When it comes to managing open source production databases, database administrators (DBAs) are overwhelmed with a multitude of tasks just to maintain their deployments, with the most common database management tasks including monitoring, backups, scaling, managing space and tables. While DBA’s are struggling just to keep up with their application database demand, this leaves them little to none time to focus on performance and improvements for their product.
SourceForge recently caught up with Dharshan Rangegowda, CEO of ScaleGrid, to discuss the challenges of maintaining production databases and which tasks DBAs can automate to improve the health and performance of their deployments.
What is ScaleGrid and what inspired its creation?
ScaleGrid is a fully managed Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) platform for MySQL, PostgreSQL, Greenplum™, Redis™ and MongoDB® database that helps you automate your time-consuming database management tasks so you can focus on product. We support public cloud, hybrid cloud, and on-premises deployments through popular providers AWS, Azure, Google Cloud (GCP), DigitalOcean, Linode, Oracle Cloud (OCI) and VMware.
ScaleGrid was founded in 2012 to help organizations adopt a new, more effective approach to managing their databases in the form of automation, without compromising the advanced security requirements for production databases. In a time when cloud computing was still a relatively new approach to online applications, we saw the future of mass migration to the cloud and the need for a platform to help support the day-to-day operations of the DBAs managing these complex environments.
What are the main challenges DBAs are facing today?
On average, organizations are leveraging 3.1 different database management systems to support their applications, and only 25.9% are using a single database type. As organizations continue to adopt new databases to support their unique use cases, DBAs are increasingly challenged with learning and managing these new systems with the same amount of resources available to them.
How can DBAs overcome these challenges for their company?
In order to effectively scale their database stack, organizations are looking for solutions like ScaleGrid that automate redundant day-to-day tasks and flatten the learning curve to adopting new database technologies. Managing a production workload is extremely complex, and we allow organizations to set up a production-ready environment in just a few clicks with advanced capabilities, including:
- High availability
- Disaster recovery
- Dynamic scaling
- Provisioning & deprovisioning
- Query performance analysis
- Monitoring & alerts
- Advanced security
- Automated management
- Managed operations
There are hundreds of components involved in database management, all unique to your database type and each as critical as the next. Where DBAs used to spend hours each month maintaining regular backups, ScaleGrid allows them to automate backups through a custom schedule by time, frequency and how many to retain so you have total control and peace of mind over the process.
Additionally, ScaleGrid cloud plans include 24/7 support from a team of database experts to help you quickly troubleshoot and resolve any issue your database faces. As any DBA will tell you, you don’t think you need it until you really do – when that 4:00 AM call comes through that your application is down, or even worse, your data has been compromised by an attack. At ScaleGrid, we help you avoid 95% of the issues your database team might face through deployment best practices, alert rules, and automation that reduces the risk of human error. For the other 5%, we are armed and ready to help you overcome any challenge your application throws your way.
What sets ScaleGrid apart from other DBaaS platforms?
At ScaleGrid, we not only understand why organizations need a DBaaS, but why they are hesitant to adopt one. The number one reason why companies are reluctant or unwilling to use a DBaaS platform is having to forfeit administrative control over their deployments. While our competitors take away database superuser admin access and SSH access to their machines, we allow our users to access these privileges when they need it to customize their deployments and leverage custom plugins and extensions to access additional features.
These privileges are disabled through most competitor platforms as they don’t want their customers “breaking” anything. This may work for 90% of the applications online, but what about the other 10% that require advanced customization and have the expertise to design these unique setups. The ScaleGrid platform is truly designed for every stage and type of business. We can disable SSH access so you don’t have to worry about breaking anything, or work with you through your use case to develop the custom configuration you need for your application.
We also offer a unique model called our Bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC) plan that allows you to host your databases through your own cloud account. This allows you to access advanced cloud capabilities such as virtual private clouds, security groups, or reserved instances to lower your long-term hosting costs up to 40%. Before creating your first cluster, you simply connect your cloud account by setting up a Cloud Profile, and then we can create and manage your database for you running on your own instances.
These are just a few of the advantages at ScaleGrid. To see how we stack up against other DBaaS platforms, check out our comparison pages:
- Compare MySQL Providers
- Compare PostgreSQL Providers
- Compare Redis™ Providers
- Compare MongoDB® Database Providers
What kind of companies are using ScaleGrid?
ScaleGrid works with all business types, ranging from enterprise companies like Accenture, Atlassian, VMware or Polaris, to early-stage startups who are just getting started. Our platform is also industry-agnostic, supporting applications across SaaS, IT, retail, education, insurance, manufacturing, hospitality, financial services, aviation, and more. Regardless of size, we help you develop an enterprise-grade infrastructure that is ready to scale the moment your business requires it.
How can companies get started?
You can start a free 30-day trial to explore the platform and create a new MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis™ or MongoDB® database cluster to see the rich feature set available for managing your deployments at ScaleGrid. Chat with our support team live in the console if you need any help setting up your account, and use our Live Migration tool to migrate your deployments over with little to no downtime for your application.
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