Now Using SQLite

Warning: geekery ahead.

My host of choice offers a $10/month plan that includes script access (great for Movable Type), and each MySQL database costs $3/month. When I signed up over 18 months ago, MT didn't yet support MySQL, so I stuck with BerkeleyDB. In that time, my database has gotten relatively quite large: as of today, this blog has 1176 entries (this will be the 1177th) and 836 comments. BerkeleyDB began dragging by the end of 2002, but I really didn't feel like paying extra for MySQL.

MT began supporting SQLite almost a year ago and, as Cornerhost supports SQLite gratis, I tried making it work shortly thereafter. No dice, the first time. I gave up. A couple months ago, I gave it another try. This time I emailed Michal looking for some help, got some excellent suggestions, and--nothing. I just couldn't see what was going wrong.

Over the break, de-spamming my blog took upward of 45 seconds a go. When I got my computer set up yesterday, on a whim, I tried doing exactly what I did last time. To my great surprise, it Just Worked. It took a good twenty minutes, but in the end, my MT database was entirely converted to a format much more suitable than BerkeleyDB. Rebuilds are snappier now, and even though I lost my Trackback pings for some reason (all five of them--no great loss), I can now play with things like Brad Choate's MT-SQL and maybe work some voodoo like Kottke's got going with his inline remaindered links.

January 12, 2004 - 11:35 AM