Percona is launching The OurSQL Foundation, an open organization that will support the community of users, developers, and companies that are invested in the success of MySQL.
According to Percona, the new Foundation will provide a venue for those involved in the MySQL community using, building, and deploying applications that use MySQL or the broad range of compatible software to share with their peers, to access knowledge, and to provide feedback on future development in a transparent and consistent way.
This community organization will support the growth and use of MySQL as an open source database and collaborate with all players in the market, including Oracle, to see MySQL succeed with the next generation of developers and applications.
The OurSQL Foundation has been created as a 501(c)(6) non-profit organization to represent the companies working around MySQL and compatible technologies as part of their deployments, as well as those businesses and partners that support MySQL use with services or products.
This will include companies that deploy and support MySQL for their customers, independent software vendors that produce complementary products, as well as consultants that provide their expertise and insights.
Following the Foundation’s creation, the community will investigate how to support and collaborate around potential member needs in the future. This collaboration may include:
- Support for a vendor-neutral governance model for the Foundation, where participation is evaluated on merit, opening the door for companies and individuals to get involved and contribute to the ecosystem around MySQL.
- Stewardship for the development of shared community assets—this could include community-focused information and assets that would provide insight to the community, such as a public bug database for shared issue tracking, a portal for tools and open source projects around MySQL, or a transparency log for security patches.
- A central location for collaboration around the future for MySQL, representing the overall community rather than any one company or provider. This will support collaboration for users and companies around data and applications, as well as healthy competition between those companies that build products that work alongside MySQL. This is expected to include both dedicated virtual events and resources at physical events.
- Development of education and training materials that the community wants to see to engage the next generation around MySQL. This may include training courses, certification and partnerships with academia, based on potential opportunities and support.
“This Foundation will provide a platform to promote and support MySQL as a database, fostering collaboration across everyone looking to contribute to the broad MySQL ecosystem. It will pool resources and provide guidance around where MySQL fits into the technology landscape today, something that has been missing over the past few years. By bringing the community together under the banner of an independent Foundation, we can demonstrate that MySQL has a valid and vibrant future ahead of it. The OurSQL Foundation will be a neutral organization that will support MySQL as a technology, helping the community as a whole to grow and succeed in parallel with Oracle’s renewed focus on MySQL community development,” said Vadim Tkachenko, co-founder at Percona.
The Foundation will follow the model that other open source foundations have taken to provide an independent, vendor-neutral space for mutual collaboration and assistance, said Percona.
The Foundation will be a separate legal entity that manages events, resource repositories, and adoption efforts on behalf of the community, growing the number of individuals that use and interact around MySQL, as well as providing a collective voice on the MySQL roadmap and future developments. The Foundation will start by creating Committee Groups to support the organization’s work around events, collaboration, and support for using MySQL.
For more information about this news, visit www.percona.com.