This document discusses the evolution of NoSQL databases and provides lessons on adopting the right approach. It describes how NoSQL started as a grassroots movement but has now seen wider adoption with many new products. However, some projects still fail when users do not apply the right principles. Specifically, it recommends not limiting yourself to one database model, choosing models based on your specific domain requirements, and using multiple models together through polyglot persistence if needed. The document emphasizes finding the right technical fit rather than following hype.

1. NoSQL adoption: what's the next step?
Luca Garulli – Founder and CEO
NuvolaBase Ltd
May 2012 29 - 30 in Cologne, Germany
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2. 2009
A new grass-root movement
of rebels, a few underdogs who believe
that the common Relational model is
no longer the only solution to every problem.
After 30 long years of
“Relational domain” new alternatives
have become possible and
sustainable
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3. it's name is
NoSQL
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4. 2012: 3 years later the
revolution has evolved:
many new products,
larger adoption
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5. ”NoSQL database technologies are largely being adopted for
new projects that require additional scalability, performance,
relaxed consistency and agility.“ – 451 Research of May 22nd 2012
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6. Nobody talks about the real origins of
databases.
You could marvel about the lot of
similarities between the past and today
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7. Are you ready to go back to the past?
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8. The computer age and the
beginning of databases?
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9. No, let's go further back
before computers took
over to see how society
managed information
persistently
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10. Way too back?
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11. “Stone” was our
first persistent
database.
Before that
everything was
“volatile”
because in-
memory only
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12. Pros:
Cheap (it’s free),
very-very
durable and
always available
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13. Cons: not exactly portable...
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14. ...And this kind of
storage had the
same problems of
modern RDBMS
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15. Slow inserts!
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16. no Market Leader
for this technology
because stone is
FREE and
unlimited
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17. So, the world
needed a better
technology:
what next?
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18. Egypt, 5000 years ago
“Papyrus”
was the
database
v. 2.0
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19. Not so cheap
not so durable
but portable
This was the first
“mobile” market
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20. Market
Leader
the
Pharaoh
?
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21. Wait a sec!
The Pharaoh Market Leader
spoke about prophecies,
exactly like an “Oracle”
would...
(Mhm, I should elaborate it a little bit more)
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22. So, the world
needed an even
better
technology:
what next?
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23. Europe, 500 years ago
Modern “Books" became
database v. 2.1 (minor version)
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24. Easy to make
copies,
not durable as
stone, but
(c) Luca Garulli
portable
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25. Users started to make choices:
3)want something really durable?
Go with Stone
2) do you want something portable?
Papyrus
3) Need also copies? Books
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26. You can’t have all of them. Choose
between:
easy to (C)opy
dur(A)bility
(P)ortability
But just pick 1 or 2 of them!
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27. I can’t believe: the origin of
CAP theorem ?
easy to (C)opy
Book
Stone
dur(A)bility (P)ortability
Papyrus
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28. We found some interesting similarities
with the modern databases:
history repeating itself!
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29. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
Visibility
Peak of
Inflated
Plateau of
Expectations
productivity
Slope of
productivity
Trough of
Disillusionment
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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30. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
Visibility
A potential technology breakthrough kicks
things off. Early proof-of-concept stories and
Peak of
media interest trigger significant publicity.
Inflated
Often no usable products exist and
Plateau of
Expectations
commercial viability is unproven.
productivity
Slope of
productivity
Trough of
Disillusionment
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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31. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
Visibility
Peak of
Inflated
Plateau of
Expectations
productivity
Slope of
productivity
Trough publicity produces a number of
Early of
success stories—often accompanied by
Disillusionment
scores of failures. Some companies take
action; many do not.
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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32. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
Interest wanes as experiments and
implementations fail to deliver. Producers of the
Visibility
technology shake out or fail. Investments continue
Peak of only if the surviving providers improve their
Inflated products to the satisfaction of early adopters.
Plateau of
Expectations
productivity
Slope of
productivity
Trough of
Disillusionment
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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33. Bad stories from the trenches
“Goodbye, CouchDB”
May 10th, 2012 by Steven Hazel
“Failing with MongoDB”
November 5, 2011 by Michael Schurter
“A year with MongoDB”
April 2012 on Kiip.me blog
“MongoDB: 9 months on”
11 May 2011 by Clueless Joe
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34. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
More instances of how the technology can
Visibility
benefit the enterprise start to crystallize
and become more widely understood.
Peak of
Second and third-generation products
Inflated
appear from technology providers. More Plateau of
Expectations
enterprises fund pilots; conservative productivity
Slope of
companies remain cautious. productivity
Trough of
Disillusionment
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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35. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
Visibility
Peak of
Inflated
Plateau of
Expectations
productivity
Slope of
productivity
Mainstream adoption starts to take
off. Criteria forof
Trough assessing provider
viability are more clearly defined. The
Disillusionment
technology’s broad market
applicability and relevance are clearly
Technology paying off.
trigger
Maturity
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36. Interpreting Technology Hype
by Gartner
2010 - 2011 Don't worry,
we're here!
Visibility
Peak of
Inflated
Plateau of
Expectations
productivity
Slope of
productivity 2015 ->
2012 - 2014
Trough of
Disillusionment
2009 2011
Technology
trigger
Maturity
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37. Why some
users don't
succeed
using
NoSQL?
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38. Don't you know them? Really?
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39. You must apply the 3 laws of
NoSQL to avoid a blood bath
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40. NoSQL 1 law st
The first rule of NoSQL is:
«You do not talk about
NoSQL»
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41. NoSQL 2 law nd
there is no “golden hammer”
“if all you have is a hammer,
everything looks like a nail”
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42. NoSQL 2 law nd
explained
If all you have is a everything looks like
rdbms tables
key value keys and values
document documents
graph db vertexes and
nodes
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43. NoSQL 3 law rd
“one size doesn't fit all”
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44. NoSQL 3 law rd
explained: choose the right model(s)
(not exhaustive)
Scalability/Size
Key/Value
Column based Document
Relational Graph
Complexity
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45. Problem:
what about if you need multiple
models?
Very often the domain can be
split
in multiple
sub-domains:
this is the Polyglot Persistence
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46. Polyglot Persistence
Use multiple storage solutions to
avoid compromising on the business
data model...
Don’t change your model,
change storage solution or integrate it
with an additional product supports
the model you need!
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47. Multi-Model storage 1/2
one product, multiple faces
Because the Polyglot Persistence some
NoSQL vendors support multiple
models in the same product
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48. Multi-Model storage 2/2
This is the best way to achieve the
NoSQL goal choosing the right model
for each piece of domain with no
compromises
Only one product to know and manage
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49. Multi-Model example 1/4
To model the main entities of a selling product we
choose the Graph one because it has the ability to
traverse items and allow fast retrieving of
relationships. NOTE: This is just an example!
Graph Model
Order
Invoice
StockItem
Stock
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50. Multi-Model example 2/4
Document model
Customer Provider
Graph Model Customer and
Order Product need a
Invoice flexible schema to
place additional
fields like the «4°
StockItem
mobile number» or
the «XXX social
Stock network ID»
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51. Multi-Model example 3/4
Document model
Customer Provider
Graph Model Object Oriented
Order Model
Invoice
Person
StockItem
Vertex
Stock
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52. Multi-Model example 4/4
Document model
Constraints:
- phones > 0
Customer Provider - surname not null
Graph Model Object Oriented
Order Model
Invoice
Person
StockItem
Vertex
Stock
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53. Lessons learned
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54. Lesson learned 1/2
If you changed your domain to fit the
selected NoSQL solution,
What you selected was probably wrong or
not the very best
solution!
#fail
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55. Lesson learned 2/2
Selecting a NoSQL product because it’s
simply the most famous or because your
preferred Social Network is using it means
that nothing has changed:
You’re making the same mistake that
generations of developers made in the last
30 years by selecting the Relational DBMS
for every use case!
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56. Lesson learned 2/2b
This is against the NoSQL vein!
#superfail
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57. Other 9 factors to consider
Obviously, the model is not the only thing to evaluate when
you choose the right product:
3.Maturity
4.Constraints (lock mgmt, write strategy, reliability, etc.)
5.Who is using it in production?
6.Has anyone ever used it with a volume of data of similar to
mine?
7.Is it Open Source? Is there an active community?
8.Commercial Support
9.Current skill of your team
10.TCO (Total Cost of Ownership)
11.Test it before to select even with micro-benchmarks
represent your use case!
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58. Future directions: NoSQL
2nd and 3rd generation of NoSQL products are
providing more features RDBMS already
have:
* persistence for memory-only db
* transaction or similar
* better locking to improve concurrency
* finer indexing systems
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59. Future directions: RDBMS
Nth generation of RDBMS are providing
NoSQL features like:
* schema-less
* improved horizontal scalability
* raw API for fast insertion
* native support for array/collection
* full-text, queueing, etc.
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60. The common goal
faster,
more
scalable and
flexible
solution
NewSQL
NoSQL
RDBMS
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61. NoSQL
what
risks & challenges
with such scenario?
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62. NoSQL Risks 1/2
In many cases companies continue
to use RDBMS as primary storage
leaving to the NoSQL solutions the
«secondary role» of distributed
and/or scalable cache
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63. NoSQL Risks 2/2
RDBMS and NewSQL products are trying
to provide a technical answer to face the
«BigData» and all the problems of
performance and scalability
Companies could stay with the «improved»
(thanks to NoSQL) RDBMS products
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64. NoSQL Challenge
The NoSQL challenge is to gain the
trust of users and customers to
be used not only as a
secondary storage,
but playing the first role
in the game of the persistence
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65. That's all folks
Enjoy NoSQL Matters 2012
2 day!
nd
Many thanks!
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66. Luca Garulli
Author of CEO at
Document-Graph NoSQL
Open Source project
Ltd, London UK
www.twitter.com/lgarulli
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67. Luca Garulli
Author of CEO at
Document-Graph NoSQL
Hey, I’m a developer! If you want to
Open Source project
hear something more technical
don’t miss «Design your Ltd, London UK
application using Persistent
Graphs and OrientDB»
Today 14:45 House 6 Room 2
www.twitter.com/lgarulli
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