Zegnaj InnoDB

Znamienne, prorocze słowa mówiące o przewadze licencji BSD nad GPL:
"Friends,
As many of you have heard, Oracle recently purchased Innobase, the company that develops the InnoDB storage engine. InnoDB is best known as a MySQL component that implements transactions, row-level locking, and other important database capabilities. Much has been written on this acquisition over the past couple of weeks, but I want to add my two cents to the discussion.
All relational database management systems (RDBMSs) have essentially two components: a SQL layer and a storage engine. The SQL layer is a language that is used to query the database and to manipulate data. The storage engine translates SQL commands in order to store and to manipulate data in underlying, raw disk files. While MySQL supports several storage engines, InnoDB is acknowledged to be the most popular for transactional applications. In other words, InnoDB is used for most MySQL applications that matter. InnoDB is now owned by Oracle.
Naturally, MySQL has put the best face possible on the situation, going so far as to issue a press release titled “MySQL AB Welcomes Oracle's Endorsement of Open Source Database Technology.” And it is certainly true that Oracle’s move demonstrates its recognition that the open source revolution is real. But MySQL’s “welcome” is like chickens welcoming a fox to the coop. In a nutshell, Oracle now controls MySQL’s access to the technology that many of its customers would argue is its most important and critical.
InnoDB is licensed under the GNU Public License (the “GPL”), and MySQL therefore can continue to use InnoDB and to distribute it. However, this is true only for the GPL version of MySQL. For paying customers, MySQL uses a traditional commercial license, and Oracle now controls the commercial licensing of InnoDB. With the Innobase purchase, Larry Ellison has shrewdly capitalized on a competitor’s strategic blunder, i.e., MySQL’s unexplainable failure to buy Innobase themselves and thereby to ensure access to critical technology on favorable terms. For its part, Oracle has stated that it “fully expects to negotiate an extension” to MySQL’s InnoDB license. Time will tell how the “negotiations” go between Oracle and MySQL.
Under just about any scenario I can imagine, Oracle’s purchase of Innobase is not a good thing for MySQL. In fact, it falls somewhere on the continuum between threatening and disastrous. In a recent interview with Martin LaMonica of CNET News, a former Oracle database marketing executive called the acquisition “a flaw in MySQL’s business model.” That is an excellent – and understated – way to put it.
Several people have asked me recently if the same thing could happen to EnterpriseDB. The answer is a definitive no. In the first place, EnterpriseDB is based on PostgreSQL, and PostgreSQL is not owned by a company that can be bought; it is maintained by the worldwide PostgreSQL community. Furthermore, PostgreSQL is distributed under the Berkeley Software Distribution (“BSD”) license, not the GPL. BSD-licensed software contains virtually no restrictions governing its use and distribution, and it therefore cannot ever be held hostage by Oracle or anyone else.
I hope this note throws some light on the subject of InnoDB. Comments are welcome, and can be sent to me at the address below.
Sincerely,
Andy
Andy Astor, CEOEnterpriseDB Corporationandy@enterprisedb.comwww.enterprisedb.com"
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