MySQL Reference Manual :: 5.1.2 The mysqld-max Extended MySQL Server

A MySQL-Max server is a version of the mysqld MySQL server that has been built to include additional features.

The distribution to use depends on your platform:

You can find the MySQL-Max binaries on the MySQL AB Web site at http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/mysql-4.0.html.

MySQL AB builds the MySQL-Max servers by using the following configure options:

MySQL-Max binary distributions are a convenience for those who wish to install precompiled programs. If you build MySQL using a source distribution, you can build your own Max-like server by enabling the same features at configuration time that the MySQL-Max binary distributions are built with.

MySQL-Max servers include the BerkeleyDB (BDB) storage engine whenever possible, but not all platforms support BDB.

MySQL-Max servers for Solaris, Mac OS X, and Linux (on most platforms) include support for the NDB Cluster storage engine. Note that the server must be started with the ndbcluster option in order to run the server as part of a MySQL Cluster. (For details, see Section 16.4, “MySQL Cluster Configuration”.)

The following table shows on which platforms allow MySQL-Max binaries include support for BDB and/or NDB Cluster:

To find out which storage engines your server supports, issue the following statement:

mysql> SHOW ENGINES;
+------------+---------+------------------------------------------------------------+
| Engine     | Support | Comment                                                    |
+------------+---------+------------------------------------------------------------+
| MyISAM     | DEFAULT | Default engine as of MySQL 3.23 with great performance     |
| HEAP       | YES     | Alias for MEMORY                                           |
| MEMORY     | YES     | Hash based, stored in memory, useful for temporary tables  |
| MERGE      | YES     | Collection of identical MyISAM tables                      |
| MRG_MYISAM | YES     | Alias for MERGE                                            |
| ISAM       | NO      | Obsolete storage engine, now replaced by MyISAM            |
| MRG_ISAM   | NO      | Obsolete storage engine, now replaced by MERGE             |
| InnoDB     | YES     | Supports transactions, row-level locking, and foreign keys |
| INNOBASE   | YES     | Alias for INNODB                                           |
| BDB        | YES     | Supports transactions and page-level locking               |
| BERKELEYDB | YES     | Alias for BDB                                              |
| NDBCLUSTER | NO      | Clustered, fault-tolerant, memory-based tables             |
| NDB        | NO      | Alias for NDBCLUSTER                                       |
| EXAMPLE    | NO      | Example storage engine                                     |
| ARCHIVE    | NO      | Archive storage engine                                     |
| CSV        | NO      | CSV storage engine                                         |
+------------+---------+------------------------------------------------------------+
16 rows in set (0.02 sec)

(See also Section 13.5.4.8, “SHOW ENGINES Syntax”.)

Before MySQL 4.1.2, SHOW ENGINES is unavailable. Use the following statement instead and check the value of the variable for the storage engine in which you are interested:

mysql> SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'have_%';
+---------------------+-------+
| Variable_name       | Value |
+---------------------+-------+
| have_archive        | NO    |
| have_bdb            | YES   |
| have_compress       | YES   |
| have_crypt          | NO    |
| have_csv            | NO    |
| have_example_engine | NO    |
| have_geometry       | YES   |
| have_innodb         | YES   |
| have_isam           | NO    |
| have_ndbcluster     | NO    |
| have_openssl        | NO    |
| have_query_cache    | YES   |
| have_raid           | NO    |
| have_rtree_keys     | YES   |
| have_symlink        | YES   |
+---------------------+-------+
15 rows in set (0.15 sec)

The precise output from these SHOW commands will vary according to the MySQL version used (and the features which are enabled). The values in the second column indicate the server's level of support for each feature, as shown here:

A value of NO means that the server was compiled without support for the feature, so it cannot be activated at runtime.

A value of DISABLED occurs either because the server was started with an option that disables the feature, or because not all options required to enable it were given. In the latter case, the host_name.err error log file should contain a reason indicating why the option is disabled.

One situation in which you might see DISABLED occurs with MySQL 3.23 when the InnoDB storage engine is compiled in. In MySQL 3.23, you must supply at least the innodb_data_file_path option at runtime to set up the InnoDB tablespace. Without this option, InnoDB disables itself. See Section 15.3, “InnoDB in MySQL 3.23”. You can specify configuration options for the BDB storage engine, too, but BDB does not disable itself if you do not provide them. See Section 14.4.3, “BDB Startup Options”.

You might also see DISABLED for the InnoDB, BDB, or ISAM storage engines if the server was compiled to support them, but was started with the --skip-innodb, --skip-bdb, or --skip-isam options at runtime.

As of Version 3.23, all MySQL servers support MyISAM tables, because MyISAM is the default storage engine.