Overview | White Papers | Shared-Disk Clustering | Multi-Table Index

Overview

ScaleDB delivers shared-disk clustering in the form of a plug-in storage engine for MySQL. Simply plug-in ScaleDB and you have an enterprise-class database that rivals some of the most expensive and most scalable databases available today. In addition to leveraging shared-disk clustering, ScaleDB leverages an innovative Multi-Table Index that also delivers significant advantages.

ScaleDB for MySQL provides the following capabilities:

  • Shared-disk clustering architecture
  • ACID compliance
  • Graceful fault-tolerance
  • Automatic data recovery
  • Plug-and-Cluster™ simplicity
  • Innovative high-speed indexing
  • High-performance transaction processing
  • Row-level locking
  • Multi-node concurrency control

In keeping with the demands of the enterprise market, ScaleDB rigorously adheres to the principles of ACID compliance.

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White Papers

Shared-Disk Clustering

Title

Description

Format

ScaleDB Overview

Datasheet describing ScaleDB (2 pages)

PDF

Database Virtualization in the Cloud New

Reshaping the cloud database landscape

PDF

Shared-Disk Clustering

Datasheet describing shared-disk clustering (2 pages)

PDF

Database Architecture Primer

White paper explaining shared-disk and shared-nothing architectures (4 pages)

PDF

Shared-Disk vs.
Shared-Nothing

White paper providing a point-by-point comparison between the shared-disk and shared-nothing architectures. (18 pages)

PDF

Cloud Computing & Databases

White paper looks at the database needs of cloud computing and compares shared-disk and shared-nothing (6 pages)

PDF

MySQL 2009 Presentation

Moshe Shadmon’s speech from MySQL 2009 you can listen to it here as well (it takes a while), but you'll want to see the PowerPoint version as well.

PPT

Multi-Table Index

Title

Description

Format

Multi-Table Indexing

Datasheet describing ScaleDB’s multi-table indexing (2 pages)

PDF

Index Overview

A brief description of ScaleDB’s Index (4 pages)

PDF

ScaleDB’s Data Structure

White paper describing ScaleDB’s unique index (17 pages)

PDF

A Fast Index to Semi-Structured Data

White paper describing the utility of the Multi-Table Index for addressing semi-structured data like XML (10 pages)

PDF

Indexing Open Schemas

White paper describing how ScaleDB’s index handles open schemas used by semi-structured data such as XML. (20 pages)

PDF

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Shared-Disk Clustering

Shared-disk clustering has long been associated with mission-critical applications. IBM’s IMS® and Oracle’s RAC® databases run many the banks, ATM networks, and other Global 2000 companies. Shared-disk clustering delivers high-availability through redundant nodes that shared the data and provide inherent fail-over and recovery. Unlike shared-nothing, which imposes a rigid design for static workloads, shared-disk is able to adapt to the changing needs of the users. For this reason, shared-disk is the architecture of choice for Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) applications. Because it enables multiple nodes to process data from a single data store, shared-disk is also used with some Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) applications where the data is stored in a central location.

Until now, the shared-disk architecture has only been available for extremely expensive commercial databases. ScaleDB now brings this high-end architecture to MySQL, delivering it for pennies on the dollar compared to commercial databases.

Vern Watts, ScaleDB’s chief architect, designed the company’s shared-disk architecture. Vern is known as the father of shared-disk clustering. In his 48 year career at IBM, Vern was the architect of IBM’s IMS® database, which released a shared-disk implementation in 1980, a full twenty years before Oracle released RAC. IBM IMS remains the workhorse of IT systems around the world.

The Main Benefits of Shared-Disk Clustering Include:

  • Eliminates data shipping and function shipping
  • Inherent and seamless fault-tolerance
  • Eliminates data partitioning (and repartitioning)
  • Simple Plug-and-Cluster expansion of your cluster
  • Enables powerful clusters based on low-cost commodity hardware
  • Dynamically adapts to changing usage demands

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Multi-Table Index

B-tree indexing only indexes the information inside distinct tables. ScaleDB’s Multi-Table Index indexes both the information inside tables and the relationships between those tables. Because the index understands the relationships between tables, it is able to perform multi-tables joins with single-table performance.

Main Benefits include:

  • The performance of materialized views, without the set-up, maintenance or stale data
  • Referential integrity is inherently maintained with minimal overhead
  • Small memory footprint (typically 15% - 25% of b-tree equivalent), reduced storage requirements
  • Built and manipulated using SQL
  • No special coding requirement in application design and development

ScaleDB’s Multi-Table Index technology leverages the indexing technologies utilized in routing and some in-memory databases. Significant improvements on these indexing technologies—developed over a 15 year period and patented by ScaleDB—enabling ScaleDB to deliver a significant advance to general purpose disk-based databases.

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