MySQL AB today announced that McGraw-Hill Education, a leading global provider of educational materials, information and solutions, has chosen the MySQL database to power the network version of its widely-used "Breakthrough to Literacy" learning program.

MySQL's high performance, flexibility and small footprint make it an ideal choice for educational software vendors and other ISVs looking to affordably integrate a world-class database into their product offerings. Today, leading educational software vendors using MySQL include American Education Corporation, eduphoria!, eSchool Solutions, LeapFrog Enterprises, Pitsco and Siboney Corporation.

MySQL users often dream about a more powerful yet stable database server. They want a server with more features, like expanding macros, customized logging, access to shell commands, access to live tables from other DBMS. Every feature, given enough development time, can be eventually implemented, but users want them now, with the current GA server.

It can be done. Using a proxy server, some of those dreams come true. Today.

In two separate pieces of news today, EnterpriseDB was selected by FTD to replace Oracle, and Liferay was selected to replace Novell's exteNd portal offering. Both demonstrate the continue value that open source provides (yes, even to EnterpriseDB).

Interestingly, both EnterpriseDB and Liferay have Apache-style licenses at their core. The difference, of course, is what they sell on top: for EnterpriseDB, they add some closed software; for Liferay, they add support. What's exactly the same is dramatic cost savings and improved performance by moving away from 100% proprietary offerings:

On EnterpriseDB's win with FTD, and over Oracle (improving system performance by 400% while dropping the cost by 83%)...

EnterpriseDB, the …

Wow. This post from Glyn Moody just resurfaced memories that should never have been forgotten. Glyn reminds us that IBM made a patent pledge that protects OSI-approved open source projects:

IBM today pledged open access to key innovations covered by 500 IBM software patents to individuals and groups working on open source software. IBM believes this is the largest pledge ever of patents of any kind and represents a major shift in the way IBM manages and deploys its intellectual property (IP) portfolio....

The pledge is applicable to any individual, community, or company working on or using software that meets the Open Source Initiative (OSI) definition of open source software now or in the future.

As Glyn suggests, IBM has …

I was just reading Tim's comments on Foo Camp.

Unless you saw me on the last day of Foo Camp, you wouldn't have seen
me with a laptop at all. I made a point of leaving it in the trunk of
the rental car.

Why?

When I have it, I use it. This means that I don't pay 100% attention
to the room. Sometimes this is ok, I multitask well, but I wanted to
see how this changed my interactions with people. One thing that
didn't happen was that I didn't race off and write code at the drop
of a hat. Normally at these events I find some interesting idea and
just write it up quickly (yeah... this is how I do note taking for
projects... I write prototypes).

Instead? I used my cell phone. I wrote my notes in it. Not great, but
it worked. The …

We had the Top 5 wishes for MySQL started by Jay recently. So in true chain letter fashion I’m starting a new one this week. “The top 5 Best Practices for MySQL”. This like it’s predecessor is generally vague, so it can include points on development, design, administration etc.

My list:

1. Write your application to support Transactions (and therefore use a Transactional Storage Engine).

2. Always use SQL_MODE. e.g. at least TRADITIONAL and ANSI to ensure better data integrity and errors as errors.

3. Use the most optimal data types (particularly for number (e.g. TINY/SMALL/BIG INT and nullability) and especially in relation to columns in indexes.

4. When using InnoDB use the shortest primary key possible (e.g. INT UNSIGNED. BIGINT unless you have more then 4 billion rows in your potential data set is laziness).

5. …

I'd like to bring two announcements to your attention, that I posted to our internals Mailing list a few days ago - both refer to ongoing activities at MySQL AB to further open up our development processes and to establish an Architecture of Participation around the MySQL Server and related applications.

I am excited to be able to talk about this topic at the upcoming FrOSCon, which will take place on August, 25th-26th in Sankt Augustin, Germany. The title of my presentation will be "Opening the doors of the Cathedral - Enabling an architecture of participation around the MySQL Server". Here's the abstract:

Even though the MySQL Server is released and distributed as Open Source Software (OSS) under the GPL, the development itself so far has mostly …

During our last major survey, we had a number of you indicate that you’re running MySQL databases in the 500GB to multi-TB range. We’re now mapping out the plans for upcoming server releases, and we’re especially interested in adding enhancements for very large MySQL DB’s. If you own one of these beasts, please contact me at rschumacher@mysql.com, let me know how big your database(s) are, and what features we should add to make your life easier.

Sun open sources clustering code. Eclipse ships largest release to-date. GPLv3 to be released on Friday. (and more)

Sun Donates High Availability Cluster Code to the Open Source Community, Enables Accelerated Innovation In Scale Out Architectures, Sun Microsystems (Press Release)

Eclipse Ships Largest-Ever Release of Leading Open Source Software Development Platform, Eclipse Foundation (Press Release)

GPLv3 upgrade set for Friday, InfoWorld, Paul Krill (Article)

Enterprise Linux 5 May Lift Red Hat Q1 Earnings, LinuxInsider (Article)

…

Computerworld has Marten Mickos on the hot seat about the growth of MySQL and what happens next. As always, Marten is insightful and rational. I am jealous that I am not as clear-headed. I am very passionate about open source. And I do believe that it is a superior method. But at the same time, I must be pragmatic. So when they say being dogmatic is very important for the Free Software Foundation ? well, they should be. That?s what we respect them for. But running a business is not about dogma. We are not judgmental about our customers or... READ MORE