Factors of OS for running mysql smoothly

• General stability of the thread library. A platform may have an excellent reputation otherwise, but MySQL will be only as stable as the thread library if that library is unstable in the code that is called by MySQL, even if everything else is perfect.

• The capability of the kernel and the thread library to take advantage of symmetric multi-processor (SMP) systems. In other words, when a process creates a thread, it should be possible for that thread to run on a different CPU than the original process.

• The capability of the kernel and the thread library to run many threads that acquire and release a mutex over a short critical region frequently without excessive context switches. If the implementation of pthread_mutex_lock() is too anxious to yield CPU time, this will hurt MySQL tremendously. If this issue is not taken care of, adding extra CPUs will actually make MySQL slower.

• General filesystem stability and performance.

• If your tables are big, the ability of the filesystem to deal with large files at all and to deal with them efficiently.

• Our level of expertise here at MySQL AB with the platform. If we know a platform well, we enable platform-specific optimizations and fixes at compile time. We can also provide advice on configuring your system optimally for MySQL.

• The amount of testing we have done internally for similar configurations.

• The number of users that have successfully run MySQL on the platform in similar configurations. If this number is high, the chances of encountering platform-specific surprises are much smaller.

Based on the preceding criteria, the best platforms for running MySQL at this point are x86 with SuSE Linux using a 2.4 kernel, and ReiserFS (or any similar Linux distribution) and SPARC with Solaris (2.7-9). FreeBSD comes third, but we really hope it will join the top club once the thread library is improved.


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