What New Database Versions and Trends Shaped 2019? A Comprehensive Review

DB‑Engines Ranking Overview

The newsletter begins with the DB‑Engines ranking for December 2019, summarizing the methodology based on search engine queries, job postings, and developer activity.

RDBMS Updates

Oracle

Gartner ranked Oracle first in all four operational DBMS capability categories for 2019. Oracle 19c introduced auto‑indexing, real‑time statistics, Active Data Guard DML redirection, automatic SQL isolation, and IoT stream processing. Oracle also announced a free‑forever cloud service with two Autonomous Databases and a new Exadata X8M featuring Intel Optane DC persistent memory, delivering 2.5× higher I/O throughput and 90% lower latency.

MySQL 8.0.18

Released on 2019‑10‑14, the version adds Hash Join, EXPLAIN ANALYZE, random password generation for CREATE/ALTER USER, group replication OFFLINE_MODE, and an IOP‑throttling option for InnoDB idle periods.

MariaDB 10.4.11

Introduced account lock/unlock commands, password expiration, and instant algorithm support for charset conversion (utf8 → utf8mb4) on tables and columns, with notes on limitations for varchar length and other data types.

PostgreSQL 12

Released on 2019‑10‑03, it adds AM storage interface, massive partition‑table performance gains (up to 469×), flexible B‑tree/GiST index ordering, audit log sampling, concurrent reindex, and JSON path query support.

NoSQL Updates

Redis 5.0.6 / 5.0.7

Version 5.0.7 fixes bugs in replication, AOF fsync, memory leaks, stream handling, and multi‑key command crashes. Version 5.0.6 adds HyperLogLog string validation fixes, merges new API modules, improves memory handling for object creation, and patches SHUTDOWN buffer flushing.

RocksDB 6.4.6

Released on 2019‑10‑16, it adds a secondary path for backups, compression dictionary pre‑loading, log read‑ahead size, new ExportColumnFamily and CreateColumnFamilyWithImport APIs, and performance improvements in iterator bounds checking, row cache, and compression dictionary handling.

NewSQL Updates

CockroachDB 19.2

Released on 2019‑11‑12, it halves transaction commit latency with a new atomic commit protocol, improves multi‑region deployment costs, and adds easier geographic configuration and partition table enhancements.

SequoiaDB 3.4

Released in November 2019, it adds a smart arbitration algorithm for distributed 2PC, multi‑level memory pools with lock‑free models, and significant performance gains (30%‑150% read/write improvements) for financial‑grade transaction workloads.

TiDB 3.0.6

Released on 2019‑11‑28, TiDB introduced TiFlash for HTAP capabilities, and TiDB Data Migration (DM) 1.0 GA for seamless MySQL/MariaDB to TiDB migration.

OceanBase Highlights

Version 2.2.3 (2019‑12‑10) adds flashback table, enhanced security auditing, SSL, transparent encryption, parallel dump for large partitions, and performance boosts (2‑3× for batch import, 15‑28× for batch update). The 2019 annual report notes breaking the TPC‑C record with 60,880,800 tpmC and supporting massive double‑11 traffic.

Big Data Ecosystem

Hadoop 2.10.0

Released on 2019‑10‑29, it introduces observer NameNode for read‑only consistency, rolling upgrade improvements, and cost‑based fair scheduler queues.

Flink 1.9.0

Released on 2019‑08‑22, it adds batch‑style recovery, a preview of the Blink Table API and SQL engine, a redesigned Web UI, and Python Table API preview with Hive integration.

Elasticsearch 7.5.0

Released on 2019‑12‑05, it adds ILM/SLM retention APIs, ingest processor extensions, machine‑learning classification APIs, and new SQL functions (DATEDIFF, DATEADD, DATE_PART, PIVOT, DATETRUNC).

Greenplum 6.0 (HTAP)

Introduces HTAP capabilities, cost‑based scheduling, and performance comparable to PostgreSQL/Oracle for OLTP workloads while retaining OLAP strengths.

Chinese Databases

GaussDB

GaussDB T (OLTP) and GaussDB A (OLAP) were announced in May 2019, offering sub‑10 s failover, 30% performance advantage on Kunpeng 920, high availability, strong consistency, and extensive SQL standard compatibility.

OushuDB

Version 4.0 introduces a SIMD‑based execution engine (5‑10× faster on TPCH), Magma storage with ACID, JSON support, and elastic scaling.

ArkDB 1.0.2

Released on 2019‑11‑28, adds parallel SQL execution, improved bulk‑load replication, shared ibd support, hot‑backup tools, and crash‑recovery fixes.

QianBase 1.5

Released on 2019‑12‑01, adds point‑in‑time recovery, Oracle‑compatible regex and numeric functions, trunc timestamp, auto‑increment sequences, FOR UPDATE lock wait, and DUMP utility.

DaMeng (DM8)

Highlights include a new generation of self‑developed DB, data sharing clusters, transparent distributed architecture, and 359 improvement items across backup, security, and performance.

Cloud Databases

POLARDB

In 2019 POLARDB released a MySQL 8.0‑compatible version, a distributed service supporting >100 TB storage, and the X‑Engine storage engine with high performance and compression.

AnalyticDB

Version 3.0 (July 2019) offers a cloud‑native OLAP service with row‑column hybrid storage, automatic indexing, AI‑driven optimization, 10× query speedup, and TPC‑DS 100 TB certification.

TBase

Open‑sourced on 2019‑11‑08, it provides distributed HTAP capabilities, multi‑region deployment, and compatibility with PostgreSQL 9.6, MySQL, and Oracle syntax.

CynosDB

Commercially launched in August 2019, it offers 100% MySQL 5.7 and PostgreSQL 10 compatibility, serverless 128 TB storage, stateless compute nodes, and usage‑based billing.

Other Cloud Offerings

Includes JD Cloud databases (PostgreSQL, InfluxDB, Greenplum, DRDS) with features such as MySQL 8.0 support, NVMe storage, online scaling, and data migration services.

Newsletter Information

The dbaplus Newsletter aims to provide a pure, non‑commercial platform for database technology updates, covering RDBMS, NoSQL, NewSQL, time‑series, big‑data, Chinese and cloud databases. It is published roughly every three months; the next issue is scheduled for 2020‑04‑06 to 2020‑04‑17. Contributions and feedback can be sent to [email protected] or via the GitHub repository https://github.com/dbaplus/DBAplus_Newsletter.