Register for the MariaDB Server Fest

The MariaDB Server Fest is approaching fast and registration is now open. We’ve been busy fine tuning things according to the input we got during the Call for Attendance, as well as selecting the final talks.

We have an excellent series of sessions lined up. Whether you’re interested in best practices, migration, new features, use cases, or the latest on hardware innovations and MariaDB, there’ll be something for you when it kicks off on 14 September.

MariaDB Server Fest CfP extended until Wed 15 July 2020

Thank you for the many submissions to our Call for Papers, and to your insightful replies to our Call for Attendees.

Based on the CfA replies and other feedback given to us, we could draw a few conclusions.

Attendees: Three-day event

First, we will spread out the event from a two-day event to a three-day event, for the attendees. We received several comments around preferences for shorter days, giving time for “normal” work. Rather three short days, than two long ones. That made perfect sense to us. We already changed a couple of convetions when moving from a physical event to a virtual;

MariaDB Server Fest 14-20 Sep 2020

Join our Online Conference in September! In three different time zones, we will meet users of MariaDB Server for two packed days of presentations, interactions and insights.

The Call for Papers is open. And we have a favour to ask everyone considering attending: Please fill in our Call for Attendance survey! We need your help to ensure that we do logistics right when it comes to timing and formats, that we cover all topics that interest you, and that we prepare interactivity and tools in the best possible way.

Selecting the right database

How do you select a database in practice? How do you pretend to select it? And, if you want to be serious, how do you select it logically?

Those are the key questions I dug into, during my keynote last week at Percona Live Online.

For those who feel they don’t want to listen to the entire 30 minute video of the presentation, I have compiled a number of entry points for you below:

  • 0:23 Silly hat meme, “Teknologmössa”
  • 2:19 Agenda
  • 2:43 Choosing a database in practice
  • 3:59 Pretending to choose a database
  • 5:00 Triggers for making a fresh choice
  • 5:51 Monetary impulses
  • 7:53 Database lifecycle impulses
  • 10:07 MariaDB 5.5 on Github
  • 11:24 Framework for database choice: 1.

A different kind of tech conference

Last Wednesday, I received an unexpected text: “Would you like to do some volunteering work? It involves speaking online to some kids for one hour about IT”. It was a classmate from high school.

MariaDB Foundation employees work remotely. Sure, we all meet together in one place a number of times a year so we don’t forget each other’s faces, but in 99% of our logged time, we are distributed around the globe. We are also not required to have a strict working schedule and this offers us the opportunity to say yes easily to these sort of events.

Join the Solstice Run Sat 20 June 2020

My favourite running track is full! Full of newbie runners, young and old. Mostly running alone, sometimes in pairs – but all following social distancing. 

Social distancing can be coupled with emotional closeness. That’s at least what Sauli Niinistö propagates, the President of Finland. In line with these two phenomena – emotional closeness between isolated colleagues, and the boom of running as a source of energy during lockdown – we are launching the Solstice Run

We want to inspire non-runners to run

As initiators, we want to inspire others to start running.

Enable post-compromise data protection with MariaDB and Virgil Security’s PureKit

MariaDB deployments hold vast amounts of sensitive data such as intellectual property, state secrets, healthcare and financial records. HIPAA, GDPR and other government regulations require even more stringent protections and disclosures. Achieving post-compromise protection is seen as a necessary new tool available to DevOps teams.

At the first MariaDB Day in Brussels on February 2nd, Virgil Security’s CTO and co-founder Dmitry Dain presented a MariaDB demo based on the Virgil PureKit security framework that can protect stored passwords, PII and any other sensitive data even if the database had been breached – making it worthless to the attacker in the face of offline attacks (read more about security benefits in this blog post). …

Business As Unusual

MariaDB Foundation faces an unusual world, just like anyone else in these Corona times. Or perhaps, not quite. Here are some ideas for how to cope with a world inhibiting travel and social contact as we know it, from someone who has worked from home for 20 years, with colleagues also working from home.

First, stay upbeat. Humans are social animals, and we live off interactions with others. But Corona just dictates what type of social interactions we can have. It doesn’t inhibit social contact.

Second, stay connected.