Slashdot Mirror
Oracle Acquires Innobase
A short time ago, Oracle announced its acquisition of Innobase, the Finnish company that makes the GPL'd InnoDB table storage engine. Among MySQL users, the separately-written InnoDB is almost as popular as the native MyISAM engine, and is considered to be more advanced for most purposes. Slashdot has, except for search, run entirely on InnoDB for the past year or two so we're as concerned about this as anybody. Brian Aker, former Slashdot coder and current Director of Architecture for MySQL AB, comments: "InnoDB is GPL, so once again the beauty of the open source market is at play: there is no lock in, and we can continue to develop Innodb as we see fit. The code is out there and we plan on continuing to support it. The largest database vendor in the world just confirmed that the market for open source databases exists."
The code is GPLed so what exactly is your concern ?
for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
Slashcode development is a tad bit different than database development.
I guess the consern would be that InnoDB isn't going to get as much support as it should be. But as the original story puts it, the MySQL team intends to continue support with InnoDB. As a heavy MySQL user I can see where the worry would come from but I'm not worried because I believe the MySQL team will hold true to their word.
I think this is excellent, and will only lead to an expansion of InnoDB functionality. The speed over MyIsam coupled with the direct disk access is great, and was a huge factor in choosing MySQL over some others in recent software development. I have not ever heard of Oracle purchasing technology to squash it, either.
Click here or here.
Why? InnoDB is GPL'ed.
But the minds behind it are not. If Oracle snaps up key talent behind innodb, it could mean a big slowdown for that aspect of MySQL.
Oracle isn't stupid. They didn't want the InnoDB buildings. They didn't even really want InnoDB itself - that's in the wild. They probably DID want the brains behind it, or the tech they were about to release.
Time for /. to convert to PostgreSQL!
Why? InnoDB is GPL'ed.
Just off the top of my head I'd say that they are worried about the possibility that future development and bug fixes will go to a closed source branch, that development might grind to a halt as the original developers are reassigned, that the nature of development might change and move in directions not beneficial to Slashdot as a user, or that something else will result from this change.
It is wise to be concerned when you technology provider undergoes a drastic change. The GPL helps, since the project will likely continue as a active, GPL project in any case, but losing most of the experienced developers could really slow things down. That is not to say that it will. In fact, development might speed up and get better. It is just understandable to be concerned.
Uh, no offense guys- but that's something I wouldn't put on my resume. Slashcode has seen near zero feature additions, is widely known to have some of the worst perl code ever written, is grossly underdocumented...
and current Director of Architecture for MySQL AB, comments: "InnoDB is GPL, so once again the beauty of the open source market is at play: there is no lock in, and we can continue to develop Innodb as we see fit.
You can, sure. But who has been putting the majority of development time into InnoDB? MySQL, or Innobase? If it's Innobase, and Oracle says to Innobase, "walk away from this", you're screwed. "Open Source" doesn't mean "if the primary supporter walks away, the project keeps going."
The largest database vendor in the world just confirmed that the market for open source databases exists."
Um...no, they didn't. They thought buying Innobase made business sense, so they did it. Inferring "OMG Oracle thinks we're cool!" is, well, quite the stretch. For all we know, Oracle could be handing out pinkslips as we speak, or folding Innobase talent into Oracle...who knows.
Please help metamoderate.
"InnoDB's contractual relationship with MySQL comes up for renewal next year. Oracle fully expects to negotiate an extension of that relationship."
Hmmm... I think InnoDB will cost MySQL a little bit more next year.
The biggest database vendor just confirmed that you can be too clever for your own good when you design your licensing schemes.
There is one key difference. Oracle isn't in direct competition with Linux.
There is a chance that Oracle has some plan for InnoDB that will help Oracle's bottom line without actually harming MySQL. But if I had to guess, I would guess that the strategy in some way involves Oracle helping Oracle by harming MySQL. Or rather by slowing MySQL's progress. Because I don't believe that this isn't something that MySQL can't deal with.
While that is a great flattery, I can't help but think that brave words such as "Great to see Oracle legitimise the open source database space as they did with Linux" feels just a little bit like putting up a brave face. Because it would almost certainly have been better for MySQL if Oracle hadn't bought InnoDB.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
Could this be one of the reasons behind recent comments regarding MySQL wanting to be the Ikea of databases and not wanting to compete with Oracle?
Actually, this could be a well thought move IF InnoDB is so important to MySQL. Indirectly, it may disrupt its development.
Not that Oracle would really need it; or would(?)... How much does MySQL threat Oracle's market share in the LONG run, especially with its new version coming around?
This could be a way of Oracle gaining "street cred" with the OSS crowd. Oracle sees that OSS is gaining in popularity...PostgreSQL and MySQL end up being the backends for most OSS apps that require a database...which leaves Oracle out of the picture...
Oracle may be thinking of releasing an OSS version of their database server. What better way to start off than by buying the developer of one of the most popular database formats for OSS.
Their "new" business model would probably be similar to MySQL and they may even sell a new version of InnoDB to MySQL every now and then (an older version of course)...
In their eyes, this would be a good way of Oracle being written into OSS apps...Write a new version of Oracle database that is identical to the commercial version in every way except that you are using InnoDB as the backend...
This happened a while back when Ford bought Jaguar. At the time Dodge was working on the Viper and word was that it would be a "Mustang killer". Ford was scared to death that one of their most popular automobiles would be outsold by the Viper. There was very little known about the vehicle at the time, but what was known was that it was going to be a big engine...bigger than a V-8... Ford knew that the only company with a V-12 was Jaguar and figured that this was the most likely powerplant to be used in the vehicle (or some variation). They decided that if Dodge was going to make a killing with the Viper then they might as well get in on the action by licensing the engine design for every Viper produced...So, Ford bought Jaguar...of course, Dodge went with their own V-10 design...some say this was always then intent, others say the original design called for a V-12...
While they cant remove existing work, they can kill any future development. AND they can absorb the developers into the corporation and cut off any short term outside projects with a 'non compete' agreement.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Could this be more subtle then we all realise? Maybe the big O is just turning the screws on SAP. Think about it. SAP is "in bed" with MySQL AB via the transfer of MaxDB. Now if SAP were thinking of pushing MySQL as the db of choice to seperate themselves from Oracle, what better way to scupper them - buy the transaction engine technology (of choice) in MySQL.
Remember SAP is the only competition left for Oracle in the Apps space.
But then again, maybe I'm just paranoid!
Of course, that was slashcode 1.x ...
Right, so like I said, the only people who say Slash has some of the worst perl code ever written don't know perl, or Slash. As you've not looked at the code in about five years, it's quite true that you don't know Slash.
Why would somebody use MySQL with PostgreSQL underneath when they could just use PostreSQL in the first place?