NuSphere Pro Advantage

Enhanced MySQL allows query designers to "atomize" sets of queries in such a way that the Enhanced MySQL engine--NuSphere calls it Gemini--treats them collectively as one unit. With atomization, either all of the queries in a unit are executed, or none of them are. It's a way to prevent your tables from becoming corrupted due to a crash in the middle of an execution cycle. Similarly, individual transactions are insulated from the effects of other transactions. Enhanced MySQL also--very significantly--supports explicit COMMIT and ROLLBACK commands. These allow programmers to specify when sets of queries go ahead, and when they get repealed.

Enhanced MySQL is the same product that ships with NuSphere MySQL Advantage. It's altogether better suited to applications that involve high transaction loads, and gives exclusively commercial database products--those from Oracle, Microsoft, Sybase, and others--a real challenge, particularly when you consider bang for the buck.

In addition to Enhanced MySQL, this package comes with a suite of tools and servers--installed simultaneously, if you like--that together make up a complete development and operating environment for dynamic Web sites. Included with NuSphere Pro Advantage is PHPEd, NuSphere's elegant IDE for PHP, MySQL, and various client-side languages such as JavaScript and HTML. It features an editor with context-sensitive function help and colored syntax highlighting. Tightly integrated with MySQL, the environment allows you to browse tables and their contents, and test SQL queries without switching to a different application.

The package also includes PHP, version 4.0.6. Naturally, this kit comes with a PHP interpreter. This is the actual run-time environment that reads, validates, and executes PHP scripts (those written in PHPEd and elsewhere). As a server-side scripting language, PHP is similar in function to Microsoft's Active Server Pages (ASP) and Sun's JavaServer Pages (JSP). It's particularly potent when paired with a MySQL database like the one included here.

NuSphere Pro Advantage also comes with Perl, version 5.6.1. Perl, like PHP, can be used to generate Web pages based on form submissions and query results. Its text-manipulation facilities are probably better than PHP's, but the question of which you use is largely a matter of personal taste.

Finally, users will also get Apache, version 1.3.20. The Apache Web server makes your applications available to all browsers by responding to HTTP requests. This kit ships with the mod_perl module for running Perl scripts and the mod_ssl module for providing Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption of communications.

As is typical of NuSphere products, PHPEd Advantage comes with a set of commercially available books instead of a custom-produced manual. It's a good strategy that keeps NuSphere from having to reinvent the wheel, particularly considering that the books are all generally respected ones:

• PHP Pocket Reference
• Apache Pocket Reference
• Perl 5 Pocket Reference, Third Edition
• MySQL/PHP Database Applications

The "advantage" in this product's name refers to a subscription service that comes with the CD-ROM in the box. Every quarter for a year, NuSphere ships its registered users an update disk with the latest stable versions of the four packages, plus additional goodies of their choosing. You get technical support, too: Web and e-mail support for a year.

NuSphere Pro Advantage is the product for you if you want the PHPEd software development environment and also require the enhanced performance and transaction management capabilities of Enhanced MySQL. It's the costliest of NuSphere's line, but it's also the best, and it costs far less than some of the database servers with which it competes. --David Wall