRay internal functions to be exposed via all APIs as well as SQL, and arbitrary nesting of functions is possible this way. See the in-depth discussion on the mailing list.
Open Database Alliance
BlackRay has become the first Non-MySQL derived database project to join the ODBA. Felix has also been elected to serve on the board of directors and is the proposed Vice-Chairman of the organization. A formal board meeting will take place in April, as part of the MySQL Conference.
Other Stuff
Also, on a different Note: It is close to Valentine’s day, and the FSF Europe has started a little campaign. No, not about flowers and chocolates, about the love for free sowftware.
The BlackRay Development Team is pleased to announce the release of BlackRay 0.10.0 for Linux, Solaris and Mac OS.
SoftMethod likes to thank all external contributors for helping to make this release possible. Special thanks go to Mike Alexeev and Souvik Roy, who dedicated a lot of their spare time to the development of BlackRay.
Besides various bug fixes, BlackRay 0.10 introduces several changes to existing features as well as some new features:
This release introduces support for the postgres protocol. You can now use your postgreSQL JDBC/ODBC drivers to connect to BlackRay.
The SQL parser has undergone some heavy changes. SQL parsing is now handled on the server side.
Initial support for python language bindings has been added.
Usage of the command-line tools has been simplified.
The syntax of the configuration file has also changed.
We’ve added some more examples to demonstrate the usage of the language bindings.
For a full list of changes please have a look at the file CHANGES included in the distribution.
For installation instructions please have a look at the BlackRay documentation, available as PDF and HTML (multi- or single-page version).
Our presentation at SAPO CodeBits is done, the videos will be posted on the codebits.eu website later. The presentation is again available for your viewing pleasure in OpenOffice , SWF, and PDF format.
A major focus of the presentation here is the imminent 0.10 release. While Thomas stayed in Munich fixing bugs and getting stuff up and running Souvik joined me here in Lisboa for a bit of networking, un-conferencing and chilling. With about 600 attendees and four stages in an old rope factory, the location is set up just perfect.
Also we have to say that SAPO CodeBits is an awesome conference format. The hacking contest, all night long, music and party. Plus, here things are free once you get accepted to the conference. Even Pizza, Coffee, Drinks, Chocolate and Energy Drinks – all just available. The crowd is very mixed, and the talks are all really interesting.
Here are some impressions from the CodeBits location…
We are excited to be at another North American un-conference again so shortly after the Florida Linux Show. This time the OpenSQL Camp set up their tent in Portland, and Felix will be attending the camp.
A major topic is the upcoming 0.10 release as well as the roadmap towards the expected 1.0 GA release in March 2010. All questions are welcome, and of course we will bring some goodies as well. See you in Portland next weekend!
On October 24th Frank and Mike were present at the Florida Linux Show 2009 in Orlando. An interested crowd was quite eager to lern about BlackRay and the people behind it. We gave away lanyards, T-Shirts and pretty flyers.
Frank also held a talk in the conference, which was well received by a medium sized audience. The slides are available below, and are unmodified from the OpenSQL Camp talk earlier this year.
Sorry for the picture quality though, they were taken with Frank’s mobile phone.
We are excited to report that we have been kindly invited to present at the Florida Linux Show 2009 in beautiful Orlando on October 24th. Frank and Mike will be exhibiting the engine, and there is going to be a 40 Minute presentation as well. See you all there and don’t forget to ask for your free lanyard!
Thank you all for the good feedback at the FrOSCon/OpenSQL Camp 2009. We have put our BlackRay presentation online (as SWF, PDF and OpenOffice Document) so you can look at what you may have missed at the conference.
Please feel free to contact any of us with any comments or suggestions you may have.
We are very happy to announce that our submission for the OpenSQL Camp 2009 was successful. OpenSQL Camp is a free conference of, by, and for the open-source database community of users and developers. BlackRay will be presented in a technical talk, and there will be plenty of chances to talk to the people behind the data engine.
As soon as we know the exact schedule, we will post an announcement here. Our talk will cover these areas
Brief retrospective and history: Why did we even bother to build this?
Basic engine architecture
Index perspectives
Query path optimization
Current roadmap and state of development
Integration with other excellent engines – MySQL/MariaDB and PostgreSQL in particular
See you all in St. Augustin on August 22nd & 23rd!
We have proposed a talk at FrosCon/OpenSQL Camp, but we need your votes for our proposal, which you can see here. As there are 27 talks but only 12 slots, we need your support to get a chance and spread our message. Voting is done via twitter or a google group. Full instructions for the voting can be found here. Quick vote works like this:
Our session-ID is 456. To vote, use twitter and send a message to @opensqlcamp:
@opensqlcamp 456 +1
with an optional message (in parentheses):
@opensqlcamp 456 +1 (give the new kid some room to talk)
After many months of deliberation, choosing TRAC plugins, subversion authentication mechanisms, and other stuff, we have come to a conclusion!
First of all, we no longer use TRAC. Sorry to say this to the guys at Edgewall – TRAC does kick ass. But, it does SUCK at maintaining multiple projects. We have evaluated many plugins. They are all crap. Sorry, no offence to the guys making them. TRAC simply is NOT designed for multiple projects
So it is writtten in Ruby, on rails. As a kid, rails and railways ruled my daily schedule. What about now? Ruby on Rails kicks ass – and not my ass I must add! Thx @rubyonrails! You guys are awesome.
Ok, so we do not know the language it is made with. Actually similar to TRAC – remember anyone excited to work themselves into Clearsilver, Genshi and NEON? Nope. Nope. Nope!
Learning Ruby does work out to be fun. It ain’t quite as cool as Java. But, for a dynamically typed language, it is quite structured, and after doing the tutorials 1-4 I do kick ass as a Ruby Ninja (hey, please DO protect me in combat!)
Now that the forge is up, be agile, be quick, be nimble and tell me anything that did not work…..
BlackRay (represented by SoftMethod) will be exhibiting at OSCON 2009. Thomas, Frank and Felix will be in the exhibit hall all days, and are happy to answer all questions related to how it works, what it can do for you, or how you can contribute. We will have a large scale live system at the show floor, and there will be plenty of stuff for you.
Mention that you saw this on the BlackRay homepage and receive a cool free T-Shirt (while supplies last)
Come by Booth 424 and get in touch with the developers and other people behind BlackRay, learn about the technology and how it will make your job easier, perform better in complex search problems and make your search eco-friendly.
All of us here at SoftMethod are very excited about the initial source and binary release of BlackRay. Several months of dedication towards turning a piece of code into an open source ready project. Special thanks go to Thomas, our Chief Technologist for BlackRay.
Welcome to the new home of BlackRay, our high performance database. We hope you enjoy your time around here and that you will take a chance and test drive the software we are offering.
