The MySQL Network is a new service operated by MySQL AB to help companies use and deploy MySQL technology in their applications. It bundles up a number of different components into a single chargeable service and includes certified copies of the MySQL binaries, online and phone-based support, full access to the MySQL KnowledgeBase, and updates and notifications of new releases.

Unlike the free MySQL, where organizations are expected to deploy and use the database on their own, the MySQL Network offers assisted setup and support either directly or through a number of MySQL partners.

I spoke to Zack Urlocker, vice president of marketing for MySQL AB, and Sami Akbay, senior director of marketing for GoldenGate Software, Inc., a MySQL Network partner, about the MySQL Network and how it will be supported and used by corporations.

In a nutshell, what is the MySQL Network?

Zack: MySQL Network is designed for corporations who want to save time developing and deploying MySQL applications. The new offering includes high-end production support, certified binaries, software advisors, IP protection, and access to our new knowledgebase.

However, we remain very much committed to supporting our open source community, so everything there stays the same. If you're a developer who's content with the software and resources you receive today from MySQL and the Web, then you're all set - nothing will change for you.

MySQL Network is for large and small enterprises that may be very interested in the cost-savings and software-quality benefits of open source software - but need some help and assurance along the way.

We like to say that the MySQL Community Edition is for people who are willing to invest their time to save money, while MySQL Network is for those who want to invest a little money in order to save time. Sami: Being one of the first ISVs to join the MySQL Network, GoldenGate reiterates its support for the open source community. As the leader in transactional data management, GoldenGate enables MySQL and Linux to seamlessly coexist with other legacy and open systems databases. This partnership strengthens both MySQL and open source ecosystems, helping businesses to confidently deploy these solutions in their mission-critical data infrastructures

Why did you choose the subscription model, rather than a one-off 'purchase' solution?

Zack: Since most of the components of the MySQL Network revolve around having a relationship with MySQL over time, it makes much more sense to provide these things as a subscription. Think about it - when you want technical support, software upgrades, or access to alerts and bulletins, these are all things you want today, tomorrow and next month. So an annual pay-as-you-go model works well. It also gives smaller companies a much easier, flexible way to get in with lower upfront costs, and then scale their IT investment as they grow.

I see that one of the main benefits is the supply of the MySQL Pro Certified Server. What's the main difference between this and the version we can all download from the Web site?

Zack: MySQL-certified software and community software are built on the same code base, but since they're designed for different audiences, they do have different purposes and benefits. The freely available Community Edition is focused on a "release early, release often" schedule where new features are introduced and the open source developer community is encouraged to bang on it and give us feedback and bug reports.

On the other hand, the MySQL Pro Certified Server is designed for commercial developers who don't necessarily want the "bleeding edge" - they just want to know which version of MySQL will work best for their production application. The certified software has already been reviewed by the open source developer community as well as MySQL's own quality-assurance suites and commercial and open source testing tools. In addition, it's inspected and verified by leading source-code analysis tools like Klocwork and Coverity for crash-causing defects, performance degradation, and security vulnerabilities. We also ask our MySQL Network certified partners to certify that their software works with our certified software. So that way a customer knows if they are working with GoldenGate, Business Objects, Quest, Embarcadero, HP, Red Hat, Novell or others, they're good to go. They don't have to worry about which version works with which.

In the long run, each of the different versions will benefit the other. All the stability and maintenance fixes included in MySQL certified software will get incorporated into the Community Edition software just like all the new features and functionality tested publicly in the Community Editions will eventually be incorporated into a certified version.

How significant do you think a certified version of MySQL will be to commercial users?

Zack: It will save many users a fair amount of time and give them considerable peace of mind. We've seen strong initial interest in MySQL Network.

MySQL is already being used by some as a replacement for commercial solutions such as Oracle and DB2. Do you see the Certified Server initiative helping this process?

Zack: Not just the certified software but the MySQL Network as a whole. IT departments used to working with traditional vendors like Microsoft, IBM, and Oracle have come to expect a high level of professional support and vendor accountability for their enterprise infrastructure. Just because we're an open source company doesn't mean we can't deliver the same.

Do you have a feeling for the number of commercial customers using MySQL in non-critical environment, because of the lack of a certified version?

Zack: Just from speaking to customers and prospects, we know that many enterprises are very interested in the ROI benefits of open source, but are concerned with the perceived lack of support, accountability, product roadmap, etc. (See graph). For these companies, it's not just about critical versus non-critical applications, because they're both important to their business. We believe that MySQL Network can help protect their investment in resources and to manage risk.

Will the certified binaries cover all the available platforms, or just those that you see as key to your target audience?

Zack: We'll be releasing certified binaries for the popular platforms that our MySQL Network subscribers ask for. Right now, that's 11 different platforms - 32- and 64-bit versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Sun Solaris, and HP-UX, which we believe cover upwards of 80% of the market today. As we move forward, you'll see us add certified binaries for other platforms on a quarterly basis. We're keeping our eyes on Mac OS X, Debian, and others. Keep in mind that the number of platforms we support is much broader than this. We support customers on more than 70 different platforms, and that includes some quite specialized niche platforms. For example FreeBSD is not a huge platform in terms of market share, but it's the standard platform at Yahoo so we support it.

Are you going to help migrate MySQL Network users from Oracle and others?

Zack: We believe that MySQL co-exists with Oracle, DB2, and SQL Server in many customer environments. That said, when a customer does want to migrate some applications to MySQL for performance reasons or lower cost, we do provide resources to help them. Our online forums (http://forums.mysql.com/) and our migration center (www.mysql.com/migration) are examples of two resources that we provide for developers and DBAs who may be interested in using MySQL in place of another database. We also offer white papers and training consulting packages that will help companies expand their staffs' skill sets and get a jumpstart in new system development. There's also a new MySQL Migration Tool that's currently available in alpha for those who want to get a jumpstart on things. And at our user conference in mid-April there are plenty of sessions on migration (www.mysqluc.com).

Lastly, we've got a bunch of great partners like GoldenGate that provide tools and platforms for data application migration and integration.

Sami: A growing number of GoldenGate customers are interested in using MySQL and Linux side-by-side with their commercial or proprietary counterparts, essentially implementing "database tiering."

Even for the most progressive IT organizations, the risk associated with replacing commercial databases in production environments can be too high. GoldenGate enables database tiering; essentially augmenting the deployed commercial infrastructure with MySQL clusters running on Linux farms.

Sabre Holdings is a great example of this. Sabre is realizing tremendous benefits by using GoldenGate and MySQL on Linux for its air travel shopping engine, which averages 300,000 updates an hour across a farm of MySQL instances and commercial databases running on the HP NonStop platform.

How will the MySQL Advisors system work?

Zack: The MySQL Network Advisors are proactive systems that notify you of new information that may impact your MySQL applications. You can fill out a profile on the MySQL Network Web site based on your environment and application, and then request how you want to receive the alerts - via email, pager, or SMS message.

The Update Advisor tells you of relevant MySQL certified software for your environment - and can also help you manage the installation and upgrade. The Technical Alert system notifies you about issues related to your specific computing environment such as operating system security vulnerabilities, performance enhancements, and new KnowledgeBase articles.

Over time, we plan to add even more Advisors to help developers and DBAs manage their systems.

You talk of customization of updates. How specific will these updates and notifications be?

Zack: Users can ask for update information by operating system, MySQL server version (e.g. 4.1.x), MySQL storage engine type, and specialized features such as "Full-Text Search" or "Replication."

Have you authors like Chad Russell, Jon Stephens, and Paul DuBois to help populate the knowledgebase that will be available?

Zack: The KnowledgeBase articles are written by MySQL's own developers and support staff, mostly based on issues raised by users and support clients including troubleshooting, performance tips, and best practices. But there's no doubt we're very fortunate that we not only have great technical staff but also great writers, great consultants, and great instructors who do our training. All of these groups helped out to make sure that the KnowledgeBase is a new kind of resource and that it's helpful to our customers.

Is the licensing affected in any way?

Zack: It is more well-defined. One of the goals of the MySQL Network is to remove any confusion around our dual licensing so that it's easier for developers and IT departments to employ MySQL in a corporate environment. The software available in MySQL Network and the MySQL Community Edition are both offered through the open source GPL license - and ISVs are still able to purchase a MySQL commercial license for embedding and reselling the MySQL database as part of their own third-party solutions.

Are there any plans to change the open source nature of MySQL?

Zack: No change at all. MySQL will still release all its software early, often, and for no cost under the open source GPL license - continuing to give the millions of MySQL developers early access to the latest features in MySQL. Even with the introduction of the MySQL Network, more than 80% of our company's development team will be dedicated to working on software that will be freely available under the GPL to the open source community.

We think the open source model is really the best way to build and distribute software and we're committed to it. For companies that are trying to get a handle on their IT costs, or do more with less, open source is the way to go. I think it's come a long way since Linux and now we're starting to see more and more companies go towards the full open source LAMP stack with Linux, Apache, MySQL, PH, Perl, and Python.

Sidebar:

Case Study: Sabre Holdings

With these goals in mind, the company decided to pursue a leaner, more cost-effective approach for Its ATSE platform. Sabre Holdings CTO Craig Murphy and his team decided to implement an infrastructure based on open systems that would provide cost efficiencies and greater flexibility down the road. "We learned the hard way," Murphy said. "In the past we got locked into application silos with proprietary practices and vendor inflexibility."

Murphy and his team designed a hybrid computing environment based on a horizontally scalable server farm built out of Unix- and Linux-based commodity machines running MySQL databases. This server farm would be integrated with a cluster of HP NonStop systems, the platform that the company uses to power its agency services.

Alan Walker, vice-president of Sabre Labs, said that "With GoldenGate, we are able to capture that data, transform it for the MySQL databases, and then pump it to the hybrid servers. With GoldenGate, we can get performance from commodity Unix and Linux servers that is remarkably similar to the NonStop machines. Synchronizing the two platforms allows us to deliver the same high level of service and reliability to our customers, yet at a much lower cost for hardware and software. GoldenGate was such an important element in this initiative because it provided the glue that let us migrate and move data, and evolve into the future."