Do they write a lot of queries? The breadth and depth of SQL features MSSQL supports blows MySQL out of the water. I work mostly with MySQL now, and it's painful to go back. For example, I really like windowing functions and table-valued functions. But there's a lot, lot more.
Do they want much better query performance? MSSQL again.
Are they a business type? They will probably like stuff like SSRS, SSIS, and SSAS, and all the additional tooling around them.
There really is no comparison between MySQL and MSSQL. Postgres is great, and generally what I use if I have a choice because it's free and better in many respects than MySQL, but even there I have problems thinking of things that Postgres does better than MSSQL, though there are a few. There's just _so much_ MSSQL does and so much it does right, and the stuff it does wrong is generally getting fixed (no more XML PATH, they finally added STRING_AGG!!!).
But if they're happy with what they're got, well, it'd be silly to spend the money on an MSSQL license.
IME, MSSQL is pretty google-able - that's really how I learned it. Do you have any specific problems with its googlability?
How much PostgreSQL do you run? Because I am a primarily PostgreSQL dev who occasionally uses MSSQL and MySQL. I always get annoyed at missing features when I have to use another database, while I do not know as well what features are missing in PostgreSQL simply because I know PostgreSQL way better than I know the other databases. It is easy to be blind this way.
Some features which PostgreSQL have which I believe are missing for MSSQL. This are features I use all the time in my every day work.
- Transactional DDL concurrently with snapshot isolation
- Exclusion constraints: a generalized form of unique constraints
- "Writable-CTEs": the ability to use RETURNING from an UPDATE, INSERT or DELETE in a CTE
- Regular expression support (I think fixed in 2016)
- JSON support (I think fixed in 2016)
- Many small things like lack of DISTINCT ON and array_agg
I think MSSQL is a pretty good database though, unlike MySQL which lacks too many features to be a competitive general purpose RDBMs (InnoDB has some nice properties though).
Do they write a lot of queries? The breadth and depth of SQL features MSSQL supports blows MySQL out of the water. I work mostly with MySQL now, and it's painful to go back. For example, I really like windowing functions and table-valued functions. But there's a lot, lot more.
Do they want much better query performance? MSSQL again.
Are they a business type? They will probably like stuff like SSRS, SSIS, and SSAS, and all the additional tooling around them.
There really is no comparison between MySQL and MSSQL. Postgres is great, and generally what I use if I have a choice because it's free and better in many respects than MySQL, but even there I have problems thinking of things that Postgres does better than MSSQL, though there are a few. There's just _so much_ MSSQL does and so much it does right, and the stuff it does wrong is generally getting fixed (no more XML PATH, they finally added STRING_AGG!!!).
But if they're happy with what they're got, well, it'd be silly to spend the money on an MSSQL license.
IME, MSSQL is pretty google-able - that's really how I learned it. Do you have any specific problems with its googlability?