Join Percona Chief Evangelist Colin Charles as he covers happenings, gives pointers and provides musings on the open source database community.

Shortly after the last dispatch, I jetted off for a spot of vacation (which really meant I was checking out the hype behind Blockchain with a database developer lens at the Blockchain Week NYC), and then some customer visits in Seoul, which explains the short hiatus. Here’s to making this more regular as the summer approaches.

I am about to embark on a fairly long trip, covering a few upcoming appearances: Lisbon for the Percona Engineering meeting, SouthEastLinuxFest in Charlotte, the …

Years ago when I worked for the MySQL Support organization at the original MySQL AB, we spoke about MySQL Support as insurance and focused on a value proposition similar to that of car insurance. For your car to be fully covered, you must purchase car insurance before the incident happens – in fact most places around the world require automobile insurance. Similarly with many organizations, any production-use technology might be mandated to have its own insurance in the way of 24/7 support.

I think however this is a very one-sided view that does not capture the full value (and ROI) that a MySQL Support contract with Percona provides. Let’s look at the different dimensions of value it provides based on the different support cases we have received throughout the years.

Reduce and Prevent …

Novell’s Q1. The future of OpenSolaris. And more.

Follow 451 CAOS Links live @caostheory on Twitter and Identi.ca

“Tracking the open source news wires, so you don’t have to.”

# Novell reported Linux platform revenue of $37.5m in Q1, up 6.4%.

# Internet.com reported that Novell’s Linux business broke even as Microsoft deal revenues fade.

# As the H reported Oracle exec Dan Roberts confirmed that OpenSolaris has a future at Oracle.

# Citrix acquired Paglo, launched GoToManage service.

# StatusNet …

There’s been a fair amount of attention – both positive and negative – on dual licensing in recent weeks. A few days ago Brian Aker wrote: “The fact is, there are few, and growing fewer, opportunities to make money on dual licensing.”

It is a sweeping statement, but one that is worth further consideration, especially since, as Stephen O’Grady noted it is directly contradicted by Gartner’s prediction that: “By 2012, at least 70% of the revenue from commercial OSS will come from vendor-centric projects with dual-license business models.”

Success?

I remember reading this prediction back in December but dismissing it as …