Is MySQL Quietly Lowering The Odds?

The database, which MySQL AB offers under both the general public license and commercially, is gaining footing in major accounts, solution providers said.

Much of the time MySQL acts in concert with other databases from Oracle, IBM or Microsoft, but that could change as corporations get comfortable with its capabilities, they said.

"Everybody is using it. It's huge, huge, huge," said Anthony Awtrey, vice president of I.D.E.A.L. Technology, an Orlando, Fla.-based solution provider. "All the new J2EE stuff uses abstraction layers, so the apps don't care what the back-end database is," he said. "You can change from doing development in-house with MySQL to production work using Oracle."

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The simplicity and low cost of the open-source database could make it a contender in the business market.

While companies aren't ripping out Oracle or IBM DB2 systems for MySQL, Awtrey and others suspect that will change. "For maybe 99 percent of the time, you won't need Oracle. If you're not taking advantage of all those features, why pay 20 grand?"

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MySQL is many things, but expensive it is not. The open-source version is free, but developers must make their code and enhancements available to the world. A commercial license carries a flat fee of $440 per server.

Marten Mickos, CEO of MySQL, is the first to downplay any head-to-head competition with Oracle, IBM DB2 or Microsoft SQL Server. "We're a complement to Oracle. ... We go for the part of the market that has been commoditized," he said.

Of course, that part of the market is getting bigger, observers say. IDC analyst Carl Olofson said MySQL is not yet on the market-share map, but he expects it to find traction. "It's currently a simple, low-priced database option serving customers not otherwise having their needs addressed by the largest database vendors, so it is not impacting [those vendors] at the present time. But we do think there's potential in the future, especially as the database market matures, and there's a need for basic RDBMS services at an affordable price," Olafson said.

MySQL primarily has been entrenched in software bundling deals. Novell is bundling the database with NetWare 6.5. Sun Microsystems does likewise on some of its servers and with Solaris, as does Apple with OSX.

VARs typically opt for the commercial license, which is still very inexpensive and lets them customize applications without disclosing all their intellectual property. "[Solution providers are] under cost pressure from customers who want the same functionality available elsewhere but with less expense. Using MySQL brings down overall cost while allowing the VAR itself to maintain margins," Olafson said.

That's one reason Novell found the product attractive. "VARs can use it to quickly develop custom business software. ... MySQL scales well and is extremely versatile," said Kris Magnusson, chairman of Novell's Open Source Review Board. In addition, MySQL is the standard database in the whole "AMP paradigm ... and we wanted to bring that paradigm to NetWare," he said. AMP refers to the Apache Web server/MySQL database/PHP server-side scripting language combination that has become the open-source standard.

Paul Quintal, a Kingston, Ontario-based consultant for Sterling Commerce, concurs. Sterling embeds MySQL in its business-to-business integration broker solution where it often works with other back-end databases. But it's also often used as the stand-alone database for companies that don't want the others.

MySQL, Quintal said, "is up to snuff. In earlier versions, there were some file-size limitations, but they've worked that out." He lauded the company for working closely with partners to address issues.

The database giants seem unfazed by what some see as a MySQL groundswell. Microsoft said it encounters MySQL in accounts only rarely. Oracle maintains that its products and MySQL can coexist fruitfully.