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Comment by chrsig | Hacker News Reader

This strikes me as pretty childish.

If it had read more like "I left because I was frustrated with code quality", and actually took ownership of the feeling, that'd have made a big difference. It reads more like "i left because the code sucks, everyone around me is dumb, and our users are sheep"

I don't think anyone's going to suddenly switch to postgres as a result of this blog post...so really, what's the point?

Maybe it'll get more attention on the systems he called out? Probably not. The post just reads as bitter, mostly about the mindset of other contributors, but doesn't outline what they tried to do to change the hearts and mind of those contributors. Or put another way: what did this person do to lift up all of these people? Deriding doesn't actually help anything.

If the goal is just to vent that's fine, but there's really not much else to see here.

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It reads more like "i left because the code sucks, everyone around me is dumb, and our users are sheep"

Not in the least. The fact that he doesn't say what you're saying he says ("everyone around me is dumb, and our users are sheep"), but rather simply sticks to brass tacks -- and it's pretty hard to counter his main point (about the quality of MySQL as a product), after all -- belies the characterization you are trying to make of what he said.

The post just reads as bitter,

Anytime anyone, heaven forbid, talks the plain and simple truth about the conditions many of us work under in this industry -- they get characterized as "bitter", "derisive", "just venting", or (especially in the context of describing our past work experiences to prospective employers), "badmouthing". Or as you put it: "childish".

Such is the state of our industry.

Insulting your coworkers and users is childish, and that's exactly what this post is. "More jarring were the people who insisted everything was OK" "was hailed as “efficient” (it wasn't)." In fact that's pretty much all it is. There are plenty of ways to complain without burning every bridge around you.

"More jarring were the people who insisted everything was OK"

I read this as simply being honest (in the "Dutch" sense). It wasn't like he was shit-talking his former co-workers, per se. He's just saying he had a radically different appraisal of technical viability of the flagship product.

Which, again, was simply the truth as he saw it.

Simply being honest doesn't mean you're not unneededly insulting everyone around you. He can say he had a radically different appraisal of the technical viability of mySQL without calling everyone he works with an idiot.

He's not saying, or even insinuating, that they're "idiots".

Really, look at the dictionary definition of the term, please.

Everyone who works on mySQL is going to read this to mean he thinks they're idiots, and that's what matters.

You don't know that -- and even if some of them do, that doesn't mean that interpretation is justified.

> Such is the state of our industry.

Yeah, but the guy is worth millions, ain't he? I assume he's pulling in 6 figures?

Well, readings are subjective, and it's ok that you don't agree with my reading of it.

But I do think that you're either mistaking "plain and simple truth" for callousness, or creating a double standard. Are descriptions such as "bitter" not the "plain and simple" truth for this post? I certainly think it reads bitterly.

They're not really complaining about the work conditions, so I'm not really sure what you're referring to there. It's just code. It doesn't bite. It does ossify. It's unpleasant to deal with, but it's part of the job.

It seemed like they had supportive, albeit corporate management.

> Are descriptions such as "bitter" not the "plain and simple" truth for this post? I certainly think it reads bitterly.

Erm, no?

You yourself pointed out: “Well, readings are subjective…”

What real facts did the author present? It's a recounting of their impression of the code base, experience on boarding, etc.

Perhaps I'm being dense - could you highlight the plain and simple truth part?

It’s not about what the author wrote. Of course what they wrote was their own opinion.

It’s about you reading ‘bitterness’ in to what they wrote. The bitterness is in your mind.

The bitterness is in your mind.

Agreed - across this thread, there's been a lot of what imputation of bad or petty intent and/or of a disagreeable emotional state on the part of the blog author that just isn't called for.

Well I didn't mean "conditions" like having to work in a windowless basement, with a pile phonebooks to sit on instead of a chair.

But rather: being asked to work on products we just can't really believe in, to be silent when upper management (though otherwise supportive and presumably in no way outwardly abusive or mean) would prefer that we keep our blinders on, etc.

It's just code.

His main concern was the quality of the product as a whole -- and the lack of awareness in that environment of what, to him, seemed to be simple and obvious facts. The remarks about the "bad code" almost tangential (like he said, "it didn't bother me much").

> Coming to MySQL was like stepping into a parallel universe, where there were lots of people genuinely believing that MySQL was a state-of-the-art product.

> (it seems most MySQL users and developers don't really use other databases)

> But perhaps consider taking a look at the other side of that fence at some point, past the “OMG vacuum” memes.

> Monty and his merry men left because they were unhappy about the new governance, not because they suddenly woke up one day and realized what a royal mess they had created in the code.

> I am genuinely proud of the work I have been doing, and MySQL 8.0 (with its ever-increasing minor version number) is a much better product than 5.7 was

————————-

There’s definitely a lot of “our users are sheep” and “everyone else is dumb” going on in this post.

Heck, it may even be true. But you can’t really argue that hybrid author isn’t saying it.

There’s definitely a lot of “our users are sheep” and “everyone else is dumb” going on in this post.

Well, we disagree then. I see his post as making some definitely very harsh critiques -- but still short of the threshold of outright insulting people.

Nah, it's a pretty important post. It's the first guy to publicly say "the emperor is naked". The total object level information hasn't changed much, but now I know others know, and they know others know too. It's out.

And from now on everybody who has issues with the query optimizer won't shamefully look for documentation on how to fix _their_ use case, but publicly stink mysql for having a shit optimizer (which it has, btw).

Which in turn will support those developers inside mysql who want to push things forward. They won't seem like cowboys that want to fix a good thing - they'll have lots of user complaints to help them argue, and also the awareness that maybe, just maybe, mysql will get left behind if they don't move faster.

`It's the first guy to publicly say "the emperor is naked"'

That MySQL has a poor optimizer has been known for as long as MySQL has been a product. The product is legendary for its inability to do even basic RDBMS needs competently, and the rise of NoSQL was largely people assuming MySQL limitations were general RDBMS problems (for instance its painful incompetence doing basic RDBMS tasks like joins).

Having said that, a couple of decades in this industry has me reading this post and immediately sensing oozing bitterness. That maybe he got passed over for a promotion he felt he earned, etc.

When someone does the "it's all crap" exit, it's seldom from a good place. Who could seriously have applied to and joined the MySQL team without knowing that it isn't exactly the pinnacle of database systems?

Having said all of that, it's interesting seeing pgsql being held as the panacea. I like pgsql, and prefer it among open source database systems, but in many ways it is a decade+ behind MSSQL and Oracle.

It might have been more useful if it wasn’t literally the day after he got another job (it’s not like he quit it because MySQL is so terrible and will now look for a new landing spot).

I don’t know the author, but assuming he has publicly made such comments before it would behoove him to link to those posts so it’s clear that he has been raising these complaints publicly for a while and didn’t just wait to dump the consequences of his public post on his now former colleagues the moment he got out.

> This strikes me as pretty childish.

It does because all adults are cynical nowadays and rather than speaking truth they will just sweep it under the rug for political convenience.

> I don't think anyone's going to suddenly switch to postgres as a result of this blog post...so really, what's the point?

Spreading the truth? Does it even need a point?

> The post just reads as bitter

Yeah it does, I still find it refreshing that this guy is just calling out all the bs as he sees it. He has nothing to gain from writing this, a lot to lose. It's pretty entertaining. Hope it doesn't affect him negatively.

> It does because all adults are cynical nowadays and rather than speaking truth they will just sweep it under the rug for political convenience.

It's possible to speak the truth without being callous. I'm not really sure what political convenience has to do with this.

> Spreading the truth? Does it even need a point?

No, but it should probably have one if it's going to be a discussion on HN.

> Yeah it does, I still find it refreshing that this guy is just calling out all the bs as he sees it. He has nothing to gain from writing this, a lot to lose. It's pretty entertaining. Hope it doesn't affect him negatively.

It's great that you're entertained by it. Personally I it just gave me the impression that the person would benefit from therapy.

> I'm not really sure what political convenience has to do with this.

Political convenience is not burning any bridges. The only reason people aren't callous is fear of retribution.

>No, but it should probably have one if it's going to be a discussion on HN.

I really hate the word should, it's almost always used to force opinions on people without justification.

> Personally I it just gave me the impression that the person would benefit from therapy.

He would probably only need therapy if he stayed at oracle.

I'd argue truth is a big enough point, don't you think so?

I dunno. I think the author makes some compelling points. Chief of which is the bad code quality. At least the bit about being unable to do full outer joins without a full rewrite. If the code base got so unwieldy that it made adding features tough all these years after it was started that’s a knock on both Oracle leadership and the project itself which I think is grounds to leave.

I don't think he's wrong from a technical assessment, but most of the problem that he was experiencing was a social problem.

> More jarring were the people who insisted everything was OK (it seems most MySQL users and developers don't really use other databases)

i.e., the problem wasn't that the executor was bad, the problem was that everyone thought it was ok

And maybe they're not a people person, and trying to enlighten isn't what they signed up for -- all good -- I for one certainly don't want anyone working a job that they're unhappy with.

But the post is littered with putdowns --

> Coming to MySQL was like stepping into a parallel universe, where there were lots of people genuinely believing that MySQL was a state-of-the-art product. At the same time, I was attending orientation and told how the optimizer worked internally, and I genuinely needed shock pauses to take in how primitive nearly everything was

> Don't believe for a second that MariaDB is any better. Monty and his merry men left because they were unhappy about the new governance, not because they suddenly woke up one day and realized what a royal mess they had created in the code.

I guess I've just seen this attitude enough where it's boring. Shock pauses, very primitive, bad code. Got it. Moving on...

> Coming to MySQL was like stepping into a parallel universe, where there were lots of people genuinely believing that MySQL was a state-of-the-art product.

Spending years in an environment where a core component of your product was crippled by technical debt and you were surrounded by people who didn't -understand- how crippled it was does seem like a recipe for understandable bitterness.

People saying "yes, we know, but rewriting that isn't the business priority right now" is a different matter - that's often aggravating but the right call - but not even acknowledging the problem is unhealthy.

Note that I've made a couple other comments on this article that do their best to acknowledge how much more of a pain in the ass learning how to setup postgres replication is than mysql, because even though I prefer postgres most of the time it's still -true- and I don't see how hiding from that fact makes anything better for any user of anything.

I wish he be happier

I think what you read out of the post and what he posted are different things.

I mean, that's kinda tautological.

your argument reads like a straw man...

It might be. Just sharing my impression of it, take it as you will.

100%. Such a petty way to resign

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