Jay Greenspan [an error occurred while processing this directive]is a former Webmonkey producer who now splits his time between poker, technology and comedy. In his spare time, he also writes books.
In this tell-all tutorial, Jay Greenspan, author of MySQL Weekend Crash Course and co-author of MySQL/PHP Database Applications, starts with a tour of the basics: He answers the age-old Q: "What's the big deal with Transactions?"; investigates the four properties that a database must have to be considered transaction-capable; takes a closer look at locking mechanisms; and finishes up with a look at MyISAM tables, the lesser cousin of fully transaction-capable tables.
Once you have a taste of the limitations of MyISAM tables, you'll be hungry for the real deal. In Lesson 2, Jay satiates that hunger with a thorough introduction to MySQL's different transactional table types: BDB, Gemini, and InnoDB.
