MySQL/MariaDB update on our shared servers

We recently notified you of this update by e-mail. We are pleased to announce that all MySQL services on our shared servers are now fully up to date.

MySQL and MariaDB: facts and reminders

"MySQL" refers at the same time to a type of database, to the database server that makes it usable and to the "client" (software) used to connect to it. MySQL databases hold the customisation data of modern PHP/MySQL sites such as WordPress or Joomla.
For example, posts, users, encrypted passwords and site settings are all stored in the site's MySQL database. In short, the database represents your site's content, apart from media files. A modern PHP/MySQL site therefore absolutely needs a MySQL server and database to work.

A MySQL database can also be accessed with a server/client other than MySQL: there is also MariaDB, a community "fork" (alternative) of MySQL servers. This alternative has a few advantages, particularly in terms of performance, but also in terms of configuration for system administrators.

For some years now, MariaDB has been the default native database system on many operating systems, including CentOS 7 and later, which HaiSoft uses. As a result, most of our MySQL servers are in fact MariaDB servers. Our update therefore mainly concerns MariaDB (roughly more than 90% of our shared servers, depending on when they were deployed). Note that whether MySQL or MariaDB is used makes no practical difference for users.

The MySQL versions are now as follows

• MariaDB 10.2
• MySQL 5.7

Note: MariaDB 10.2 is the closest equivalent to MySQL 5.7.

What has changed?

Backward compatibility has been perfect so far: we have not seen any malfunction, even with the oldest sites.

Potentially noticeable changes:

• Better performance in certain specific cases
• Support for new commands/formatting
• Support for utf8-mb4 (and therefore emoji!)
• No more warnings about the MySQL version in WordPress

How did the update go?

The upgrades brought to light a few databases with problems, and we took the opportunity to fix them with the customers concerned. This led to a few postponed upgrades, but we had allowed for this and so stayed on schedule.

Overall, we are delighted to have carried out this upgrade: no problems to report, the databases are now cleaner, and performance and compatibility are first-rate, just like our customers!

What about my dedicated/virtual server?

You can also request an update of your MySQL server right away: this work is included in your managed services!
As a rule, allow for 10 to 30 minutes of downtime, depending on your server and the size of your databases.