Some thoughts on MySQL and Oracle
Posted Dec 18, 2009 7:53 UTC (Fri) by
hingo (guest, #14792)
In reply to:
Some thoughts on MySQL and Oracle by vblum
Parent article:
Some thoughts on MySQL and Oracle
The significant difference is that the license used for Linux does not affect the software run on top of Linux (a.k.a user space). So you can run GPLv2, GPLv3, LGPL, BSD, proprietary software on a Linux system. This of course makes sense.
For the GPLv2 version of MySQL this is not possible, and as discussed above this is by design, since the business model was to require proprietary SW makers to pay money for the privilege of using MySQL. (Imagine if glibc and other libraries used on Linux were also GPL all the way.) MySQL does however provide for a FOSS Exception, so that also other open source SW than GPLv2 can use it freely, with one exception...
So if MySQL were controlled by a "hostile" party, proprietary software, and curiously GPLv3 software (which is missing from the list of FOSS exception licenses), could not use MySQL or a fork of it anymore.
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