# Which d should I choose? **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [January 20, 2010, 4:50am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913 "2010-01-20T04:50:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 4:50am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/1 "2010-01-20T04:50:48Z")
Hi I am planning to start a new rails project. I would like to know from two options mysql and postgresql which i should use? Can anyone please compare them? Thanks Tom ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 10:26am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/2 "2010-01-20T10:26:13Z")
2010/1/20 Tom M. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Hi > Â I am planning to start a new rails project. I would like to know from > two options mysql and postgresql which i should use? Can anyone please > compare them? The first thing to consider is which is available on the server where you plan to deploy the application. If you have a free choice then postgresql is generally considered superior I believe. Of course if you require the answer for a student assignment then google is the place to start your research. Colin ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 11:55am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/3 "2010-01-20T11:55:17Z")
Hi Colin Thanks for reply.Any other detailed links or thoughts broadly compares the merits/demerits ? Any thoughts? Tom ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 11:56am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/4 "2010-01-20T11:56:57Z")
Additionally we have the authority to choose db since deployed on our server ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 12:29pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/5 "2010-01-20T12:29:09Z")
I have, and continue to use both. As they both live behind ActiveRecord they are much of a muchness. They work and I don’t have to give them much thought. If you are just using them as plain databases then flip a coin there is no real difference between the two. However in the companies that I have work in for the last 13 years as a web developer in Perl, Java and Ruby PostgreSQL has been used on almost all projects except three. MySQL was use on two projects (I can’t remember why we used them, I suspect it was a client requirement, but we had no issues with it) and MSSQL Server (definitely imposed by the client). Personally I use MySQL for my own projects, but that was just because I had it installed. To be honest PostgreSQL and MySQL are both solid and trusted databases that work well in large production environments and are well supported, it comes down to personal choice, just like the editor you write you code in (Vi, emacs or textmate?). People can become passionate about which editor / database they use but this doesn’t mean one is better than the other. Flip a coin, heads install PostgreSQL, tails install MySQL. Then get back to the important part, developing the application. ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 12:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/6 "2010-01-20T12:12:10Z")
2010/1/20 Tom M. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Hi Colin > > Thanks for reply.Any other detailed links or thoughts broadly compares > the merits/demerits  ? Any thoughts? I have little personal experience but Google for compare mysql postgresql yields many results. Colin ---
**Author:** ![tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/bc8723/32.png) [@tom-mac](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tom-mac)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2010, 12:32pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-d-should-i-choose/181913/7 "2010-01-20T12:32:05Z")
It really depends on the type of application you wish to develop. For example, MySQL’s MyISAM database format is fast for applications that require more reads than writes, yet it doesn’t support transactions. I would read up on the differences and choose your database for your specific application. The wonderful thing, however, is that rails will abstract most of it away so for a project that is just starting up it shouldn’t even matter; you could develop it with sqlite and figure it out later. Jeff Aigner