MySQL

Oracle can help Sun, but will it lose MySQL?

The Register paints a very unflattering picture of Sun Microsystems' alleged mismanagement of its hardware and software assets.

Unfortunately, there's likely a lot of truth to the argument, though it's easy to point fingers from the outside and tell others what to do.

But this is precisely why Sun should be grateful for Oracle's acquisition of its assets: Oracle needn't appease internal or customer lobbies. It just needs to determine what pays the bills, and shutter or sell everything that doesn't.

The one open question for me, however, remains MySQL. Oracle could do much with … Read more

Will Oracle let MySQL keep its new enterprise chops?

MySQL 5.4 has just been announced, evaporating the open-source database's previous four cores per instance limitation. Now, as Betanews reports, MySQL can handle up to "16-processor ("16-way") support for x86 servers with multiple cores per processor."

In other words, MySQL, long the leader in Web-focused database applications, just became a serious contender in the enterprise. It's unlikely MySQL's new owner, Oracle, is going to welcome this news.

While Redmonk analyst Stephen O'Grady suggests that MySQL nicely complements Oracle in many ways, he's also right to note that "the Oracle … Read more

IBM puts Oracle to the sword with EnterpriseDB

IBM is going on the offensive against the pending merger of Sun Microsystems and Oracle.

IBM announced Wednesday that it nabbed 100 of Sun's and Hewlett-Packard's customers last quarter alone for its high-end servers and mainframes, with half the deals worth over $1 million each, as reported by The Wall Street Journal.

The bigger news, however, may be IBM's partnership with EnterpriseDB, the commercial backer of the open-source PostgreSQL database, to embed EnterpriseDB's Postgres Plus Advanced Server technology into IBM's DB2 9.7 database product. EnterpriseDB's technology basically allows applications written for the Oracle … Read more

Oracle buys integration challenge along with Sun

Through one important piece of corporate computing jargon--"integration"--Oracle has found a justification for its $7.4 billion acquisition of Sun Microsystems. Now it will have to convince historically skeptical customers, too, that the idea makes sense.

The all-cash acquisition agreement--announced Monday, costing Oracle $5.6 billion with Sun's cash factored in, and expected to close this summer--puts the innovative but financially bumbling Sun out of its misery after IBM's move to buy it fell apart earlier in April. The way to fit Sun's technology into Oracle's business model goes back to a … Read more

Oracle gets Sun for $7.4 billion, MySQL for $0

Back in the early days of computing, there was no such thing as a "software vendor." Companies like IBM sold hardware/software integrated solutions and, really, software was developed simply to sell the value of the hardware.

With Monday's announcement that Oracle is acquiring Sun for $7.4 billion, however, Oracle is signaling its own "iPod moment," seeking to compete with Hewlett-Packard, IBM, and others in integrated hardware/software systems.

It's a bold move, and not for the faint of heart. But then, no one would ever accuse Oracle of being faint-hearted.

"I … Read more

MySQL and the freedom to fork

Patrick Galbraith has initiated a fascinating discussion with his post, "What is the official branch of MySQL?" I did a double-take when I first saw it, and I can't quite shake the question from my mind. It implies much of the power, and peril, of open source.

The question is critical because it implies that open source can become much bigger than the developer--whether an individual or a company--that created it. While Linus Torvalds, for example, remains central to Linux kernel development, Linux has become much, much bigger than Torvalds. Companies and foundations have been set up … Read more

Commercial open source, the future state

In preparation for my upcoming OSBC session, "Open-Core Licensing: The New Business Model Standard for Commercial Software," I dug through some old presentations to try to figure out how monetization efforts have changed in commercial open-source companies.

Ultimately, revenue from open source boils down to understanding buyer types, as described by former MySQL CEO and current Sun Senior Vice President Marten Mickos starting all the way back in 2005.

Marten described the buyer market for open-source solutions as:

Those who spend time to save money Those who spend money to save time

Marten has also asserted that "in the past, differentiation was a compelling reason to buy but, if incorrectly implemented, it could also drive the compelling reason to abandon."

That statement leads into the topic of discussion around open-core licensing and the associated risk-versus-reward scenario as open-source vendors manage projects to balance revenue and community.

The big challenge for vendors trying to monetize open-source products is how to encourage payment for something (anything?) while not bastardizing the user base that is hooked on the free software. I've outlined below my latest attempt at explaining the commercial open-source evolution--or at least, an explanation of how several companies have matured their models to ensure both community and financial success.

Support + free code Support + commercial license Support + commercial license + indemnity + warranty Support + commercial license + indemnity + warranty + exclusive features

… Read more

Why Oracle didn't buy MySQL

Reading the excellent analysis of Arjen Lentz, founder of MySQL training company Open Query, of what the open-source database leader MySQL is (and isn't) makes me wish that Oracle would have discovered MySQL as a complement, rather than as a competitor, several years ago.

MySQL's is the database software of choice for the Web, period. Oracle's is the database software of choice for the enterprise, period. It's unclear, as Lentz points out, that this means one is better than the other--and why we need to keep talking about competition between them:

MySQL doesn't have to … Read more

Simplicity-money combo spells MySQL success

There are lots of reasons to love MySQL, the leading open-source database that Sun bought in 2008: it's inexpensive, perfect for Web applications (among other things), and boasts high performance.

According to Brian Aker, a principal engineer at Sun Microsystems, however, the real secret to MySQL's success is ease of use:

The thing that MySQL brought to the table when it came out was the ease of use and the ease of installation. MySQL came out in an era where comparable products were really complex and required a lot of knowledge to be able to use and install. … Read more