January 18, 2012
Couchbase Meetup at new HQ
Join us Thursday January 19 at 6:30 PM at our brand new Headquarters (aka Fort Awesome). Join and RSVP here.
January 10, 2012
Why Couchbase?
So apparently my last entry ruffled some feathers, so maybe I should explain why I think Couchbase is the future?
Simple Fast Elastic.
That's pretty much it. We make it very simple to get started, we are extremely fast (and getting faster), and we really are "web scale", with the ability to add and remove machines from a cluster to rapidly scale your capacity to your workload.
The Membase product was very fast and scalable, but a bit too simple, with no reporting capability or cross-datacenter replication capability.
The CouchDB product has a lot of features, but is too slow, unable to keep up with high loads and inability scale-out on it's own.
The combination of the 2 will hit a sweet spot to allow developers to quickly get their apps up and running, along with the reliability, speed and low cost that make running it in production cheap and worry free.
Our 2.0 product is coming soon, adding CouchDB style views and reporting with a nifty trick for extremely fast failover while maintaining full coherency with the underling distributed data storage (we are calling it our B-Superstar index). We'll of course have lighting fast reads (same as Memcached) but also very fast durable writes. For 2kb docs, we are currently getting sustained random insert/updates rates of 25k writes/sec, fully durable, with compaction in background so it can go all day and all night. We've got some more write work coming soon which we are hoping will give us another performance boost too before 2.0. Stay tuned.
And so right now the focus is on the features and customers that pay, a thing that allow us to build a real sustainable business. And that's REAL DAMN IMPORTANT. It's not enough to build some cool technology, not enough to build a community of excited technologist. You need to cross the chasm and build a real business. A business that provides support, training, documentation and of course a reliable product. A business you can call up when you have difficultly upgrading from an old version, or are getting some weird error you've never seen before at 3am. A business you know will be around to support you for years to come.
And so while we focus on the features and customers that most quickly make us a viable business (and it's growing fast), we are still looking to build the features and technology to expand our use cases and, get customers and developers excited. Future versions are planned to have full CouchDB compatible replication technology, with the ability to support all sorts of mobile and embedded databases, such as our new TouchDB projects for iOS and Android. So with Couchbase you can have fast, scalable database in the cloud that also supports the offline use of thousands, or millions of apps on devices that drop in and out of internet connectivity, and can sync when connected but still completely usable when disconnected.
That's some cool shit. Simple Fast Elastic. And Reliable. And Mobile. That's why Couchbase.
January 4, 2012
The Future of CouchDB
What's the future of CouchDB? It's Couchbase.
Huh? So what about Apache CouchDB? Well, that's a great project. I founded it, coded the earliest versions almost completely myself, I've spent a huge amount of blood, sweat and tears on it. I'm very proud of it and the impact it's had. And now I, and the Couchbase team, are mostly moving on. It's not that we think CouchDB isn't awesome. It's that we are creating the successor to it: Couchbase Server. A product and project with similar capabilities and goals, but more faster, more scalable, more customer and developer focused. And definitely not part of Apache.
With Apache CouchDB, much of the focus has been around creating a consensus based, developer community that helps govern and move the project forward. Apache has done, and is doing a good job of that. But for us, it's no longer enough. CouchDB was something I created because I thought an easy to use, peer based, replicating document store was something the world would find useful. And it proved a lot of the ideas were possible and useful and it's been successful beyond my wildest ambitions. But if I had it all to do again, I'd do many things different.
If it sounds like I'm saying Apache was a mistake, I'm not. Apache was a big part in the success of CouchDB, without it CouchDB would not have enjoyed the early success it did. But in my opinion it's reached a point where the consensus based approach has limited the competitiveness of the project. It's not personal, it's business.
And now, as it turns out, I have a chance to do it all again, without the pain of starting from scratch. Building on the previous Apache CouchDB and Membase projects, throwing out what didn't work, and strengthening what does, and advancing great technologies to make something that is developer friendly, high performance, designed for mission critical deployment and mobile integration, and can move faster and more responsively to users and customers needs than a community based project.
Apache CouchDB, as project and community, is in fine shape. And many of us at Couchbase are still contributing back to it. But the future, the one I'm pushing forward on, is Couchbase Server.
And what is my part in building Couchbase? Right now I'm focusing on getting Couchbase 2.0 ready for serious production use. I'm once again an engineer and coder, back in the trenches, designing and writing code, reviewing code and designs, helping other engineers and solving tough problems. And I'm dead serious about making it the easiest, fastest and most reliable NoSQL database. Easy for developers to use, easy to deploy, reliable on single machines or large clusters, and fast as hell. We are building something you can put your mission critical, customer facing business data on, and not feel like you're running a dirty hack.
Soon, to work more closely with the team (and get rid of my nasty Oakland commute), I'll be relocating my family to the Mountain View area. Shit just got real!
And I'm really excited about the work we've got in the pipeline. We are moving more and more of the core database in C/C++, while still using many of the concurrency and reliability design principles we've proven with the Erlang codebase. And Erlang is still going to be part of the product as well, particularly with cluster management, but most of the performance sensitive portions will be moving to over C code. Erlang is still a great language, but when you need top performance and low level control, C is hard to beat.
Anyway, there so much to talk about, to much for one blog post. One of my New Years resolutions is to blog more, and I've got a ton of interesting things to talk about. The trials of tribulations of building a startup and an engineering culture. What's wrong (and right) with Erlang. Bringing forth UnQL. TouchDB for Mobile. And yes, we'll still interoperate with Apache CouchDB and Memcached. But the future is Couchbase.
Ride with me.
Edit
As J. Chris Anderson notes in the comments, Couchbase is completely open source and Apache licensed:
Everything Couchbase does is open source, we have 2 github pages that are very active:https://github.com/couchbaselabs
Probably the most fun place to jump into development is the code review: http://review.couchbase.org/
Let me clarify, if you like Apache CouchDB, stick with it. I'm working on something I think you'll like a lot better. If not, well, there's still Apache CouchDB.
September 27, 2011
Become a Distributed Database Expert (or just look like one)
At Couchbase we are looking for experienced hackers to help us build the fastest, most reliable distributed database on the planet. You don't need to a be expert already, but you should be ready to learn the ins and outs of distribute database systems, including:
- Distributed Systems
- Systems Resource Management: io (disk, network), cpu, memory usage
- Maximizing Throughput and Minimizing Latency
- Functional programming
- Systems Reliability
- Network Programming
- Profiling, Benchmarking and Optimization
- Cluster and Network Topology
- Replication and Logical Sync
- Distributed Data modeling
- Embedded and Mobile software
More info here: http://www.couchbase.com/company/jobs Or you can send your resume and qualifications to me here: damien@couchbase.com
September 24, 2011
Re: Data sync
>On Sep 23, 2011, at 1:40 AM, XXXX XXXXX wrote:
>
>Hi Damien,
>
>Greeting from XXXXX XXXXXX;
>
>Im running a small company with history in the mobile enterprise space
>
>We are just about to get some seed funding to build sqllite sync
>technology for mobile devices;
>
>I came across CouchBase extremely cool;
>
>We are planning to offer some of same features;
>
>Offline access
>Smart sync
>Bandwidth optimisation
>
>It would be good to get any advice or pointers you might have in
>terms of building sync technology for mobile
>
>All the best,
>
>XXXX XXXXX,
Hello! I would say that mobile sync is a deceptively hard problem to get all the nice properties you want. I suggest you look at how Couchbase replication works and try to duplicate it, and ideally, try to interoperate with it.
Some of the properties you probably want:
Incremental replication - The ability to stop and restart replication and not lose all your progress. Vital in a mobile environment where connections are slow and flaky.
Concurrency -You want to be able to use the local and the remote the databases while it's getting sync'd/replicated, no global locking. So the app is usable at all times and syncing in the background.
Conflict management - You need plan for how you'll deal with and manage edit conflicts.
Partial replication - Having replicas that only hold a interesting subset of other replicas. Important when sharing a large data set, but mobile clients only need a portion of it.
Ad hoc Topology - Couchbase supports ad hoc topology, any machine can sync with any other machine without prior knowledge. This is much more flexible than a single centralized sync point or fixed topology. Though many deployments will only need a single sync point, often new ones will need to be added.
Schema upgrade - Couchbase is schemaless, so it's easy to add new field/properties without breaking things. If using a schema, it's difficult to upgrade remote clients when they have new data in older schemas, etc.
Security - the ability to refuse updates if the come from unauthorized sources.
Anyway, Couchbase and CouchDB has worked out these problems and is successful in production on millions of machines. It's not the only way to build a sync scheme, but it's one of the most successful.
-Damien
July 7, 2011
Break's Over. Big Mover. Couchbase changing the Game.
There is some seriously cool stuff coming up at CouchConf on July 29. One the things I'm most excited about is Richard Hipp, creator of SQLite, will join me on stage to talk about our current joint project. Can't tell you what it is right now, but if you feel the Earth shift a little that day, you'll know why...and be sure to watch this space on July 29 to learn the details!
June 21, 2011
Couchbase Training Summer Special
We are doing a special training deal this summer--$395 for two days of training!
The next one is in Portland in just a couple days on June 27 and 28! If you're in Portland for OSBridge, or you are in the area, you should definitely sign up.
http://www.couchbase.com/couchdb-training/portland-june-2011
Also, if you're in NYC this summer and want to learn about Membase Server, we'll be doing a class on July 11 and 12th.
http://www.couchbase.com/membase-training/nyc-july-2011
We only have a limited number of seats so it's important to sign up ASAP.
June 16, 2011
CouchConf Early Bird Special Ends Tomorrow
Sign up by Friday, June 16, for the early bird rate. CouchConf is July 29 in San Francisco.
CouchConf is the only conference dedicated to all things Couch. This one-day event is for any developer who wants to take a deeper dive into Couchbase technology, learn where it's headed and build really cool stuff.
May 19, 2011
I'm in Boston next week for a Couchbase Meetup
Get yo couch on! Sign up here: http://www.meetup.com/Boston-CouchDB/events/17374461/
damien@couchbase.com
March 21, 2011
Couchbase SF Training Was Awesome
I had a blast teaching the first Couchbase CouchDB Training with training pro Alan McKean last week. 2 intensive days of hands on teaching and talking about Apache CouchDB to enthusiastic and excited people. It was actually a learning experience for me too, there's a lot in CouchDB I haven't had a chance to use yet :)
It's not too late to sign up for the remaining 3 cities on the Couchbase Training World Tour: Austin, London and Berlin.
