MariaDB is an open-source fork of the popular MySQL relational database. Its development is lead by some of the original developers of MySQL. Let's dive into the deep of MariaDB to get more details -

What is MariaDB?

MariaDB is an open source relational database management system (DBMS) that is a compatible drop-in replacement for the widely used MySQL database technology. It is one of the most popular database servers in the world. It’s made by the original developers of MySQL and guaranteed to stay open source. It was Initial released on 22 January 2009. MariaDB is developed as open source software and as a relational database, it provides an SQL interface for accessing data. The latest versions of MariaDB also include GIS and JSON features. Notable users include Wikipedia, Mozilla, DBS Bank, WordPress.com, and Google. Several Linux and BSD distributions include MariaDB. In 2013 Google tasked one of its engineers to work at the MariaDB Foundation. The European Investment Bank has funded MariaDB with €25 million in 2017.

MariaDB turns data into structured information in a wide array of applications, ranging from banking to websites. It is an enhanced, drop-in replacement for MySQL. MariaDB is used because it is fast, scalable and robust, with a rich ecosystem of storage engines, plugins, and many other tools make it very versatile for a wide variety of use cases.

Why is the database called MariaDB?

The 'MySQL' name is trademarked by Oracle, and they have chosen to keep that trademark to themselves. Michael Widenius or Monty is one of the founders of MySQL AB and the founder of Monty Program AB. On 16 January 2008, MySQL AB announced that it had agreed to be acquired by Sun Microsystems for approximately $1 billion. The acquisition completed on 26 February 2008. And MariaDB is named after Monty's younger daughter Maria, similarly to how MySQL is named after his other daughter My.

Features of MariaDB

• All of MariaDB is under GPL, LGPL, or BSD.

• It includes a wide selection of storage engines, including high-performance storage engines, for working with other RDBMS data sources.

• It uses a standard and popular querying language.

• It runs on a number of operating systems and supports a wide variety of programming languages.

• It offers support for PHP and Galera cluster technology. It also offers many operations and commands unavailable in MySQL and eliminates/replaces features impacting performance negatively.

The important commands that you will regularly use when working with MariaDB −

USE (database name) − Sets the current default database.

SHOW DATABASES − Lists the databases currently on the server.

SHOW TABLES − Lists all non-temporary tables.

SHOW COLUMNS FROM (table name) − Provides column information pertaining to the specified table.

SHOW INDEX FROM TABLENAME (table name) − Provides table index information relating to the specified table.

SHOW TABLE STATUS (table name) – Provides tables with information about non-temporary tables, and the pattern that appears after the LIKE clause is used to fetch table names.

Security

With encryption of MariaDB, your databases will be secure by default. Most other database systems don't have default encryptiont. Many organizations are leery about using commercial database software because they don't know for sure if the compiled code contains back-doors for accessing the data or some special way in which the software is using encryption that could allow a hacker to get at their data. Since MariaDB is open-source, governments and other organizations know that their databases are secure. So, nothing is hidden.

Implementation

A Linux-based MariaDB Galera Cluster implementation provided a synchronous multi-master cluster option for MariaDB users. As with other open sources RDBMSs technologies, such as PostgreSQL and Firebird, both MariaDB and MySQL have found use as lower-cost alternatives to mainstream Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, and IBM DB2 databases. Web and cloud applications are used of open source databases; MariaDB has won adherents among users of other components in various open source software combinations, including the OpenStack framework. MariaDB users are Wikipedia, Facebook and Google, as well as Singapore-based DBS Bank and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle. MariaDB software supports on Windows, Linux and macOS operating systems; it's available on Intel and IBM Power8 hardware platforms. It also runs as a service on several cloud platforms. It Supports programming languages include C++, C#, Java, Python, and others.