After Oracle purchased Sun Microsystems, there was a stir in MySQL developer´s community and in the data base business.

In an ingenious way, SQL community was able to create a new data base starting from the public branch and revived the project called MariaDB.

In his website, AskMonty.org (founded by Michael “Monty” Widenius, the creator of MySQL) set his targets.

“Provide a development for the community of a stable and free branch of MySQL, and from the point of view of the user compatible with the main version. We will effort to get the full interoperability between both branches”

He also affirms the following:

“MariaDB is compatible backwards, and can replace directly MySQL data base. Includes support for the main storing mechanism, including the own Aria”

What about cloud computing?

There is clear commitment of both MySQL and MariaDB products to work in the cloud. They or third party companies provide plenty of AMIs and tools for configuration, monitoring and management MySQL instances when in high availability in the Cloud. Another MySQL branch called Drizzle whose focus is in “Cloud Computing” and networks applications, it´s being designed for massive concurrency in modern architectures multi CPU and multi core. The code derivates from MySQL the original”

By looking at both commentaries, it comes clear that both projects have the same source what is MySQL, but they have evolved in different ways after Oracle´s purchasing.