The anon poster claimed to have deployed an early version of Mongo, at a "high profile" company with tens of millions of users, and yet seemed surprised by basic RTFM facts like 'must use getLastError after calls if you need to ensure your write was taken', even well into a production deploy. That should raise huge alarm bells for anyone who is considering taking the guy seriously.
It's just not clear that there were bona-fide 'data-loss bugs' in play here. Seems at least as likely that misuse and misunderstanding of Mongo led to data-loss that could have been avoided.
So, I'd revise your simile. This is more like ignoring a lot of perfectly safe roads which lead to where you're trying to go, instead choosing to chance a more exciting looking shortcut filled with lava pits and dinosaurs. And putting on a blindfold before driving on to it.
Look, NoSQL is wild and wooly and full of tradeoffs, that's a truism by now. If you use such tech without thoroughly understanding it, and consequently run your company's data off a cliff, absolutely it's on you. Mongo does not have a responsibility to put training wheels on and save naive users from themselves, because there should not be naive users. These are data stores, the center of gravity for an application or a business. People involved in choosing and deploying them should not be whinging about default settings being dangerous, about not getting write confirmations when they didn't ask for write confirmations, etc. There's just no excuse for relying blindly upon default settings. Reading the manual on such tech is not optional. Those who don't and run into problems, well, they'd be well-advised to chalk it up as a learning experience and do better next time. Posting "ZOMG X SUCKS BECAUSE I BURNED MYSELF WITH IT" is just silly, reactionary stuff, and it depresses me that HN falls for it and upvotes it like it's worth a damn, every freaking time.
It's just not clear that there were bona-fide 'data-loss bugs' in play here. Seems at least as likely that misuse and misunderstanding of Mongo led to data-loss that could have been avoided.
So, I'd revise your simile. This is more like ignoring a lot of perfectly safe roads which lead to where you're trying to go, instead choosing to chance a more exciting looking shortcut filled with lava pits and dinosaurs. And putting on a blindfold before driving on to it.
Look, NoSQL is wild and wooly and full of tradeoffs, that's a truism by now. If you use such tech without thoroughly understanding it, and consequently run your company's data off a cliff, absolutely it's on you. Mongo does not have a responsibility to put training wheels on and save naive users from themselves, because there should not be naive users. These are data stores, the center of gravity for an application or a business. People involved in choosing and deploying them should not be whinging about default settings being dangerous, about not getting write confirmations when they didn't ask for write confirmations, etc. There's just no excuse for relying blindly upon default settings. Reading the manual on such tech is not optional. Those who don't and run into problems, well, they'd be well-advised to chalk it up as a learning experience and do better next time. Posting "ZOMG X SUCKS BECAUSE I BURNED MYSELF WITH IT" is just silly, reactionary stuff, and it depresses me that HN falls for it and upvotes it like it's worth a damn, every freaking time.