ThinkPHP /dev/blog - Open Source

Disruptive Kraft von OpenSource im E-Commerce

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Mon, 10 May 2010 14:52:09 +0200

Meine Keynote auf der OXID Commons 2010. Ein großer Dank gilt an die Veranstalter - mit mehr als 250 Teilnehmern hat sich die OXID Commons zu einer prächtigen Konferenz entwickelt, auf der Business, Community und Technologie nicht zu kurz kommen. Grandios die visionären Einblicke von Roland Fesenmayr in seiner Eröffnung - Geschäftsmodelle bestimmen die Software, und nicht umgekehrt. Bilder von der Konferenz hier, und natürlich auch die Videomitschnitte.

Disruptive Kraft von Open Source im E-Commerce

View more presentations from Mayflower GmbH.

Die disruptive Kraft von OpenSource im E-Commerce

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 11:02:17 +0200

"OpenSource verändert die Welt."

Wir leben in einer Zeit, in der wir nicht mehr diskutieren müssen, ob OpenSource nun gut oder schlecht ist. Immer mehr (Groß-)Unternehmen erkennen die Kraft, die OpenSource Technologien mit sich bringen. Gleichgültig, ob man das Betriebssystem oder einzelne Schichten des Anwendungs-Stacks betrachtet - fast überall gibt es (mächtige) OpenSource Alternativen, auf die ein Blick zu werfen sich lohnt.

In den vergangenen beiden Jahren erschütterte die Kraft von OpenSource die E-Commerce Welt: OXID eShop - ehemals proprietär-kommerziell - ging mit der Community Edition OpenSource und bot gleichzeitig mächtige Aufstiegsvarianten mit der Professional und der Enterprise Edition sowie einem SaaS Service namens OXID eFire. Ungefähr zur gleichen Zeit machte sich Magento aus den USA daran, den europäischen und insbesondere den deutschen (seit jeher ein großer Markt für OpenSource - wer erinnert sich noch an die Blüte des LinuxTag Anfang dieser Dekade?) Markt zu erobern.

Etablierte E-Commerce Player wie Intershop oder hybris (die zwar proprietär sind, aber teilweise natürlich auch OpenSource Technologien für ihr Produkt nutzen) wurden dabei gehörig aufgeschreckt. Der Milliardenmarkt E-Commerce schien bequem verteilt zu sein.

So schien es. Doch klammheimlich erobern die neuen Player aus dem OpenSource Stück für Stück, Meter um Meter Neukunden im Umfeld großer Unternehmen, die auf der Suche nach Alternativen zu den proprietären Installationen sind. Und dabei geht es nicht ausschließlich um Einsparung von Lizenzkosten, sondern um die schnelle innovative Kraft, die OpenSource Lösungen ermöglichen - zum Vorteil für den Kunden.

"Die disruptive Kraft von OpenSource im E-Commerce" ist das Thema meiner Keynote auf der OXID Commons, der jährlichen Konferenz der OXID eSales AG. Der E-Commerce Anbieter-Kuchen wird dank Magento und OXID eShop neu verteilt - ich werde aufzeigen, warum dies so ist und welche Chancen und Innovationsmöglichkeiten für Anbieter, E-Commerce Händler und Endkunden dahinter stecken.

Das Programm der OXID Commons ist auf der Website der OXID eSales AG zu finden.

Disclosure: Mayflower ist Lösungspartner für OXID- und Magento-basierte Shop-Systeme im Unternehmensumfeld.

PHProjekt V6 kicks out of the door on March 18th

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:21:01 +0100

PHProjekt V6, our little ~~beast~~bee and Open Source project management software, kicks out of the door on March 18th as GA. It's a complete rewrite (and thus, a major version update was needed) with Zend Framework and dojo and now licensed under LGPL (earlier versions were licensed under GPL). You may ask what you want to do until March 18th? Well, besides eating popcorn for Film@11:

follow the little bee @phprojekt6
get social with PHProjekt at its Facebook fanpage
visit the PHProjekt blog for regular updates
check out the code at github
want to talk to the developers or contribute? /join #phprojekt on freenode (irc.freenode.org)
... and, finally, try out the demo at p6.phprojekt.com

The bee is watching you!

A comet over PHProjekt 6

nospam@example.com (Martin Ruprecht) — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 12:59:37 +0100

So far PHProjekt 6 (P6, see http://phprojekt.com) is already enhanced with nice AJAX workflows and snappy user-experience. Nevertheless, we discussed a way to provide synchronous communication and direct information within the application.

Everybody knows GoogleMail with its easy to use frontend. Maybe you use it for your daily work. In GoogleMail, there is no need to refresh the page to receive a new mail, Google informs you automatically whenever a new mail is available. But how is this possible? The answer to this question is really simple: The server triggers a signal informing that a new mail is available. This technology is called Comet and describes a way how the server communicates with the client [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_(programming) ].

Is there a way to use Comet for P6? As P6 works with a lot of users, it is important for me as a user to be informed when somebody has changed something in my projects or has added an urgent todo. The list where a notification could be triggered is long, but at the moment, only email notifications are sent immediately. So, what we need in P6 are real-time notifications. With real-time notifications, for example, every time somebody changes something in my project, I receive a message in form of a highlighted info box. This looks like a typical use case for using Comet. And yes, Comet would be great for realizing this kind of real-time notification! But since the users love the handy system requirements (Apache Server and MySQL) and the ease of installation, something different is needed than a real Comet architecture, because all the Comet magic is based on a so called application server, e.g. Jetty, Persevere. Therefore, I decide to implement another (Comet-) technology, called Long Polling. You can find the name AJAX Polling for this technology, too.

The technology behind Long Polling is to open a connection from the client to the server and not to close this connection immediately. Ok, that´s fine, but how to open a connection and "hold" it? Opening a connection to the server is easy, a simple AJAX will do the trick. P6 uses the Dojo Toolkit for all its AJAX, so in this case I used the Dojo.xhrPost.

        dojo.xhrPost({
            url:   myUrl,
            error: function(error, handle) {
                handleError(myUrl, error);
            },
            load: function(response) {
                if (false != response.data) {
                    showToaster(response.data);
                }
            },
            handleAs: 'json'
        });

Since the HTTP protocoll is connection-based, at the server-side, a process is also needed that holds the connection and does not return . So, what I do to hold this connection open is to set a simple timeout during the execution of the server-side script, in my case I use sleep(). This is the basic idea of long polling, but the gimmick of this approach is to return earlier if something happens on the server-side. In other words, I open a connection to the server and check whether there are any changes, if not, the connection stays open for the maximum polling time. If yes, the response will be returned to the client immediately.

This diagram shows the basic workflow, and the lines below show the possible solution in PHP:

        $counter  = 0;
        $maxLoops = 4;
        $data     = array();

        while ($counter != $maxLoops) {
            $counter++;
            $data = $this->getMessage($userId); // get data from database
            if (false === empty($data)) {
                return $data; // there is something new, return immediately
            }
            sleep(5); // nothing is new, sleep for 5 sec.
        }

        return $data; // return the empty array

For P6 this means that I always save the following: the person who triggers an event, the event itself (e.g. somebody adds a new note), the item, the project, the creation time, the time until this message is valid, and the persons who should receive a frontend message from the database. The long polling loop checks whether there is anything new. If yes, it returns the data. If not, the polling loop starts again. Every event is saved in the database for a maximum of two minutes, except events in the future. Itis real-time so itis possible to miss a message ;-)

One word about the Dojo Toolkit. The AJAX API of Dojo provides several functions to communicate with the server. The easiest way is to use dojo.xhrGet or dojo.xhrPost. I decided to use the Post version. Although the function has a property setTimeout, which allows you to set the time to wait for a response from the server, this is not needed, because of the sleep loops at the server side.

Now, lets look at the downsides of the long polling approach. Yes, I partly agree with everybody who says that the permanent polling to the server causes massive traffic and server load, especially with an increasing number of users. But in the special case of P6 this is OK, because the number of users is manageable and in most cases, P6 runs in a local network. In addition, the frontend messages are configurable, You can set the polling loop and the number of requests to the database.

Considering all the facts and keeping in mind that P6 is designed to be a lightweight open source groupware, I am positive to say that the Long Polling technology is the right choice for P6.

Former MySQL CEO represents Oracle at EC hearing?

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 01:44:49 +0100

I just came across several blog posts regarding the Oracle/Sun/MySQL war, including this one. There are a lot of interesting clarifications and opinions, but I want to highlight this comment from MySQL's founder Monty about Mårten Mickos which is worth reading. One excerpt:

That could however explain why he [Mårten] is now so eager to help Oracle buy MySQL and even represented Oracle at the EC hearing.

MySQL's former CEO representing Oracle in the EC hearing? Is it because Mårten converted to the dark side of the planet or is it because he believes MySQL will have a great future under Oracle's umbrella? Or has it to do with stock options as Monty's comment suggests?

UPDATE: Mårten clarifies in this comment that he participated in the EU hearing and represented only himself. Furthermore he says he has no financial or other ties to any of the companies represented there.

MySQL: from Midrange to the Enterprise market

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 19:31:26 +0100

First of all, I want to link to a blog article written by the founder of MySQL to help MySQL being rescued - everybody can stand up and tell the European Commision why the Oracle/Sun deal threatens MySQL. Second, due to a personal request, I want to make clear that this posting reflects my personal opinion of the case.

Third, I have been thinking about the markets both database systems address and why MySQL really competes to Oracle in one way or another. There are several voices who claimed that MySQL is not a competitor to Oracle, but if you know "Project Peter", Sun (the current owner of the trademark MySQL and its source code) targets Oracle customers in order to convince them migrating to MySQL.

For a long time, I have been watching the rise of MySQL (since 1994 or 1995, I don't remember the exact date anymore). It's not only because myself and our company works mainly with PHP (the scripting language of the Web) and uses mainly MySQL (the database for the Web, although other "database" architectures like NoSQL become popular nowadays) ... I remember back in 2000 when I was maintaining the PHP-Center (together with Ralf Geschke), Germany's first portal where developers could find news, job listing, articles, case studies etc around PHP in German language. At this time, MySQL invited several luminaries and community members including myself to a meeting in Germany where we discussed the new German website and also the idea to create a subsidiary of MySQL AB for Germany (which was later known as the MySQL GmbH).

At this time, MySQL mainly targeted smaller and middle web applications, web sites like microsites for consumer goods, content management systems and the like. Back then, the so called "Enterprise Market" wasn't really a target as Oracle, DB2 and others were deep inside the Enterprise and had features MySQL couldn't compete with.

But in the last decade, MySQL's feature set grew continuously. It didn't grow that much so that it could replace database systems like Oracle. And also, if you look today at the feature sets of MySQL and Oracle, there's a clear difference between them although in some cases MySQL can compete in terms of database size, transaction handling, online backups and the like.

But something has changed in other areas in the last 10 years: the Web has been arriving into the Enterprise. Large customers thought about switching from terminal or desktop apps to web technologies like PHP, and this transition is going on until today and the future. The Web is everywhere - and with it there's also a fair chance that there's PHP and there's MySQL.

Enterprises are looking for cheaper IT infrastructure. With web architecture, they do not only get scalable systems. They are also thinking if they really need an Oracle or DB2 for their systems - or if a PHP5/MySQL5 would suffice their needs. And I can't believe that Oracle's sales force would sell MySQL subscriptions into the Enterprise in these cases if Oracle would own MySQL.

Please don't get me wrong: there are many areas where MySQL does not compete with an Oracle, but due to this transition to the web there are also many many situations where MySQL could become a great choice for an Enterprise customer.

And this is one of the reasons why MySQL must not be owned by Oracle - to give Enterprises a chance to make the transition to web architecture and cheaper infrastructure.

Developing desktop applications by using web technologies

nospam@example.com (Thomas Steur) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 11:33:00 +0100

Looking how to develop a desktop application in a short term, I came accross "Titanium Developer". This Open-Source tool helps you to create desktop apps. The special feature about it is the possibility to use well-known Web-Technologies such as HTML, JavaScript and PHP. Thus, learning a new programming language is no longer necessary. Another advantage is that you can directly create binaries for Mac, Linux and Windows using the same code.

Continue reading "Developing desktop applications by using web technologies"

Everybody can fork MySQL. But what about market penetration?

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 21:31:59 +0100

When I talked with journalists, lawyers and analysts about the Oracle/Sun merger case questions were raised about the possibility to fork MySQL and that everybody who is not satisfied with Oracle's future way regarding MySQL could do this. I don't agree with that and I think it's best to put Monty's own words (found in a comment in his blog) here because I can't explain it better:

In addition, the MySQL trademark is so strong that it's hard to impossible for a fork to attract enough attention to be able to compete in a meaningful manner if MySQL would be owned by a vendor that refuses to cooperate and works against the fork.

Oracle/MySQL - Project Peter - Monty's dreams for BSD license

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 16:52:26 +0100

These are tough days in the case of the Oracle/MySQL decision the EU faces. First of all, the lobbyists of Oracle achieved that the decision deadline will be extended from January, 19th to January, 27th 2010. Secondly, Monty recommended that a license change from GPL to BSD would be a great idea for MySQL's future.

Today, Johann pointed me to a document called "Project Peter" which can be found at wikileaks.org (download PDF from wikileaks.org server in Sweden). It's a presentation of MySQL's Robin Schumacher. You may ask "What is Project Peter?". The presentation says:

Project Peter is an internal effort to assist Sun/MySQL customers in migrating from Oracle to MySQL by offering them a comprehensive solution that consists of Professional Services, Best Practices, and a set of approved third party migration tools and utilities that will enable them to move to MySQL in a way that is as easy as possible.

Marten Mickos, former CEO of MySQL, tweeted some time ago about an interview in eWeek where he was asked if Oracle and MySQL compete directly against each other. On page 2 of this interview, he claims that certainly Oracle and MySQL compete to each other:

"MySQL most certainly competes with Oracle," Mickos said. "And successfully so. But what must be remembered in terms of dollars in that competition, it is not significant enough to warrant an antitrust consideration. Secondly, this competition happens partly outside of the businessin the free, installed base.

"So no matter who owns MySQL, the competition will continue to exist."

Even if Oracle does ultimately own the MySQL code base and act as the enterprise headquarters for the database, "MySQL will still apply price pressure on Oracle," Mickos said. "That won't change. This is why there's no reason to stop the acquisition."

Asked about the future of MySQL, Mickos claimed: "The MySQL business is a very strong business, with enormous potential in the next 10 to 20 years."

So, maybe MySQL doesn't compete in terms of dollars today. But if MySQL does have a bright future in the next 10 or 20 years, there's evidence that numbers will climb up in the era of the "database for the web". So that's why there's Project Peter for the sales force of Sun to try to convert Oracle customers to MySQL. I'm not sure if Oracle will accept a Project Peter if Oracle will own Sun and MySQL in the future - I guess they'll shut down Project Peter because MySQL may be kind of a threat to Oracle's business in certain areas.

And this is why Oracle mustn't own MySQL.

PHP_CodeBrowser Release version 0.1.0

nospam@example.com (Elger Thiele) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:22:49 +0100

Mayflower is proud to announce the release of the open source tool PHP_CodeBrowser in the current version 0.1.0-alpha.

What is PHP_CodeBrowser

PHP_CodeBrowser is a tool mainly intended to be used in conjunction with CruiseControl. It provides a code browser for PHP files with syntax highlighting and colored error-sections found by quality assurance tools like PHPUnit or PHP_CodeSniffer. The visualisation of errors, warnings or notices, found by above mentioned kind of tools, is the real power of PHP_CodeBrowser. You may also use PHP_CodeBrowser as a stand alone version, but therefore you would need previous generated XML error files.

Integration in phpUnderControl

PHP_CodeBrowser features

PHP_CodeBrowser comes along with syntax highlighting, colored error sections and a smart clickable error overview. Supported are XML report files generated from following supported quality assurance tools:

PHPUnit
CPD
Padawan
CodeSniffer

Colored error sections

Why should you use it

Because it's cool, and it helps strongly getting an complete overview over your code quality in single files.

Clickable error list overview

Installation

If you would like to try out, please check out source directly from SVN:

svn co svn://phpunit.de/phpunit/phpcb/trunk PHP_CodeBrowser

or use pear installation routine:

pear config-set preferred_state alpha
pear channel-discover pear.phpunit.de
pear install --alldeps phpunit/PHP_CodeBrowser

For the integration in cruisecontrol, please have a look at the README file, or use the current version of phpUnderControl.

European commision hands down a formal objection to Oracle-Sun deal

nospam@example.com (Björn Schotte) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 07:17:17 +0100

As eWeek reports, the EC handed down a formal objection to the Oracle-Sun deal. To quote the article:

The regulators see a major conflict of interest in the world's largest commercial database company owning its largest open source competitor.

Oracle responded with a statement yesterday. To quote from it:

It is well understood by those knowledgeable about open source software that because MySQL is open source, it cannot be controlled by anyone.

Yes, thank God that true Open Source (as we knew it 10 years ago) can't be controlled by anyone and everybody has the right to fork the software (as has already been done by forking into Drizzle or MariaDB).

But in these years, we have to understand how Commercial Open Source software works in these times: of course software like MySQL has a vibrant community that releases the software more often and sometimes provides more patches than the vendor does. But, there are many customers who want to rely on the "commercial" MySQL software that it is fully tested, certified and provided with commercial support. They stick into MySQL and not into Drizzle or MariaDB and so they stick into the vendor that does care for the software.

This means that customers expect a commercial entity behind the software. A commercial entity that pays developers to develop the software and its services around it. Open Source is not only free software and "free as in freedom", it's also a distribution vehicle to lower costs in sales and marketing, as you could read for example in the article "How JBoss did it" (via @mjasay).

Sheeri pointed out in a comment in this blog that Oracle has experience with free software like InnoDB and earns a ton of money off it (with InnoDB Hot Backup). But I think there's a difference. InnoDB is only a table handler (though an important one as it provides transactions etc. to the MySQL server). But MySQL itself stands for the whole database server and an own database market. Do the math.

As Marco Tabini wrote in an earlier blog article "Who would buy MySQL?", he agreed to my advice that it would be wise to sell MySQL to another company in order to get the Oracle-Sun merger done. But to whom?

UPDATE: El Reg has also an article about the official objective against the deal, and there's a SEC filing which does not yet have any further details (via Kris Köhntopp's blog).