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No GPLv3 for MySQL... yet
Jan. 04, 2007

Kaj Arno, MySQL VP of community relations, quietly revealed on his blog before Christmas that MySQL has changed its license to "GPL2 Only." This does not mean, however, that the MySQL AB, the well-known open-source DBMS (database management system) vendor, is sticking to the GPLv2 forever.

Unlike the Linux core developers, who have little if any interest in switching to the GPLv3, MySQL has been involved with creating the GPLv3 since its start.

Arno wrote, "MySQL has been part of the GPLv3 Committee B advising FSF [the Free Software Foundation] since the GPLv3 draft was announced in January 2006. For GPLv3, we have seen fantastic improvements and hope for GPLv3 to spread."

So why is MySQL not supporting the use of GPLv3 as wholeheartedly as the Samba Team, which announced in early December that it was committed to moving Samba's code to GPLv3 as soon as it was out?

According to Arno, MySQL is taking a wait and see attitude towards community acceptance of the forthcoming open-source license. "Until we get clear and strong indications for the general acceptance of GPLv3 over GPLv2, we feel comfortable with a specific GPLv2 reference in our license," he explained.

Consistent with this strategy, the company has changed the copyright notice in the MySQL 5.0 and MySQL 5.1 code bases from referring to "either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version" to, simply, "version 2."

In a letter published by Arno from Eben Moglen, general counsel for the FSF (Free Software Foundation) and a leading figure in the GPL's version 3 revision, Moglen wrote, "I believe MySQL will soon be in a position to see the GPLv3 being adopted over GPLv2 by various Free Software projects."

The news also recently slipped out that MySQL will soon release the alpha version of its Falcon storage engine. Falcon, which had Jim Starkey, the so-called father of Interbase, as its chief architect, is expected to be released as open source later this week.


-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols



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