MySQL: Now and Then… and Dual License Community Impact

December 24, 2008 1 Comment

Stephen O’Grady recently posted a Q&A pertaining to the past, present, and future of MySQL. There’s been quite a bit going on at MySQL and Sun lately, but I’ll focus on one issue in this post – the impact of the current MySQL dual-licensing strategy. Stephen covers much more in his post, and I will be posting some additional MySQL-related thoughts soon. From the linked post:

A: Well, let’s remember what the dual license mechanism is and how it works. Here’s a basic description I wrote a while back:

A single entity such as MySQL is responsible for the overwhelming majority of all development on a given codebase. Anything they don’t produce themselves, they license. Very often this is practiced in conjunction with the dual-license model; because MySQL is responsible for virtually all of the development of the core code, they own or have licensed appropriately all of the involved IP. As such, they’re free to issue commercial licenses to those who would cannot or choose not to comply with the terms of the open source license – the GPL, in this case.

Generally, this model has served MySQL fairly well. By controlling the intellectual property, they retain the rights to relicense the code, thus protecting a revenue stream. They also were afforded a slightly greater protection from forks versus more collaboratively developed projects like Linux, in that they – theoretically – employed the majority of the people qualified and paid to work on the codebase at the lowest levels. But let’s come back to that.

What’s the catch to the model? In part, it’s that the burden of development is born almost entirely by the MySQL staff, but the more relevant concern here is the inability to consume external contributions – even if they’re excellent – without licensing them.

Stated more simply: as long as MySQL remains committed to the dual licensing model, it will be unable to accept the same patch set that open source only versions of the code can, because they do not share the same licensing concerns. Which is why we’ve seen these spring up, and possibly why the MySQL-derived Drizzle project has taken a different approach from its parent.

For a long time, most viewed the control that MySQL AB had as a strength, at least from a business perspective. With the high quality work that is now going on outside MySQL/Sun, however, that is increasingly not the case. Percona, Proven Scaling, OurDelta, Google and others are doing some really cool things these days. The current thinking for many is that the best bang for the buck when it comes to MySQL is now outside MySQL. That’s never happened before and I think it shifts the entire MySQL landscape. The question for Sun now becomes: when will the ability to consume external contributions outweigh the perceived benefits of the dual-license strategy that inhibits the consumption of those contributions? While Drizzle may change some of this, I think it’s a question Sun is going to have to answer (for its own good) sooner… rather than later.

–jeremy

Filed under Google, MySQL, Open Source, Sun

Steal This Comic

October 23, 2008 1 Comment

From xkcd.com:

DRM

On the topic of DRM-free music, congratulations to Jono on his release of Severed Fifth, an album released completely under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike license.

–jeremy

Filed under DRM, Open Source

MySQL cofounder David Axmark leaving Sun

October 8, 2008 Leave a comment

From InfoWorld:

David Axmark, a cofounder and former lead engineer for MySQL, has resigned from Sun Microsystems a few weeks after another cofounder said he may also leave the company.

“I have thought about my role at Sun and decided that I am better off in smaller organisations,” Axmark wrote in his resignation letter, according to a blog post Tuesday from Kaj Arno, head of MySQL community relations.

“I HATE all the rules that I need to follow, and I also HATE breaking them. It would be far better for me to ‘retire’ from employment and work with MySQL and Sun on a less formal basis,” Axmark wrote. His last day with Sun will be Nov. 10, Arno said via instant message from Germany.

Axmark filled several important roles at MySQL over the years, including head of engineering, head of internal IT and head of community relations.

How important was David to MySQL? As Kaj explains:

Let me recap what David has done for MySQL. David is the reason MySQL is FOSS. Without David, MySQL wouldn’t be GPL (Monty originally planned a closed-source product). David is also the reason people associate MySQL primarily with Sweden and less so with Finland, since MySQL AB was founded in Uppsala to be close to David (and our third co-founder Allan Larsson).

With David gone and rumours that Monty is leaving, it will be interesting to watch how the MySQL acquisition progresses within Sun. This is a good reminder that much of what you purchase when you buy an Open Source company is the people. Making sure the key people fit well within your organization is of utmost importance if you want to derive the maximum value out of your investment..

David next to Larry's yact
(A picture of David Axmark in his boat, next to the yacht of Larry Ellison)

–jeremy

Filed under MySQL, Open Source

OSCON Updates

July 23, 2008 Leave a comment

I had planned to post regular OSCON updates, but the network has been up and down, so here are some random musings. As with some conference posts of mine, this is a bit random stream of consciousness and is not edited/proofread.

Tuesday Evening Extravaganza
* Mark put it well when he said that Open Source is really looking for a “complimentary economic model”. The web took a while to sort out that advertising was the answer, and I’m confident we’ll find the right answer (or more likely, answers) as well. This means me need economic innovation nearly as much as we need innovation in other areas. He also brought up the free software syncronicity issue again. I’ve been meaning to post on this topic and will do so soon.
* r0ml once again exceeded expectations and is one of my favorite speakers – he even juggled this time. He not only compared rhetoric methodologies to software development methodologies, he did it with panache.

Wednesday
Tim O’Reilly
* 3 biggest challenges and opportunities – Cloud Computing, open programmable web and open mobile
* It’s clear that mobile Linux is going to be a hot topic for a while. Intel will be releasing Moblin soon. Which mobile Linux offering will prevail remains to be seen.
Aker and Monty
* Monty “thank god we didn’t go public” – would very likely have led to more closed source components!
* “6 months later, Sun is still trying to figure out what they bought”
* Tim asked whether Jonathon committing to Open Source so heavily has caused internal conflicts within Sun
Brian – certainly
* Tim asked how the support within Sun was for “internal projects” such as Maria and Drizzle. Answer: surprisingly well.
* Monty: “for the last few years, MySQL has been management driven and not developer driven. Sun is allowing us to go back to our roots”
* Monty: “we had become – submit a patch and it may make it in sometime in about 3 years. That was ridiculous”
* Tim: “Adobe is one of the last great proprietary software companies”

Identi.ca
* Identi.ca is really taking off. It’s even streaming in the OSCON lobby. Had a chance to chat with Evan about it for a little bit and he’s once again doing a fantastic job. Kudos.

Changing Education… Open Content, Open Hardware, Open Curricula
* This was an extremely interesting panel and a topic that really interests me. It will be something I plan to research more in the coming months,
See: Curriki, Literacy Bridge and The Cape Town Open Education Declaration

OSSL at Microsoft
* A good look at what happens behind the scenes at the Microsoft Open Source Software Lab – surprising how many people didn’t know this existed.

Off to a break now – more updates should hopefully come soon.

–jeremy

Filed under Open Source, OSCON

Opening up Symbian – Good or Bad for Linux?

June 30, 2008 Leave a comment

That’s the question raised by this recent Nokia press release:

Espoo, Finland – Nokia today announced it has launched a cash offer to acquire all of the shares of Symbian Limited that Nokia does not already own, at a price of EUR 3.647 per share. The net cash outlay from Nokia to purchase the approximately 52% of Symbian Limited shares it does not already own will be approximately EUR 264 million.

The acquisition is a fundamental step in the establishment of the Symbian Foundation, announced today by Nokia, together with AT&T, LG Electronics, Motorola, NTT DOCOMO, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Vodafone. More information about the planned foundation can be found at http://www.symbianfoundation.org.

From the Symbian Foundation site:

The Symbian Foundation platform will be available to members under a royalty-free license from this non-profit foundation. The Symbian Foundation will provide, manage and unify the platform for its members. Also, it will commit to moving the platform to open source during the next two years, with the intent to use the Eclipse Public License. This will make the platform code available to all for free, bringing additional innovation to the platform and engaging even a broader community in future developments.

Keep in mind that while not a huge success in the US, Symbian does still account for about 60% of all smartphones, with the next OS a distant second at about 15%. So, what does this mean for mobile Linux? It’s still unclear to me the direction Nokia will take, so it’s hard to tell. They are all over the place at the moment. The have the GTK based maemo project, have recently acquired TrollTech for QT and now have an Open Source Symbian. Long term, they can’t possibly want to support all three of these. Looking at Symbian specifically, I’m not sure it can compete directly with the likes of the iPhone and Android. The UI looks old and clunky and it doesn’t have a lot of the functionality and polish of the newer mobile offerings. That said, developers know it, it has a huge application catalog and an entrenched base. Whether that will be enough for Symbian to make it out of the Open Source process alive remains to be seen though, and in my opinion it isn’t a certainty. What Nokia does get is 1) options and 2) the perception that they are not sitting on their hands while Android and the iPhone pass it by. Even if Symbian can’t compete feature for feature with something like Android, this announce will serve to remove one of its key advantages. That alone is likely worth the investment to Nokia.

Further Reading:
Linux Foundation
Red Monk
SAI

–jeremy

Filed under Google, iPhone, Linux, maemo, Nokia, Open Source

As the ODF-OOXML world turns

June 2, 2008 1 Comment

I’m a bit behind on this, but it’s a topic I’ve been covering for a while now so I wanted to follow up. First, from the the 451 group:

Oh the drama. Most of us knew ISO approval of Microsoft’s OOXML format was not the end, but more of a beginning in the ongoing fight for the future’s file format. Any doubts of that were put to rest this week with a flurry of activity around OOXML’s approval, ODF adoption, Microsoft’s support and the stance of U.S. states and other governments.

Much of it started with Microsoft’s announcement that it would expand its Office 2007 format support, including ODF. The move, which means Office 2007 users will be able to set ODF as their default file format, is further evidence of changes at Microsoft and the need to support multiple formats and interoperability. However, it still drew criticism from a number of ODF proponents/OOXML opponents, whose concerns include the typical Microsoft skepticism, but also center on the software giant’s OOXML approval campaign and previous statements downplaying the market for ODF.

We also saw further objection to ISO’s OOXML approval, primarily an appeal from South Africa. As format expert and saga watcher Andy Updegrove points out here, the appeal centers on the approval process and also on the ‘business basis’ for OOXML’s fast-track approval. Despite that relatively rapid approval, Updegrove points out that, ironically, Microsoft Office users will not have the opportunity to use the file format until Microsoft’s coming Office 14, expected in 2010 at the earliest.

Microsoft credited customer and government demand for its new found ODF love, but we also saw indications it may also involve difficulties in backward compatibility with OOXML. As ZDNet’s Tom Espiner points out, ‘The company now says OOXML support would require substantially more work.’ This comes as no surprise to many open source software users who have come to the same conclusion over the years. In fact, the inability of Microsoft to support different versions of its own Office and format software has fueled many OpenOffice.org downloads over the last few years, including my own.

Still, customer demand as the reasoning behind Microsoft’s ODF support was reinforced by yet another development in the ongoing format saga: findings from the State of New York. While the state’s officials indicated it would be a mistake to name ODF or OOXML as the standard of choice, New York’s format wonks did indicate that openness is the path to the future. That does not necessarily mean ODF, but it certainly makes it more likely given the controversy, uncertainty and drama still surrounding OOXML.

Since that post, Brazil and India have also decided to appeal. The deadline to appeal has now passed. The India post by Andy contains some good “what comes next” information for those that are interested. The appeals all have some items in common, but each also has points made only by that country. It’s clear that Microsoft did some very shady things during this process. It’s a sad indication that the company is still not willing to compete on the merits of its products on the one hand. On the other hand, they recently announced that Office 2007 would support ODF but not OOXML:

Microsoft today announced that it would update Office 2007 to natively support ODF 1.1, but not to implement its own OOXML format. Moreover, it would also join both the OASIS working group as well as the ISO/IEC JTC1 working group that has control of the ISO/IEC version of ODF. Implementation of DIS 29500, the ISO/IEC JTC 1 version of OOXML that has still not been publicly released will await the release of Office 14, the ship date of which remains unannounced.

So they fast track an office format while a competing one already exists, push it through the approval process using tactics that are questionable at best and then decide to only implement the competing standard in the current shipping product. You couldn’t make this stuff up. It’s clear that the internal battle within Microsoft is still raging. Part of the company really want to change, but part of it really doesn’t. It remains to be seen which side will prevail, but it’s not difficult to see why many in the Open Source community remain wary.

–jeremy

Filed under Microsoft, ODF, Open Formats, Open Source, Open Standards

Ozzie: Open Source a more disruptive competitor than Google

June 2, 2008 Leave a comment

I’ve often said that for Microsoft to truly change, Ballmer will have to go. On the other hand, Microsoft should be clinging to some other top level execs with a kung fu grip. Ray Ozzie is one of those execs. The vision and leadership he’s shown over his career is exceptional. He gets it. With that in mind it wasn’t a real surprise to hear him say this:

Google has nothing on open source when it comes to potential competitive threats to Microsoft, according to Redmond’s Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie.

Ozzie fielded a number of questions on his role at Microsoft and the company’s evolving technology strategies during an appearance at the Sanford Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference on May 28. (I listened to his session via the Webcast.)

Ozzie reiterated that it often takes a strong competitor to truly galvanize Microsoft.

“Microsoft has built up a culture of crisis,” Ozzie told conference attendees.

Competitors like his former employer, Lotus, and now, Google, have spurred the company to make changes to its business to stay ahead, Ozzie said. But while Google is a “tremendously strong competitor,” Ozzie acknowledged, “open source was much more potentially disruptive” to Microsoft’s business. (He noted that, unlike Google, many open-source programmers aren’t beholden to shareholders.)

Ozzie said that competing with open source “made Microsoft a much stronger company.” He cited changes Microsoft has made to its business model — such as focusing on making its closed-source software interoperable with open-source products — as directly attributable to that competition.

You see, Google is a company… and Microsoft knows how to compete with companies (although they are proving completely unable to compete on the web, despite both huge efforts and large amounts of cash). Open Source is a movement, and that concept is proving troublesome for many at Redmond. Keep in mind that in my opinion Google would never have been possible without Open Source. Open Source enables companies like Google to exist, and that’s really powerful. It’s literally changing the rules of the game.

So why is Ballmer still in charge? I’m not sure. I thought the failed Yahoo! blunder may be enough to do him in, but it looks like that isn’t going to be the case. In a way, I guess many of us in the OSS world should be happy. The longer he’s around the more time we have to mature and hone our products and skills. It’s hard for a behemoth like MSFT to turn around, but once they do – look out.

–jeremy

Filed under Microsoft, Open Source

Gratis OSCON 2008 Conference Pass

May 14, 2008 Leave a comment

Are you interested in attending OSCON this year? It’s my pleasure to inform you that LQ is able to give away one full conference pass (a $1445.00 value) absolutely free of charge. See this LQ thread for more information on how to be eligible. We’ll pick a winner on May 31st, so you don’t have much time. OSCON is always a great conference and I’m looking forward to attending once again. If you don’t win but still plan on going, use “os08linq” when you register to save 15% off the best rate at the time. Good luck and see you in Portland.

–jeremy

NOTE: I continue to be disappointed in the QA of WordPress. How a bug that causes all RSS feeds to break for any site who has WP in a top level folder (not exactly an edge case) could sneak into a 2.5.1 release is beyond me. I apologize if you weren’t getting updates here or at LQ Radio. If you use WP you might want to check your feed. If the issue is impacting you, you can get the patch here.

Filed under Open Source, OSCON Tagged with

The OpenSolaris Community v2: Prepare Yourself

May 2, 2008 Leave a comment

Sun is a company I plan on covering a bit more as they continue to delve deeper into Open Source. I’ve commented on the current messaging issue Sun has around its Open Source participation previously. I haven’t been following Open Solaris as much as I’d have liked, but this post by Ben gets you up to speed on the current situation:

Ian Murdock’s distro formly known as “Indiana” will be birthed as “OpenSolaris” in less than a week, being debuted at CommunityOne on May 5th. This will be a major landmark even in the history of Solaris, right up there with the BSD-to-SysV transition and release of the code. There is no talk at Sun regarding Solaris 11, when pushed the only quote I get is “over my dead body”, apparently coming from high within the organization. While no one will clarify on the situation, the current vibe seems to be that Solaris 10 will be with us for a very long time, in update purgatory, while the future revolves around the OpenSolaris distribution. Ultimately the decision will probly be made by Sun’s attempts to get ISV’s behind OpenSolaris… but this is only my hunch, I’ll continue pushing Sun to clarify the roadmap, perhaps at CommunityOne will learn more.

… Its time for a community reset. With the release of the OpenSolaris distro the last bits of the community started by Andy Tucker and Claire Giordano will be, in my view, gone away. The experiment in community official ended and replaced. Rather than the community being joint owners of Solaris it will be affirmed that Sun is firmly staying at the helm and we’re free to board the train and pitch in if we choose. Those of us fighting against the tide are now presented with a choice… give up and try to re-invent our roles in the “new reality” or continue to fight the inevitable like so many of those in our community who still whine if an OS doesn’t run on an i386 with 512K of RAM looking like a senile prick.

It seems clear to me that Sun is not going to give up full control of Open Solaris. To be fair, Red Hat didn’t go as open with Fedora as was initially assumed either. In the end, much of it comes down to how Sun perceives Solaris driving its bottom line. It used to be that Solaris sold expensive SPARC hardware. That’s not as much the case any more. Where that leaves Solaris is unclear to me. Sun is still driving innovation – you need look no further than DTrace and ZFS to see evidence of that. Does that sell enough Sun hardware to justify the engineering costs associated with Solaris? I don’t know, but at some point Sun is going to have to look very at that question and they may not like the answer they get.

While catching up on Open Solaris, I also came across two good posts by Ted. In What Sun was trying to do with Open Solaris he looks into what kinds of participation Sun was originally looking for when they launched Open Solaris. His Organic vs. Non-organic Open Source follow up delves into a Brian Aker comment about projects moving between “organic” and “non-organic” (or in the case of Solaris->Open Solaris, moving between proprietary and either organic/non-organic Open Source). These kind of issues are going to be getting more and more scrutiny if I had to guess, as more and more commercial Open Source companies are going to have to figure out their business models and hit revenue goals. The commercial Open Source space is starting to mature, and I don’t think some people are going to like it.

–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Open Source, Sun

OLPC's New President & Negroponte: Its a Laptop Project Now

May 2, 2008 Leave a comment

It’s a bit sad to see the new direction the OLPC project may be taking. The Open Source community has put a lot into the project, not only from a technical standpoint but from a marketing one as well. I think many of us thought that Open Source was baked in and part of what was needed for the project to obtain its goals. It’s becoming clear that’s not the case and the project has already seen some high profile departures. For my part, LQ was one of the first “give one get one” customers and we promoted it fairly heavily at conferences and online. I really agreed with the original goals of the project. It seems things are starting to unravel a bit and it will be a shame if things don’t work out as originally planned.

–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Open Source

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