Major Discussions

Vote on release of Apache CouchDB 1.5.1-rc.1 (will be released as Apache CouchDB 1.5.1 — see thread)

The vote passed.

Importing CSV data into a CouchDB document using Python-Cloudant module (discussion still open — see thread)

Approaches brought up: (1) Transforming a CSV file into a JSON file with Python; (2) rc_scv, a direct rcouch extension; (3) using Google Refine and Max Ogden’s refine uploader (see visual example here); (4) CSV2Couch. Further information can also be found in this blog post on “Using Python with Cloudant” and the newer Cloudant-Python interface

CouchDB 1.6.0 proposals (see thread)

Discussion around the open blocker plus how to deal with it and around re-cutting 1.6.x from master. Releasing 1.5.1 will take precedence.

Poll around Erlang whitespace standards (see thread; the poll is still open)

Joan Touzet: “I know many of you are fed up with not being able to auto format in your favourite editor and match the CouchDB Erlang coding standards, or receiving pull requests that are formatted poorly. I’d like to fix that with an appropriate whitespace standard, and supplementary plugins for vi and Emacs that will just Do The Right Thing and let us all stop worrying about whitespace corrections in pull requests.”

There’s currently a poll around this topic which is still open.

Multiple Concurrent Instances of CouchDB on Mac OS X 10.7.5 (see thread)

Approaches: (1) for a powerful enough machine Vagrant could be used to spin up a few CouchDB VMs, e.g. with CouchDB-Vagrant. Other options could be: (2) using Docker, (3) Node-Multicouch (used in Hoodie) or (4) this script to configure isolated instances, it should be possible to point couchdb to the CouchDB commands inside the .app.

CouchDB Universe

• CouchDB was just featured on GitHub’s list of NoSQL databases
• npm inc: “How are [we] going to make money?“
• Displaying a million DNA barcodes on Google Maps using CouchDB
• NoSQL Job Trends: February 2014
• Stackdriver can monitor CouchDB

Releases in the CouchDB Universe

• Wilt 3.0.0 – a browser/server based CouchDB API library based on the SAG CouchDB library for PHP
• contentful-2-couchdb – a proof of concept for easy data export to CouchDB and replication use
• Availability of MariaDB 10 announced
• PouchDB released a new website
• PouchDB 2.1.0 release includes e.g. (all release notes here):
  • Support optional leveldown builds
  • Replication performance improvements
  • Fix for localStorage detection in Chrome Apps
  • Improved error reporting from replicator et al.

Opinions

• On Error handling in Node.js
• “CouchDB has hit the big time.” – IBM & Cloudant: Chapter One of NoSQL
• CouchDB Short Review
• A bit older, but still good news about Opencouch from Erlang Factory 2014
• “If you are designing your own REST backend you’re doing it wrong“
• Book: “Seven Databases in Seven Weeks: A Guide to Modern Databases and the NoSQL Movement“
  • There’s a “Database song” for it, too, and it’s also mentioning CouchDB
• Book: “Speaking JavaScript“. References CouchDB in a couple places (e.g. in the chapter “Historical JavaScript Milestones”)

Use Cases, Questions and Answers

• Turning the server into the new personal device with Node.js, Cozy and CouchDB
• StackOverflow: “CouchDB / MongoDB for syncing distributed MySQL application“
• StackOverflow: “Where can I find an example of a couchDB database?“
• StackOverflow: “Retrieve and decode a couchdb document using php“
• StackOverflow: “how to improve the view with map/reduce in couchdb and nodejs“
• StackOverflow: “Translate relational db into couchDB (noSQL)“

Getting involved into CouchDB

If you want to get into working on CouchDB: here’s a list of beginner tickets you can get started with. These are issues around our currently ongoing Fauxton-implementation. If you have any questions or need help, don’t hesitate to contact us in the couchdb-dev IRC room (#couchdb-dev) – Garren (garren) and Sue (deathbear) are happy to help. We’d appreciate having you!

New Committers and PMC Members

• Robert Kowalski (IRC nick: robertkowalski, Twitter: robinson_k) has been elected as a CouchDB committer. Welcome to the Couch, Robert!

… and also in the news

• Deliver Working Software Frequently
• GitHub Selfies…!

Posted on behalf of Lena Reinhard.

Welcome to the Apache CouchDB weekly news! From today on, we’ll bring you the highlights of what happened in the CouchDB Universe each thursday.

Major Discussions

BigCouch vs. Couchbase

A comparison between the two, around conflict solving, revision docs, nodes, replicas and hashing. Find the thread here.

Healthcare projects running on CouchDB

Albin Stigö asked for healthcare companies / projects using CouchDB. In the thread, a collection of examples and reasons why this is a good fit was discussed. CouchDB works well in healthcare due to its relative ease of configuration and deployment, easy synchronization, backups, attachment-handling and notifications and mobile-readiness. Some examples of projects / companies using CouchDB: CommCare HQ, Mobius, Neurofoundation. Find his summary and the entire thread here.

Weekly CouchDB meeting – summary

• 1.6.rc-2: discussion around blocker; will be collated and sent to the mailing list
• Marketing: there’ll be a weekly CouchDB news (which you are currently reading)
• Fauxton – status: Futon will be removed as soon as Fauxton-implementation is done; following release will be marked as beta
• Merges: discussion around BigCouch and rcouch merges will also be collated and sent to the mailing list

CouchDB Universe

• node-couchdb-model – a simple CouchDB abstraction for NodeJS built on nano
• On recent npm downtime and npm did to make things better: “New Powerful Machines”
• npm’s search got better
• CouchDB-tools: a library of handy functions for use when working with CouchDB documents.
• PouchDB’s replication just got a whole lot faster
• econfig version 0.4.2, a simple EErlang config handler using INI files, has been released
• cloudant 0.5.8 – an effortless Cloudant / CouchDB interface for Python
• Couchbase Lite 1.0 beta 3, a CouchDB-compatible embedded mobile database

Opinions

• On CouchDB as event store
• CouchDB progresses as IBM acquires Cloudant
• 10 common misconceptions about Apache CouchDB
• A presentation on the state of PouchDB

… and also in the news

• “Relying on laws to keep your private information safe is like relying on a dog to guard a plate of bacon.” – Stop Thinking the Government Can Fix Privacy
• “Why your previous developer was terrible; and why your current one seems so amazing”

Posted on behalf of Lena Reinhard.