Jeremy Cole wrote:
Hi!
>> In the beginning, before the community and enterprise versions split, it
>> was simple, Gentoo simply provided 'dev-db/mysql'.
>>
>> Then the split happened, and we added 'dev-db/mysql-community' to the
>> tree, while the main 'dev-db/mysql' followed the Enterprise source
>> releases. This allowed folk to just upgrade into the enterprise version,
>> which had better support in terms of bug-fixes actually getting out to
>> users than the Community version.
>
> The above makes sense to me -- in fact I'd be hard-pressed to find a
> reason why a user would choose mysql-community other than my own
> profiling patch which was committed there (which for most users isn't a
> very big carrot).
There are obviously more planned features, besides your own profiling
patch. I believe the patch queue log is public, even
>> Now that Enterprise source has gone closed (but not missing), and Gentoo
>> is faced with a difficult decision.
>
> It's more like the other way around -- it's not closed, it's missing.
> But it's not really missing either. :)
Its still GPLv2, and its not closed source. So tarballs are available
only to Enterprise customers, via enterprise.mysql.com
Sources are still open, via Bitkeeper
>> - Do we respect the wishes of MySQL AB, and only package the community
>> sources, dropping ES entirely? This would hurt any commercial
>> Enterprise users on Gentoo.
>
> I think this is the worst case for the user, and would hurt not only the
> "commercial Enterprise users" but all users, as they then get a much
> less-maintained version of MySQL with more delayed bug fixes.
Since distributions don't normally *ship* every month, how does this
make it worse for our user base?
Distributions typically ship once every 6-9 months, with the exception
of Gentoo and FreeBSD who have a different sort of packaging system that
handles "ports"
So, frankly, every bit of software you get on your distribution is
mostly *outdated*. Providing one source release once every 3 months (90
days) ensures that distributions are actually getting the freshest copy
of MySQL Community, and during their "support cycle" can release another
update in another 3 months, even
>> - Make a new package, dev-db/mysql-dorsal, retire the old dev-db/mysql,
>> and FORCE users to migrate to one of community or dorsal (such an
>> approach will NOT be popular for any distribution).
>
> Given the above, this actually doesn't make much sense, since we are
> using MySQL's own tarballs on DorsalSource (and mirror.ps), there is no
> need to rename them.
Yes, there is. I believe you cannot call it MySQL Enterprise, because
that in itself is trademarked
> This is actually pretty interesting, in that MySQL has been actually
> releasing MySQL Community much more often than they claimed they would
> -- their initial claim was 2 builds per year, and they did quite a lot
> more than that in practice (but still not enough). They have since
> revised their policy to 4 builds per year, so one should expect a build
> every 90 days or so, I guess.
Now its 4 source tarballs a year, so every quarter, i.e. 90 days
This is meant to *help* distributions (though I can see this being
negative towards Gentoo or FreeBSD whom have no "release" concept -
everything is latest)
thanks and kind regards
--
Colin Charles, Community Relations Manager, APAC
MySQL AB, Melbourne, Australia, www.mysql.com
Mobile: +614 12 593 292 / Ekiga/Skype/Gizmo: colincharles
Web: http://www.bytebot.net/blog/
MySQL Forge: http://forge.mysql.com/
