HiveDevs

Proposal to Make HiveSQL Free Again

The goal of this proposal is to make HiveSQL free to use again in order to enable as many developers and users as possible to benefit from this valuable tool and develop applications and services for the Hive ecosystem.

_{In the following document, I may have to mention It Which Must Not Be Mentioned. In order to spare the faint of heart, I'll do my best to avoid it and replace it with Hive. In case that is not possible, I will just strikethrough.}

A bit of history

HiveSQL has been one of my first major projects for the ~~Steem~~ Hive blockchain. I initiated it in 2016, at the very beginning of the ~~Steem~~ blockchain life.

At that time, HiveSQL was free to use! Yes, totally free... except for me ;)

Over time, with more and more users and applications relying on HiveSQL for their proper functioning, and with the volume of data steadily increasing, operating costs started to climb.

HiveSQL has regularly undergone several code reviews [1][2][3] and infrastructure upgrades [4][5] to be able to maintain the performance provided at the best level.

A few numbers for the techies

HiveSQL has been running uninterrupted for 4 years now and its database size is over 2TB.

Every day, HiveSQL processes around 11082 requests per minute (graph), daily servicing an average of 25 applications (graph). Among them, well known apps likes Hive Keychain, HiveDapps.com, 3Speak, ...

Hive SQL database indexes are extremely harnessed and are the key to the performances it delivers. Every minute, up to 2 millions index scans (graph) are performed.

Failing to stay free

Inevitably, being able to sustain such hammering had an impact on the costs and at the end of 2017, I launched a call for help and support in order to continue to provide this service with the same top quality level.

The call was not heard and the only solution I found to make HiveSQL survive was to switch to the actual subscription model. Unfortunately, DHF and its proposals system did not exist at that time.

Why a proposal?

My wish has always been to keep access to HiveSQL public and free to everyone. I'm a bit of a utopian and would like to try again to find a way to fund this project while remaining true to the idea of providing it for free.

Others reasons are:

1. To cover costs

Let's call a spade a spade: I also need to cover costs.

For more than 4 years, HiveSQL has proven to be reliable, responsive and highly available.

Providing high-quality services is not free. Setting up, monitoring and maintaining such an infrastructure requires a lot of attention. Maintaining and monitoring the processes that inject data from the blockchain into the database also requires its share of work.

Although costs are managed effectively, they keep growing.

I have tried to keep the subscription fees affordable, but they are no longer enough to cover these costs and increasing the price of subscriptions is not a viable solution.

It is slowly becoming unsustainable for all and I cannot continue to provide this service at loss.

2. Bring back Less fortunate devs and users left behind

It really pissed me off when HiveSQL moved to a subscription model because I saw a lot of developers and users who couldn't afford the subscription get left behind.

This led me to offer a daily subscription, but despite that, it was not enough to slow down the slaughter.

I would really like these people to be able to take advantage of the enormous potential that HiveSQL provides to them in terms of support for applications, analytics or any other use case that they have.

3. Grow the hive ecosystem

HiveSQL is a powerful, fast and efficient tool.

By making HiveSQL available to a maximum of people already immersed in Hive or, even better, to people from outside our ecosystem, I am convinced that we can make it grow.

Knowledge is power and data brings knowledge.

If we give users and application developers free access to the blockchain data, in a way they can easily retrieve and manipulate it, we are providing them with the perfect tool to develop their business and services and in turn to onboard more users.

Request for Funding

This proposal is not intended to reimburse the expenses that have been incurred so far. It is strictly to cover current and future costs in terms of infrastructure and human resources so that HiveSQL can continue to run and enable developers and users to use it for free.

Here are the costs that have been budgeted, taking into account the past experience of several years and my plans for the future:

1. Infrastructure and services ($1900/month)

SQL Server (including license)
Dedicated Hive private nodes (AH and HM)
Firewall
Security management and monitoring tools
Performances monitoring tools
Backup services
Language identification services

2. DevOps ($800/month)

Infrastructure maintenance and updates
Code maintenance
Support to users and developers
New features implementation (like Sentiment Analysis)

3. WebOps ($300/month)

HiveSQL.io website update and maintenance
Documentation creation and maintenance
Tutorials creation and maintenance

Considering the elements mentioned above, I'm asking for 100 HBD per day for the remaining days of 2020 and the next two years.

Make HiveSQL free again!

Support This Proposal:

Thank you for your support!

Comments · 39

@lilymay(54)· 1501d
Done voting for the proposal 138 ..thank you @mers for tagging me.
@challenge-fr(56)· 1502d
Bonjour @arcange je trouve cette proposition très intéressante, j'ai donc voté pour elle. Cependant, j'ai une petite question. Je ne sais pas si j'ai le droit d'organiser un giveaway (des récompenses) pour toutes personnes qui vote pour votre proposition. Merci de votre éventuelle réponse.
@niallon11(77)· 1502d
That's an easy yes. Great service that adds a lot to the eco system.
@wrestlingdesires(72)· 1502d
I put in my vote to support it :) ...
@omitaylor(57)· 1952d
Do I only have to vote once? Ie on Peaked OR Hivesigner? But not both, correct?

Also, can you tell me more about HiveSQL? I was not aware of it. It's been a long time.
@poshbot(59)· 2008d
https://twitter.com/steevc/status/1364509025526837251
@atma.love(71)· 2028d
Just seen this. Thanks for your work @arcange. Definitely happy to support this proposal (even though it's supported anyway).

Peace and Love
@gregory-f(72)· 2069d
I support this!
@poshbot(59)· 2111d
https://twitter.com/EnjarGames/status/1327090829362606081
@abh12345(80)· 2113d
Sorry I missed this one - have just reblogged!
@r0nd0n(65)· 2113d
You mentioned that you seen a lot of smaller users unable to use HiveSQL once it became a payed subscription. That makes me wonder a few things:
1. How much growth did you account for with the service becoming free?
2. Could more calls and larger user base affect the QoS for those whose apps rely on the service?
3. If growth does start to hurt user experience, will you be seeking additional funding through the DHF or with priority subscriptions?
@drniche(45)· 2114d
Voted! I hope it can be free!
@jasonbu(65)· 2117d
Love HiveSQL, I've subscribed a few times for specific instances but could not keep up the sub, sorry! I think it's a fantastic tool that could be used by devs and others, like me. Totally supporting your proposal!
@eturnerx(69)· 2119d
As much as I'm concerned about the closed source nature of this, I think that the benefits it can provide are worth it because:
- Business analysts can use their standard toolkits to help us make better-informed decisions
- dApps can get off the ground quickly. If a dApp gains traction the owner can then either support HiveSQL monetarily, code out the dependency on HiveSQL or run their own hivemind nodes.
So, it's a yes for me.
@inertia(75)· 2119d
I support this. If you're doing ruby/rails development, you can access HiveSQL through this library, which wraps the tables in ActiveRecord:

https://github.com/inertia186/hive_sql
@beggars(71)· 2119d
I was a subscriber back when it was SteemSQL and I can attest to the stability of what you offer. Furthermore, what you offer allows running some substantially powerful and long queries, the kind that you couldn't query the blockchain itself (not without some tricky engineering a whole lot of Hive Power).

I would love to see @blocktrades and other heavy hitters in the Hive ecosystem support HiveSQL because the possibilities it allows from a dApp perspective are severely underrated and worth paying for. Not having to manage hardware, servers and sync your own database is worth paying for alone. I will be disappointed and disheartened if the Hive community doesn't support this proposal and make it happen.

Just letting you know @arcange that the second link for the proposal on Hive.blog appears to be broken as well.
@pixelfan(74)· 2119d
Happy to support something usefull... you have my vote 👍
@doze(76)· 2120d
Done! 👍
@hiro-hive(75)· 2120d
I will support this proposal to make it easy for all developers to access the information
@poshbot(59)· 2120d
https://twitter.com/TraciYorkWriter/status/1324122100479774720
@traciyork(75)· 2120d
@darkflame(70)· 2120d
I support this 100% and if I had more of the technical skills would be very interested in helping.
@brianoflondon(77)· 2120d
Voting for this. I'd really like to experiment more and I think this is a key part of that.
@guiltyparties(74)· 2120d
Considering your experience/credentials, the quality of the service and its utility, the proposal is absolutely reasonable and in my opinion should be supported.
@sk1920(74)· 2121d
Do you mind me asking if you use the funds from your frequent posts to support HiveSQL costs? I'm not sure if it's going to get voted through, but maybe you can achieve your goals and receive some reimbursement from these posts.

Also I suggest using some H-E tokens like Leo, Palnet or Neoxian to bootstrap the earnings.

Voted!
@jocieprosza(68)· 2121d
We need to move out of stagnation, I hope this will help other developers to create some more commotion in our ecosystem.

Voted
@yintercept(65)· 2121d
Things on the Internet are either free or out of reach.

The problem with free is that free things tend to be abused.

I've asked myself: are there any queries that I could perform on HiveSQL that would be worth the $40 a month subscription. So, the sad truth is "No"

IMHO, HIVE would be a happier and more sustainable ecosystem if we had more middle ground structures that minnows and dolphins could afford. I don't think you have to aim at making HIVEsql free. There needs to be some ways for low value accounts to small amounts of computer time on the machine to make periodic queries.
@vimm(71)· 2121d
I support this.
@bashadow(70)· 2121d
I hope it goes through, I am pretty sure my vote proxy will be voting for it.
@papilloncharity(83)· 2121d
Done!
@mahdiyari(73)· 2121d
Don't get me wrong but hivesql is a centralized closed-source database. You leave at any moment and hivesql will be gone too.
@amico(67)· 2121d
I'll support you for sure!

Posted using Dapplr
@fbslo(72)· 2121d
Voted!
@funnyman(71)· 2121d
Would love to support, just wanted to know if it's going to be open sourced?

Posted using Dapplr
@hivebuzz(74)· 2121d
Congratulations @arcange! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :

You got more than 31500 replies. Your next target is to reach 32000 replies.

_{You can view your badges on your board and compare yourself to others in the Ranking} _{If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word STOP}

Do not miss the last post from @hivebuzz:

Feedback from the November 1st Hive Power Up Day
@beerlover(65)· 2121d
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@pixresteemer(71)· 2121d

Bang, I did it again... I just rehived your post!

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!BEER

₁
@sanat(55)· 2121d
I heard a lot about hivesql, is it opensource, I mean the codebase to sync, indexing, etc.?
@dalz(81)· 2121d
Happy to support it! Btw the links didnt work for me.