common_schema roadmap thoughts

I’m happy with common_schema; it is in fact a tool I use myself on an almost daily basis. I’m also happy to see that it gains traction; which is why I’m exposing a little bit of my thoughts on general future development. I’d love to get feedback.

Supported versions

At this moment, common_schema supports MySQL >= 5.1, all variants. This includes 5.5, 5.6, MySQL, Percona Server & MariaDB.

5.1 is today past end of line, and I’m really missing the SIGNAL/RESIGNAL syntax that I would like to use; I can do in the meanwhile with version-specific code such as /*!50500 … */. Nevertheless, I’m wondering whether I will eventually have to:

• Support different branches of common_schema (one that supports 5.1, one that supports >= 5.5)
• Stop support for 5.1

Of course community-wise, the former is preferred; but I have limited resources, so I would like to make a quick poll here:

[poll id=”3″]

I’ll use the poll’s results as a vague idea of what people use and want. Or please use comments below to sound your voice!

rdebug

This was a crazy jump at providing a stored routine debugger and debugging API. From some talk I made I don’t see this getting traction. For the time being, I don’t see that I will concentrate my efforts on this. Actually it is almost complete. You can step-into, step-out, step-over, set breakpoints, read variables, modify variables — it’s pretty cool.

But someone will eventually have to write a GUI front-end for this (eclipse/IntelliJ/whatever); I know not many will use a command line approach for a debugger. I also know I’m not going to write the GUI front-end. So the API is there, let’s see how it rolls.

QueryScript

I will keep on improving QueryScript, and in particular split, error handling, and otherwise simplification of common tasks. I have no doubt QueryScript goes the right way: I just see how easy it is to solve complex problems with a QueryScript one-liner. Other bullets on my TODO for QueryScript:

• Script tracking (a semi-debugging mechanism, which allows one to recognize status of script)
• Message passing to scripts (again, a semi-debugger approach)
• Error recovery; ability to resume script from point of failure or point of suspension. I have plenty use cases for that.

performance_schema

I will most probably include parts of Mark Leith’s ps_helper, which is released under a permissive license, and otherwise draw ideas from his work. I’m happy to learn parts of ps_helper were influenced by common_schema itself.

Hosting

common_schema will most probably move out of Google Code; by Jan 2014 there will no longer be a “Downloads” section, and I really, really, want there to be a “Downloads” section.

I could go LaunchPad, GitHub, BitBucket (they don’t have “Downloads” sections, either, do they?), other; any advice?

World domination

Yep. This is still common_schema‘s goal. More seriously, I would want to see it installed on every single MySQL server instance. Then I would control your fate. bwahahaha!

Even more seriously, if you are a happy user, please do pass the word. I can only blog so much and present so much; there are no financing resources for this project, and I need all the help I can get in promoting common_schema. Thank you!