MariaDB Support

Feature requests
22

The first thing to do is either ditch MariaDB altogether or adapt it for MacOS. It makes no sense to adopt it for only one platform and abandon the rest of us. I was confused about coming from Windows to MacOS and not being able to choose MariaDB as an option.

Secondly, MySQL 8 and MariaDB are not 1:1, and issues arise when I take a client/customer MariaDB and import it into MySQL 8 or, depending on the version of MariaDB, MySQL 5.

These issues range from being unable to import the database without extensive wrangling to MYSQL 8 to creating weird problems not seen on MariaDB production servers locally. So if I push a development database to staging with MariaDB, strange things happen, and most of all I can not trust the staging server

Either way, I downloaded Local on MacOS Arm again and tried to drag and drop a WordPress backup on MariaDB.

It failed to import and died during database import specifically; no errors were given. Just didnā€™t work.

I use https://centminmod.com/ to power my personal and clientsā€™ web servers, and it defaults to MariaDB.

I appreciate that this is free software, but at the same time, the features that are put into it are mainly to make money and push it to your parent company. Itā€™d be nice to be able to use a freely available and popular open-source database engine with LocalWP after years past the initial request.

Plus, I know people that refuse to use MySQL because of Oracle. Yes, those people are certainly the minority, but itā€™s the principle of the matter for a decent amount.

2 Likes
25

@austinwendt and others at LocalWP: Clearly, there is a real need for MariaDB support (see replies above). Is there any interest or plan to support MariaDB in addition to MySQL? I would like to make a decision of my prototyping environment for the coming year and whether to stay with Local or switch to something else.

26

Hi all - Iā€™ll address/answer a few of the recent questions here.

I was confused about coming from Windows to MacOS and not being able to choose MariaDB as an option.

To be honest, it isnā€™t clear why (even internally, on the team) MariaDB exists on Windows only. This seems to be a legacy decision, even well before the WP Engine acquisition. It isnā€™t about trying to drive people to WP Engine.

We could remove it from Windows, but that would be going in the opposite direction, in my opinion. I agree, the community is vocal about needing it. In the past, our solution has been to use Local on Windows (or a VM) if needed to leverage MariaDB. ~60% of the Local user base is on Windows, interestingly enough. Even then, MariaDB usage is quite low.

Is there any interest or plan to support MariaDB in addition to MySQL?

Yes, thereā€™s interest - thatā€™s why weā€™ve kept the feature request open. In 2023, we made a number of improvements to our compiled services (PHP, MySQL, nginx, Apache, etc) - improved our PHP automation to make new releases available sooner, PHP 8.3 release, native binaries for Apple Silicon, among others. This has been on the radar, but never risen to the top as we focus on more cross-cutting improvements.

Whatā€™s next for Local in this realm: bump to MySQL 8.2 (will solve issues on Linux with missing libraries in MySQL 8, along with access to native binaries for Apple Silicon), bump to nginx (will include native binaries for Apple Silicon), replacing Mailhog with a similar tool (Mailpit) to remove outdated dependencies. All of these will be nice steps forward on a number of our feature requests in the forums.

I would like to make a decision of my prototyping environment for the coming year and whether to stay with Local or switch to something else.

The beginning of the year is a big kicking off point for new projects. At this point in time, I donā€™t see Local supporting MariaDB on macOS for at least 4-5 months. Unfortunately, if this is a deal breaker, a different prototyping environment would be better suited.

We really appreciate the time and effort made to continue the discussions on the forums and around this MariaDB thread specifically. I hope these explanations donā€™t come across as ā€œexcusesā€ but rather transparency around what weā€™re prioritizing instead and why. If something changes and MariaDB is coming sooner than expected, Iā€™ll make sure to update the thread here.

5 Likes
27

Signed up just to upvote this in 2024!

We work almost exclusively with Cloudways and itā€™s all MariaDB. Would love to use Local, the interface and setup is like no otherā€¦ but we canā€™t.

Thanks for your hard work on this free resource, and for continuing to consider adding this feature.

1 Like
28

Same host here. I guess I am upvoting this as well.

Also, seems there is no choice but to try a different solutionā€¦