MySQL Database Adds Features, MaxDB Compatability

By Jacqueline Emigh
Linux Today Writer

“Future versions of MySQL’s flagship database will add new
features that will make it more comparable to MaxDB, a commercial
product from MySQL that is based on SAP’s open source database.

In an interview at Comdex, MySQL CEO Mårten Mickos
contended that MaxDB is just as capable as the Oracle and IBM DB2
databases, for example. Mickos added that the product represents a
rebranding and enhancement of SAP DB, a open-source database that
originated as a university research project in Europe back during
the 1970s.

Through a cross licensing and technology pact signed with SAP,
MySQL acquired full commercial rights to develop and market future
releases of SAP DB.

Mickos said that MaxDB and the commercial edition of MySQL are
both aimed at producing revenues that will help to support MySQL’s
own open source development activities.

MaxDB is geared to large SAP R/3 installations, as well as other
environments requiring enterprise-calibre database
functionality.

About 5,000 customers are using MaxDB, including Colgate, Intel,
Bayer, Daimler-Chrysler, and Deutsche Post, the German Post
Office.

Capabilities that are now present in MaxDB but absent from the
MySQL flagship database include stored procedures, views, and
triggers, said Kelly Kimball, marketing and sales manager for
MySQL.

Stored procedures are currently being tested for MySQL, however.
These are available for free download, according to Kimball.

Kimball expects the stored procedures will appear in the MySQL
database product in January of next year.

“Views and triggers are still a bit further down the road,
though,” Kimball noted.