I’ve been doing my usual Friday news gathering for the day job and that means here is todays NewsBits…. Here’s what’s in it:
- Redis 5.0 gets a new release candidate and controversy.
- Updates for older MongoDB versions.
- A guide to analyzing slow MongoDB queries.
- Making MySQL’s shell shine.
- Google open up Dataset Search.
- Firefox 62 lands, as does the new ESR release.
- HTTP2 support no longer experimental in Node 10.10.
- VS Code gets a new Settings UI.
- Checkout pull requests with the latest Atom.
- Where to get Java support in the future?
- And whats it like migrating to Java 11?
- And finally an SQL puzzler…
Here’s those bits in full thanks to the Wayback machine…
Database Bits
Redis
Redis 5.0 RC 5
Redis 5.0 is approaching and that means another RC, RC5 has arrived. This candidate carries two quite big breaking changes for anyone running Redis in its master-slave configuration. The slave nodes ignore maxmemory settings, but more importantly running a script on the master doesn’t mean the script runs on the slave now. Instead the changes made on the master are replicated to the slaves. This should make things more predictable in replication terms as there won’t be multiple runs of the same script.
The release candidate features were somewhat overshadowed by a heated discussion over the use of the terms master/slave in Redis - the terminology, which has been common in distributed computing, is regarded as offensive by some leading to calls to stop using it. Redis creator Antirez, Salvatore Sanfilippo, responded to the calls saying the issue is that the words are baked into the documentation, APIs and INFO fields of Redis, and would have a wide ranging impact on Redis users.
MongoDB
Updates
There’s two MongoDB updates that landed this week, MongoDB 3.2.21 and MongoDB 3.4.17. As one might expect, changes are fairly minor; full details in the 3.2.21 changelog and 3.4.17 changelog. 3.2.21 does fix a performance regression when parsing big $in lists which was already fixed in previous releases for other major versions.
MongoDB Slow Query spotting
Over at Idealo, the developers have been collecting slow query logs from MongoDB for years and in How to visually spot and analyze slow MongoDB operations, they tell how. It’s a good read which takes the process from the gathering of data from multiple MongoDBs, the storage and analysis of that data and the creation of charts which plot slow queries and their impacts over time. The best part is the tool they developed is also open sourced.
MySQL
MySQL Shell Tricks
If you run the newer MySQL Shell, you’ll already know it’s a more flexible way to talk to multiple MySQL servers. Jesper Krogh is showing how to exploit this with two articles, one on creating your own prompt to show much more information and one on how to make that prompt awesome. Awesomeness may include Powerline fonts and inline iconography.
Open Data
Google’s Dataset Search
Google’s new Dataset Search is making it easier to find the data that developers, activists and policy makers have helped open up to the world. By adding support for schema.org datasets and similar, data providers can make Google aware that what they have is a dataset and index it in the dataset search. The announcement gives examples of what can currently be searched for, with datasets from organisations such as NOAA and NASA for environmental data to news publishers like ProPublica who do data driven journalism. If you have a dataset and want to make it visible to the search, refer to the developers site.
Developer Bits
Firefox
Firefox 62.0
Firefox 62.0 is the latest update to the open source browser. According to the release notes, it features a reworked default/home tab packing in more “hot” locations including stories from Pocket. There’s also an option to preempt Mozilla’s removal of trust from Symantec certificates, better Windows rendering and some enterprise enhancements.
Firefox 60.2 ESR
Simultaneous with the 62.0 release is the 60.2 ESR release of Firefox, the long term support release designed for Enterprises. Version 60 has been available since May, but 60.2 is the first qualified release - there’s two unqualified releases before the final stamp of approval is applied. Version wise, Firefox ESR jumps from 52.2 from June 2017 to the new release. That means there’s a lot of changes in it - Firefox 52 is still available for users who have legacy addons or need XP/Vista. The Firefox 60.0 ESR notes cover the significant changes.
Node.js
Node.js 10.10.0
In October, Node.js 10 will become the new LTS edition of Node.js and as we approach, so comes new current releases, specifically Node.js 10.10.0. Probable highlight of this update is the fact that the HTTP2 support is now no longer experimental. There’s also new methods (os.getPriority and os.setPriority) to allow Node apps to control other processes’ priority.
Editors
VS Code
Microsoft keep up the solid release train of Visual Studio Code with the release of version 1.27. This update includes a whole new UI for the settings editor to replace the pseudo-text editor settings configuration. Windows and Linux get customisable menu bars, a Terminal menu bar which absorbs the old Tasks menu, platform specific keybindings for customising across different machines and many, many more enhancements. You’ll likely be updated to 1.27.1 after some update issues with 1.27.
Atom
Missed in our previous NewsBits, Atom 1.30 is now out. There’s enhancements to the GitHub integration allowing you to checkout pull requests and use emojis in commit messages. There’s also support for Ruby in the parsing system and for mixed languages in one file.
Java
Java support
With Oracle commercialising support for Java 11, people have been surveying the state of the Java ecosystem. In Time to look beyond Oracle’s JDK, Stephen Colebourne reviews the state of the OpenJDK. You’ll be surprised at how many different versions of OpenJDK are out there and how compatible the are.
Going to 11
Of course, that begs the question “Is it worth going to Java 11 and how hard is it?”. Colebourne usefully also blogs about his experiences in From Java 8 to Java 11. The impact is different for library developers, application developers and tool developers. Worth a read to prepare for the next stage of Java’s new accelerated release scheduling.
And finally
Our attention was drawn to a corner of the SQLite documentation where to demonstrate the use of the SQL WITH statement, the author uses SQL to solve Sudoku puzzles.
This article was imported from the original CodeScaling blog