MySQL, the database darling of the open-source crowd, may be going mainstream.
The database, which MySQL AB offers under both the general public license and commercially, is gaining footing in major accounts, solution providers said.
Much of the time MySQL acts in concert with other databases from Oracle, IBM or Microsoft, but that could change as corporations get comfortable with its capabilities, they said.
"Everybody is using it. It"s huge, huge, huge," said Anthony Awtrey, vice president of I.D.E.A.L. Technology, an Orlando, Fla.-based solution provider. "All the new J2EE stuff uses abstraction layers, so the apps don"t care what the back-end database is," he said. "You can change from doing development in-house with MySQL to production work using Oracle."
The simplicity and low cost of the open-source database could make it a contender in the business market.