Meme Week: NOLOCK? NOSQL.


When you find yourself using NOLOCK, consider NOSQL instead.

NOLOCK has 4 big problems:

Your query can see the same rows twice Your query can skip rows altogether Your query can see data that was never committed Your query can fail altogether

If you’re okay with all 4 of those, and you find yourself REGULARLY applying NOLOCK, you probably don’t need the expense of a relational database at all. You’d probably be better off with an eventual consistency platform that trades accurate results for speed.