September 2015 Summaries

N1QL is a powerful query language designed to make NoSQL databases more accessible to developers, reducing the learning curve and facilitating the creation of advanced applications. While it offers a promising platform, akin to SQL, it is also susceptible to injection attacks, though it is slightly more resistant than traditional SQL due to its inability to batch multiple commands and its use of C-style comment blocks. Despite these vulnerabilities, developers can effectively safeguard their applications by employing best practices such as using named or positional parameters, escaping quotes and identifiers, and avoiding user input directly in queries. By adhering to these security measures, developers can leverage N1QL to build robust and secure applications with Couchbase NoSQL databases.

Couchbase 4.0, although not yet fully released, is already being utilized by the team behind the crowd-sourced video app Seenit, particularly through its N1QL feature. Dave Starling, the Chief Technology Officer of Seenit and a recognized Couchbase Developer Expert, discussed the application of Couchbase 4.0 in their operations, highlighting its current usage and potential benefits for their platform.

Couchbase has released the General Availability version of its official SDK for Go, emphasizing the company's commitment to the Go platform. The SDK supports various features including synchronous and asynchronous APIs, N1QL and view querying, CRUD operations, and SSL support. It is designed to efficiently handle operations across multiple goroutines without performance penalties, and offers non-blocking asynchronous operations. Additionally, the SDK supports replica reads, allowing data access even if the primary server encounters issues, ensuring uninterrupted service. Installation follows standard Go module procedures and comprehensive documentation is available for users. However, a concern is raised regarding the absence of SQL injection sanitization, an important security consideration given its prominence as a vulnerability.

Couchbase has announced the release of a Go SDK, which enhances the scalability and ease of integration for developers working with Go, a language known for its high concurrency and efficient handling of JSON data. The SDK is designed to seamlessly align with Go's constructs, such as goroutines and channels, allowing applications to scale with minimal effort while interfacing efficiently with Couchbase Server clusters. The SDK offers a simple interface, gocb, for type-safe operations and also provides a more detailed layer, gocbcore, for developers requiring deeper integration or asynchronous interfaces. The SDK supports Go 1.5, benefiting from its improved memory management and development tools, and anticipates future enhancements in Couchbase Server projects, many of which are also being developed in Go. This release aims to simplify the development process with Couchbase and encourages developers to explore new possibilities with the Go SDK, as outlined by Brett Lawson, the lead engineer for the project.

The Couchbase developer community is expanding, and to better serve its members, there is an effort to understand their preferences and needs. There is a call for community members to participate in a survey, which aims to gather insights on what improvements or additions they would like, such as more workshops in nearby cities or additional sample applications for specific use cases. The feedback collected will assist the Developer Advocacy team in enhancing the community experience. Participants who complete the survey will also be entered into a draw to win a $500 Amazon voucher, adding an incentive to contribute their opinions.

Couchbase Server 4.0 Release Candidate introduces significant architectural advancements and new capabilities, highlighted by the N1QL Query Language, which combines SQL's simplicity with JSON's flexibility for scalable application development. The release includes Global Secondary Indexing (GSI) to enhance the speed of document access and Multi-Dimensional Scaling (MDS) for optimized hardware resource allocation. It also features the advanced storage engine ForestDB, designed for SSD efficiency, and simplified security compliance with native LDAP integration and auditing capabilities. Additionally, powerful global data distribution is achieved through Cross Datacenter Replication Filtering, which allows data to be filtered and distributed with low latency across geographical locations. While this release candidate is not yet production-ready, Couchbase encourages feedback to refine the final product, offering comprehensive resources and support for developers to explore the new features.

The 2.1.0 version of the Couchbase Java SDK introduces a range of new features and enhancements compared to the 2.0 branch, driven by user feedback. Notable additions include support for N1QL DP4 and spatial View queries, both still experimental, which offer extended query options and more flexible error handling. The update also improves performance under certain workloads, introduces idle socket heartbeats to maintain connections, and offers pluggable retry strategies for faster feedback and customizable request handling. Additionally, a subscribable event bus has been added to facilitate event-driven programming, and DNS SRV bootstrap support allows centralized configuration of bootstrap nodes. The team plans to focus on stabilizing this branch with bug fixes and enhancing framework integration in future updates.

ScoreMore Baseball has launched an app across major mobile platforms, utilizing Couchbase to enhance its functionality. The app's architecture involves designing Object Relation Maps with a "type" attribute to categorize documents, such as "coach" or "team," and uses arrays to organize data like a batter's hits or a team's seasonal records. Views in the app ensure that documents of a single type are returned, and a Spray Chart View, for instance, visualizes hit locations for players. JavaScript structures represent various document types, and JSON.stringify is used for database interactions. Overall, the app aims to provide a seamless experience for users across different devices, leveraging Couchbase Mobile's capabilities.

The Couchbase Spark Connector allows developers to move data in and out of Couchbase directly using Spark RDDs, leveraging the scalability, performance, and ease of use shared by both platforms. The connector is available as a developer preview, featuring capabilities such as creating RDDs from documents, views, and N1QL queries, writing RDDs and DStreams into Couchbase, and transparent cluster and bucket management. Developers can access the project on GitHub and follow configuration instructions to set up the connector for use with Spark. The connector supports reading from Couchbase into RDDs, applying transformations, and hinting target document types, as well as writing RDDs into Couchbase using custom converters or flat JSON structures. Future plans include tighter N1QL and Spark SQL integration, DStreams through DCP, and custom converter enhancements.

The blog post outlines the author's journey in developing a Node.js application using Couchbase as the database, detailing the process over a series of posts. Initially, it covers the installation of the Couchbase Node SDK, noting that Windows users receive pre-built components while others may need additional tools like node-gyp. The post explains three methods to input data into Couchbase—insert, replace, and upsert—and focuses on creating a simple demo using the upsert method. The author describes setting up the environment with Express.js, body-parser, and a local Couchbase Server, and details the steps to connect to the Couchbase cluster and create a basic form to capture and handle data input. The process includes setting up routes to manage form submissions, converting the submitted data to JSON, and storing it in a Couchbase document. The author hints at future posts that will explore building a more functional application and structuring data representation in Couchbase.

The first beta release of the official Go SDK version 1.0.0, tagged as 0.9.0, introduces support for Couchbase 4.0 server features, including N1QL and Multidimensional Scaling (MDS), a new bulk operations API, and numerous bug fixes. This release allows users to execute N1QL queries easily and perform bulk operations synchronously, enabling the asynchronous fetching or storing of thousands of documents simultaneously. MDS enhances cluster scalability by allowing distinct nodes to be designated for specific tasks, such as querying or data handling, and scales them according to resource needs. While this version is optimized for Couchbase 4.0’s capabilities, it maintains compatibility with earlier versions of Couchbase servers. Installation follows standard Go module procedures, and documentation is readily available online.

Couchbase Server version 4.0 introduces a SQL gene and an expressive query language called N1QL, which combines the flexible data model of JSON documents with the power of SQL. This allows for simplified programmability and powerful new enterprise applications that can take advantage of the NoSQL data model. The addition of N1QL enables Couchbase Server to compete with relational databases in terms of query performance and scalability. N1QL delivers high-performance queries through a new global secondary indexing mechanism, which provides low latency and scalability for demanding big data applications. The new scalability model, called multidimensional scaling, allows for independent scaling of services such as data, index, and query operations, enabling users to choose the best hardware design per zone based on their workload. Overall, N1QL represents a significant step forward in Couchbase's ability to compete with relational databases in terms of query performance and scalability.

The first beta release of the Couchbase Spark Connector introduces significant updates, including support for Spark 1.4, enhanced Spark SQL DataFrame integration, Java API support, and the implementation of StoreModes in the saveToCouchbase() method. This release marks a crucial development phase, providing official documentation and various enhancements to improve flexibility and usability. The connector's support for Spark 1.4 involves adapting to the new DataFrame API, ensuring compatibility and ease of use. Java developers can now leverage the connector through the com.couchbase.spark.java namespace, while the introduction of StoreModes offers options like UPSERT and INSERT_AND_FAIL for more nuanced data handling. The 1.0.0 GA release is scheduled for a month later, inviting users to test the beta version and contribute to its refinement.

In 2013, Apple Inc. introduced iBeacon technology, which operates on the Bluetooth Low Energy protocol, enabling devices to broadcast information for location-based applications. This innovation allows multiple devices to interact without direct pairing, which is typically required in standard Bluetooth connections. Primarily focusing on iOS, the blog describes how the EPage team, led by Ed Arenberg, integrates this technology with Couchbase Mobile to develop applications that log and synchronize data across devices using iBeacons. The service utilizes Couchbase Lite for local storage and Couchbase Sync Gateway for syncing data when network connectivity is available, ensuring data consistency across various app instances. The implementation involves object-relational mapping for handling beacon data in native classes and setting up replication processes to manage data synchronization seamlessly. The approach highlights how developers can build sophisticated services that maintain state consistency across a network, paving the way for more advanced location-aware applications.

Hortonworks and Couchbase have announced a strategic partnership to streamline the flow of operational big data between NoSQL databases and Hadoop. This partnership enables enterprises to export and stream data from Couchbase Server to HDP, and vice-versa, using the database change protocol (DCP) and other tools such as Sqoop, Kafka, and Storm. The key to unlocking the value of operational big data is making these systems work together efficiently, allowing for real-time analytics and processing, and enabling enterprises to export and stream data with multiple tasks in parallel. This partnership will be showcased at Strata+Hadoop World, where Couchbase will present on using Kafka to enable the big data pipeline.

Couchbase Connect 2015 marks the release of Couchbase Server 4.0 Beta, a significant update introducing key features such as N1QL, a new query language combining SQL's power with JSON's flexibility, and Multi-Dimensional Scaling for improved resource utilization and application performance. The update also includes Global Secondary Indexing (GSI) for efficient data retrieval, ForestDB as a storage engine designed for multi-core processors and SSDs, and enhanced security compliance features like LDAP integration and detailed auditing. Additionally, the release enhances Cross Datacenter Replication (XDCR) with filtering options to optimize data distribution across various geographical locations, providing enterprises with a robust, scalable solution for managing distributed databases efficiently.

Couchbase Server 4.0, now in developer preview, introduces significant enhancements such as the N1QL query language that combines SQL and JSON to simplify application coding by enabling SQL-like operations on JSON data. The release also features Global Secondary Indexing (GSI) for faster, scalable queries, and Multi-Dimensional Scaling (MDS) to optimize performance by allowing separate scaling of data, indexing, and query workloads. Additionally, it offers improved security compliance with features like native LDAP integration and detailed auditing, alongside native SDKs for easier integration and connectivity options via ODBC and JDBC drivers. The release is still under development, encouraging user feedback to shape its final form, with resources available for developers to explore and test these new capabilities.