SQLServerCentral / Editorials / SQLServerCentral.com / Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident? / Latest Posts

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Lynn Pettis — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 16:46:26 GMT

[quote][b]gnuoytr (8/21/2009)[/b][hr]Umm. This thread is about Oracle and MySql. Whether such a thread should be on SQLServer dedicated site is not my call.[/quote]Actually, this thread is a discussion based on an editorial regarding Oracles purchase of MySQL. It is totally relevant on this site. We may be MS SQL Server centered, but we realize that there are other systems out there and SQL Server does need to interact with these systems at times. So it makes sense to pay attention to things going on outside our normal world of SQL Server.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:54:38 GMT

Umm. This thread is about Oracle and MySql. Whether such a thread should be on SQLServer dedicated site is not my call.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RBarryYoung — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:01:48 GMT

Perhaps explaining yourself a little would help. I don't know what you mean by "z", and alluding to "*nix" is possibly even worse. I'm not even sure that you can call "*nix" a "thing" in operating systems. Which of the Six million versions and names of Eunichs do you mean? Some *are* good at this kind of thing, most suck worse than late-version windows (suffereing as they do from the same kind GUI IPL over-load as most modern OS's). If you have insights on which ones are good for this and why, I would like to hear it, but the same statements I made about Oracle's mthycal performance dominance apply geerally to Unix also. Why doesn't nix with Oracle, or Sybase to mke it even more pointed, dominate the TPC benchmarks then? They don't they're just in that horse race along with everyone else.[quote][b]gnuoytr ... You've quoted me out of context. ... The horsepower referred to is the MVCC semantics ...[/quote] We may have a miscommunication here, but its not because I am quoted you out of context. In my 35 years in the computer field, "horsepower" has only ever meant one thing: performance. I am not aware of any context in your statement that magically gives it a defintion it never had before. And as for Nix scalability, TPC measures that too: it's still not running away with it.[quote].. SQLServer (modulo snapshot) has neither. I'm not asserting that one *must have* these things, only that SQLServer currently (and so far as *nix support is concerned, always will) has nothing comparable. It is clear at this point that MVCC semantics and multi-tier architecture are a very good match. ...[/quote]Lots of interesting statements here tha I would like to hear more about, but no real explanations or substantiation. I am especially intrigue about how the Nix communities opinion that MS "will never have" something, could be regarded as anything other than prejudice (given the imposssibilty predicting the future with that kind of accuracy).[quote] M$ and IBM are playing catchup; revealed by their actions with their databases. To argue otherwise is, at best, disingenuous.[/quote]The only thing disingenuous here is acting like you should be able to foist a bunch MS/SQL Server hating hand-waving on a site dedicated to SQL Server and not get called on it.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 13:29:05 GMT

[quote][b]RBarryYoung (8/21/2009)[/b][hr][quote][b]gnuoytr (8/20/2009)[/b][hr] If you need Oracle horsepower, SQLServer won't do. [/quote] This rash and unsubstantiaed (and always disproven) claim has been made so many times over the decades by Oracle wonks and industray wags, that at this point it illustrates little more than their ignorance of the actual facts.If there was even a shred of truth to this ridiculous claim then SQL Server (and Windows) wouldn't even show up in the TPC benchmarks (nor would anything else if you swallowed the Oracle hype). But the fact of the matter is that NO vendor has EVER dominated the TPC benchmarks, nor even any single category. Everybody wins some and loses others and over the decades it has always been very dynamic. And Oracle has never been the performance-dominant player that it counts on weak-minded pundits believing.[/quote]You've quoted me out of context. Oh well. The horsepower referred to is the MVCC semantics and *nix scalability. SQLServer (modulo snapshot) has neither. I'm not asserting that one *must have* these things, only that SQLServer currently (and so far as *nix support is concerned, always will) has nothing comparable. It is clear at this point that MVCC semantics and multi-tier architecture are a very good match. Thus snapshot in SQLServer (and "Oracle compatibility" in DB2/LUW 9.7); but not quite the same. I'm not a particular fan of Oracle, by the way. I've spent most of the last decade with DB2 on *nix and z. But the fact is that Oracle's semantics simply make more sense for many types of applications. M$ and IBM are playing catchup; revealed by their actions with their databases. To argue otherwise is, at best, disingenuous.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RBarryYoung — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 13:01:44 GMT

[quote][b]gnuoytr (8/20/2009)[/b][hr] If you need Oracle horsepower, SQLServer won't do. [/quote] This rash and unsubstantiated (and always disproven) claim has been made so many times over the decades by Oracle wonks and industry wags, that at this point it illustrates little more than their ignorance of the actual facts.If there was even a shred of truth to this ridiculous claim then SQL Server (and Windows) wouldn't even show up in the TPC benchmarks (nor would anything else if you swallowed the Oracle hype). But the fact of the matter is that NO vendor has EVER dominated the TPC benchmarks, nor even any single category. Everybody wins some and loses others and over the decades it has always been very dynamic. And Oracle has never been the performance-dominant player that it counts on weak-minded pundits believing.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Gift Peddie — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 10:48:30 GMT

I think Godaddy and many ISP run the version that includes INNO DB because I have helped both US and UK users deploy MySQL version of the Asp.net 2.0 Club starter kit based on code uploaded by a user in Belgium. Now that was pre Sun MySQL. The UK user and I was offline email conversation the main reason to use MySQL was unlimited storage for a few Euros.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 10:02:40 GMT

[quote]A side note I think Postgres had a DARPA grant.And the US Government have approved the sale so MySQL users mostly ISP that charges a few dollars a month for unlimited use may have to pay more because Oracle is not known for nickle and dime business model.[url]http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090821/ap_on_hi_te/us_oracle_sun[/url][/quote]The DARPA $$ were for Stonebraker at Berkley in 1986. That relationship is long gone.Not sure of the timing any more (it was just before or just after the announcement of the buyout by Sun), but there are, at least, two forks of MySql; allegedly to return it to its roots, which is to say, a mere SQL parser in front of a file system. Those folks will not be Oracle customers, those folks don't do relational data. I'd wager that most moved out since Sun bought MySql. The first release under Sun is widely reported to have been less than useful.In any case, MySql is GPL, so for those who don't want to deal with Larry, alternatives already exist.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Gift Peddie — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 09:16:42 GMT

[quote]No version of windoze will scale as well as *nix. That *nix can do what z machines do is a (the) reason Larry wants Sun. If you need Oracle horsepower, SQLServer won't do. If you need real MVCC and don't have the $$$, then Postgres is where you'll go. At least in the short term. Whether Snapshot Isolation can be made to behave enough like real MVCC is also an open question. The real issue is the OS. SQLServer has that albatross round its neck.[/quote]I am not sure about transaction related limitation in SQL Server because Oracle implemented and always improve the .NET based transaction model where different implementations are propagated to the RDBMS to be either consumed as Unit of Work ANSI SQL transaction or ADO.NET transaction.A side note I think Postgres had a DARPA grant.And the US Government have approved the sale so MySQL users mostly ISP that charges a few dollars a month for unlimited use may have to pay more because Oracle is not known for nickle and dime business model.[url]http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090821/ap_on_hi_te/us_oracle_sun[/url]

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:48:04 GMT

[quote][b]davtt (8/20/2009)[/b][hr] so as long as MS keeps improving SQL Server they will not have anything to fear from Oracle. DaveT[/quote]No version of windoze will scale as well as *nix. That *nix can do what z machines do is a (the) reason Larry wants Sun. If you need Oracle horsepower, SQLServer won't do. If you need real MVCC and don't have the $$$, then Postgres is where you'll go. At least in the short term. Whether Snapshot Isolation can be made to behave enough like real MVCC is also an open question. The real issue is the OS. SQLServer has that albatross round its neck.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:38:46 GMT

[quote]Actually, they bought RDB to get the Clustering management and RDB's MVCC stuff. RDB was already on the chopping block and VMS already in sharp decline and no longer strategic for Oracle[/quote]Oracle was MVCC from version 3 (some sources say 4), in 1983 (1984). What might they have gotten from DEC in 1994?

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

davtt — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:54:10 GMT

Maybe MYSQL was getting too much functionality. Oracle's charging model - massive upfront cost and then only renting the licence - will never compete with the outright purchase model of SQL Server. Their model makes the TCO for SMB's prohibitive, so as long as MS keeps improving SQL Server they will not have anything to fear from Oracle. MYSQL could give Oracle a vehicle for a low-cost solution, or as a previous post suggested, a cut-down starter version of oracle.DaveT

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

davtt — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:50:29 GMT

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RBarryYoung — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 14:24:02 GMT

[quote][b]Michael Valentine Jones (8/18/2009)[/b][hr]Oracle bought Digital’s Rdb database that runs on the VMS platform to eliminate the competition. They couldn’t compete in the VMS world, because Digital included an Rdb run-time license with the OS, and Rdb had more advanced features than Oracle. First they sued Digital to stop them from including the run-time. Later, they bought Rdb and immediately raised support costs to be even higher than Oracle and stopped development to kill it off. Notice that they didn’t even mention Rdb in the list of database products in their announcement?Looks like a road-map for what will happen to MySQL.[/quote]Actually, they bought RDB to get the Clustering management and RDB's MVCC stuff. RDB was already on the chopping block and VMS already in sharp decline and no longer strategic for Oracle

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:22:03 GMT

[quote]Per the link below both INNODB and the new Sun developed Falcon are MVCC. If Oracle wants to beat IBM then Oracle needs to find out why IBM is always selling hardware divisions and aggressively adding software assets like separate Dimension modeling BI team in Cognos and Prediction modeling team in SSPS.[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiversion_concurrency_control[/url];-)[/quote]Yeah, I know. As I've already posted, brain cramp. IBM keeps buying various "service" companies because, like the banks and insurance companies, they think that return on real capital is higher when you don't have to actually have physical assets. That only goes so far. And they, mostly, depend on the z/390/370/360 platform. If Larry can best the platform, he wins both hardware and software battles. Oracle has already demonstrated that the MVCC database wins. All except DB2 (modulo 9.7, sort of) now do MVCC.I remain convinced that Larry's goal is to replace the IBM mainframe platform. Do that, and he wins the software battle too, by default. He thinks big, and this is a Big Strategy. It's not a tactic. Java is a tactic.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Michael Valentine Jones — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:53:01 GMT

Oracle bought Digital’s Rdb database that runs on the VMS platform to eliminate the competition. They couldn’t compete in the VMS world, because Digital included an Rdb run-time license with the OS, and Rdb had more advanced features than Oracle. First they sued Digital to stop them from including the run-time. Later, they bought Rdb and immediately raised support costs to be even higher than Oracle and stopped development to kill it off. Notice that they didn’t even mention Rdb in the list of database products in their announcement?Looks like a road-map for what will happen to MySQL.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Gift Peddie — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:09:46 GMT

[quote]Larry has a history. That history is an obsession with beating IBM to death. Oracle produced the first relational database, based on Dr. Codd's work, before IBM. The software acquisition binge has been to further that end. So is the Sun acquisition, but not to get java. java is already theirs, to the extent they want it[/quote]The late brilliant Jim Grey version is different and I have to take that. Sun's Java is JDK that is like C# with Ecma that is not related in most cases with vendor extensions because Oracle through BEA and other purchases may actually be dealing with many unrelated Java versions. I prepared for Sun SCJP a while back before taking the C# exams.[quote]MySql is not a useful steppingstone to Oracle. Postgres is (was and will be, too). Oracle is an MVCC database, while MySql and DB2 are traditional lockers. Unless InnoDB is written to MVCC semantics (how much work that requires, I don't know), MySql isn't an entry level Oracle. It's just another piece that's come along for the ride. [/quote]Per the link below both INNODB and the new Sun developed Falcon are MVCC. If Oracle wants to beat IBM then Oracle needs to find out why IBM is always selling hardware divisions and aggressively adding software assets like separate Dimension modeling BI team in Cognos and Prediction modeling team in SSPS.[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiversion_concurrency_control[/url];-)

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Jason Toews — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 07:30:37 GMT

Hi,Look what Oracle did with Virtual Iron...they wanted some code out of it, and then throw away the corpse. This very well could be the case with MySql. I'm not trying to be overly negative; however if they do that with V.I. then why not MySql? They shouldn't ignore the low hanging fruit they could get with V.I. and MySql; but I'm not sure they care about that.Jason.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 07:10:18 GMT

Yeah. Brain cramp.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Arun Jebakumar — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 07:04:48 GMT

I guess Oracle's strategy would be to stop releasing or supporting any future versions of MySQL, thereby preventing competition from the open-end market for their DBMS products anymore. Microsoft /IBM will still remain the core rivals for them.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

manorchurch — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 10:14:06 GMT

Oracle will do the same to MySQL as IBM did to Lotus, as Microsoft did to Foxpro, etc. That is, let it die, or worse -- remember that MS released a "new" version of Foxpro after the purchase, and the new version was FUBAR, for the most part, as a result of which Foxpro users were forced to abandon ship.I don't know how smart Ellison really is, but the last few years of performance by Oracle don't support a belief that he's a marketing genius of any kind. With MySQL gone as a supported freeware (or ebbing away rapidly), Ellison's best course of action, IMHO, would be to release a low-end Oracle DB with a verrrrry smooth MySQL transition wizard included, priced below SQL Server

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

tmeyer1969 — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 09:56:48 GMT

[quote] Oracle is an MVCC database, while MySql and DB2 are traditional lockers. Unless InnoDB is written to MVCC semantics (how much work that requires, I don't know), MySql isn't an entry level Oracle. It's just another piece that's come along for the ride.[/quote]Incorrect. The InnoDB & Falcon engines use MVCC.http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/innodb-multi-versioning.html

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RobertYoung — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 07:12:49 GMT

MySql is something of a Red Herring (passing through the Red Gate headed upstream to spawn) in the Oracle/Sun deal to my way of thinking, from the beginning.Larry has a history. That history is an obsession with beating IBM to death. Oracle produced the first relational database, based on Dr. Codd's work, before IBM. The software acquisition binge has been to further that end. So is the Sun acquisition, but not to get java. java is already theirs, to the extent they want it. The reason for the deal was the hardware stack, both as it is now, and what it can be. The latter is the key to understanding the deal. Historically, Oracle as run like dog poo on IBM mainframes. This is due to intimate knowledge of the internals of the (now) z/processor, and the contrary roots of Oracle as unix software.With the Sun stack (especially with SSD now a integral part), Larry now has an offering to replace the IBM mainframe habitat. Since Oracle can't run on the IBM mainframe, turn the Sun iron into an Oracle mainframe. They've tried it with the HP database machine, with some success, but that required collaboration. Now Larry has a full playground in which to work.MySql is not a useful steppingstone to Oracle. Postgres is (was and will be, too). Oracle is an MVCC database, while MySql and DB2 are traditional lockers. Unless InnoDB is written to MVCC semantics (how much work that requires, I don't know), MySql isn't an entry level Oracle. It's just another piece that's come along for the ride.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Gift Peddie — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 22:30:26 GMT

[quote]Heh... reminds me of the days when IBM bought Lotus. Lotus 1-2-3 was HUGE before IBM bought it. Does anyone actually use it anymore? Does anyone remember Lotus Smart Suite which was an integrated package of apps similar to Microsoft Office?[/quote]I used Lotus back in 2006 as a mail a server, client and calender for meetings you can look up any of your team member and schedule a meeting and they can accept or reject it.[quote] Jeff: Oracle bought SUN (for $7.4B ?) and got MySQL in the deal. It's a dark day for Open-source... [/quote]Oracle replaced IBM which would have given IBM three of the 8 major RDBMS on the market not that Oracle is any better. I think both the US justice department and EU are inverstigating that is also the reason IBM dropped out of the bidding.The person who created MySQL quit Sun before the sale and one of the reasons Sun paid one billion dollars for MySQL was ANSI SQL expert Peter Gulutzan in Canada so both US and EU could ask for MySQL to be either sold or put in a none profit trust for the Sun sale to be final.IBM owns Informix through pressure from Walmart and have not spent much money improving Informix, then there is DB2, DB2 AS400 and Iseries which I have used with Oracle 9i but some companies run as is. I don't think large software companies should buy other large software companies like Exxon and Mobil we all thought oil will always be less than $50While the regulators are at it INNO DB must also be part of the package because most commercial uses of MySQL require INNO DB.

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

RBarryYoung — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 20:54:25 GMT

Jeff: Oracle bought SUN (for $7.4B ?) and got MySQL in the deal. It's a dark day for Open-source...

RE: Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Jeff Moden — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 17:00:20 GMT

I didn't know Oracle bought MySQL. Thanks for the info.Heh... reminds me of the days when IBM bought Lotus. Lotus 1-2-3 was HUGE before IBM bought it. Does anyone actually use it anymore? Does anyone remember Lotus Smart Suite which was an integrated package of apps similar to Microsoft Office? It will be interesting to see what happens with MySQL now that "big red" has bought it.

Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?

Tony Davis — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 15:47:22 GMT

Comments posted to this topic are about the item [B]Did Oracle buy MySQL by accident?[/B]