MaxDB, the Enterprise Grade Database from MySQL

The partnership between SAP and MySQL is starting to bear fruit also in the short term. While the partnership provides MySQL with the resources to increase development speed within MySQL (see "SAP Development Kickoff paving the way for MySQL enterprise use"), MySQL also acquired the commercial rights to SAP DB. In the beginning of August SAP DB was rebranded MaxDB by MySQL, and in Q4 this year MySQL will start offering MaxDB both under the GPL and with a commercial license.

MaxDB is a full enterprise grade database that can act as the database of choice for all SAP enterprise solutions. Providing features like views and triggers, it acts as a complement to the current MySQL database offering. This gives you as a user the possibility to choose whether you like your database fast, stable and easy to use (as in MySQL), or whether you like it enterprise-grade and feature-packed (as in MaxDB).

The first MaxDB release, labelled 7.5.00, will be a normal version upgrade to SAP DB 7.4 introducing new features such as Replication, Snapshots and Archive-tables. The next release after that, MaxDB 7.5.01, will include the first MySQL interoperability features, which over time will include both MySQL Proxy and MySQL Replication.

The MySQL Proxy will enable connections to the MaxDB server using the MySQL protocol, and thus a user will be able to launch the familiar MySQL tools like mysql client, mysqldump client, mysqlimport client and mysqlshow client against his MaxDB database. Thus, a user can do a mysqldump for a MaxDB database and pipe the input into a MySQL server -- or, quite as easily, move data from MySQL to MaxDB. The replication functionality will enable replication to be set up between MySQL and MaxDB, so that either one act as master, as the other one act as slave.

During September, SAP DB mailing lists have been renamed MaxDB and moved to the MySQL list server. This transition work will continue, as the complete SAP DB website will shortly be moved and integrated into the MySQL website, www.mysql.com. When the transition has been completed, the MaxDB downloads, documentation and other important information will be available from within the MySQL site. As a further addition in user services, MySQL will in the beginning of next year start offering MaxDB support to its commercial customers.