Storage Engines and Data Types

Summary

In this chapter, we’ve covered information that will come in handy as you develop an understanding of how to implement your database applications in MySQL. Our discussion on storage engines focused on the main differences in the way transactions, storage, and indexing are implemented across the range of available options. We gave you some recommendations in choosing your storage engines, so that you can learn from the experience of others before making any major mistakes.

We also examined the various data types available to you as you define the schema of your database. We looked at the strengths and peculiarities of each type of data, and then provided some suggestions to guide you in your database creation.

In the next chapter, you will learn some techniques for benchmarking and profiling your database applications. These skills will be vital to our exploration of SQL and index optimization in the following chapters.