MySQL: How it came to Dominate & Popularize Open Source Database Management, and Why it Might Die: As every dev knows and Oracle is apt to mention, MySQL is the world’s most popular database tool for developers. If you have ever pulled data from a server it’s likely you were using Structured Query Language or SQL to do it and MySQL is the defacto conveyor of this data. Created in C and C++ and named after one of the co-founders daughters, My, MySQL was first released in 1995 and acts as the database component of the popular LAMP stack that developers use to create the relational databases that power software and websites. It is cross-platform or agnostic meaning that MySQL will run on most operating systems. Institutions that are dependent on data integrity and massive data scale such as banks or governments don't use MySQL because of its limitations, but the vast majority of websites and apps do in some capacity. In fact, all 10 of the most visited websites in the world use it for something. According to Twitter, MySQL acts as the “persistent storage technology behind most Twitter data: the interest graph, timelines, user data and the Tweets themselves.” It is considered fast, free, and reliable but not without faults. Most notably, it’s acquisition by Oracle (via Sun Microsystems), which at the time raised red flags amongst developers and even had a wikileaks scandal released regarding possible collusion between the EU and Oracle, has lead to more recent complaints from developers throughout the world that MySQL is being slowly killed off or unsupported in the interest of selling higher priced proprietary database tools offered by the parent company.

1. MySQL: Dominant
Database, Open Forever?
James Taylor
Com 585 Fall 2012

2. World's Most Popular Open
Source Database
• 5/23/1995
• OS Compatibility: Cross-platform
• Built: LAMP software stack
(Linux, Apache, MySQL,Perl/PHP/Python)

3. Ubiquitous
“persistent storage technology behind most Twitter data: the
interest graph, timelines, user data and the Tweets themselves.”
• Software
• Web

4. Benefits & Use Cases
• Small/Medium scale single-server
deployments + Free
simple, fast, stable, free(ish), ubiquitous

5. Specs
• Freemium Model
• Command-line tools -or- front-end
tools
• Source Code - or - Binary
package
• Cloud

6. Complaints &
Controversy:
• Ownership
• Support
• Popular Alternative
”…no problem, until their favorite sites using this opensource
technology are forced to migrate to a paid database solution."

7. Sources
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Widenius
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MySQL
• http://www.mysql.com/products/
• http://comments.apreche.net/156/mysql-is-great-haters-gonna-
hate/
• http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/18/oracle-makes-more-moves-
to-kill-open-source-mysql/
• http://muxo.co/is-mysql-dead/