Oracle to buy out Zend??!!!!

dalecosp

Now, here's one we've got to discuss, whether Jason Batten is reading the forum or not:

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2006/tc20060209_810527.htm

Just caught it on the PHP general mail-list. Interesting, to say the least, up to a point; beyond which, maybe it's just another merger.

Any thoughts from the dream team?

Weedpacket

Well, it's a good sign if you start looking that juicy to the big players. At least it's not comparable to Microsoft buying Foxpro so that it wouldn't compete against Access; does Oracle have anything that competes with Zend's line?

But there seem to be some issues with what goes where. From the article:

Zend's PHP software language is one of the most prevalent on the Web....

Which is a bit backwards: PHP does use Zend components (the parser engine), but the PHP Group is not part of Zend. So it's more like "Zend is the support company for PHP, one of the most prevalent software languages on the Web...." So I'm not a copyeditor.

Sleepycat. Um ... remind me ... that's the one with the DBMS, isn't it? Ah, yes, Berkeley DB. Now who would gain what from Oracle buying that?

dalecosp

So, as"owner", they intend to cash in on the small guys success only, and not liquidate them as defense?

does Oracle have anything that competes with Zend's line?

Pretty good point. I suppose I'm so anti-MS that I'm having trouble seeing any other rationale behind such a plan....

dream_scape

Weedpacket wrote:
But there seem to be some issues with what goes where. From the article:Which is a bit backwards: PHP does use Zend components (the parser engine), but the PHP Group is not part of Zend. So it's more like "Zend is the support company for PHP, one of the most prevalent software languages on the Web...."

Well that may be technically true, reality is quite a bit different. The 2 guys that created PHP are the same 2 guys that founded Zend. Both are still in key positions at Zend. And at least one of them, Andi, is still a member of the PHP Group, who is a leading contributor. It was Andi who led the OO improvements in PHP 5. I'm not sure if Zeev is still part of the PHP Group, but he works heavily on designing the Zend engine and PHP components.

So, if you purchase Zend, Inc., you basically are also purchasing 2 of PHP's biggest assets: the Zend Engine and the creators.

The question I have, is if Oracle purchases Zend, then what happens to Zend Core, like Zend Core for IBM? Would we see Zend Core for IBM go away and there would only be Zend Core exclusively for Oracle? Something tells me this may be part of Oracle's plan.

bpat1434

Just to jibe in:
Just because the two creators of PHP created Zend does NOT mean that Zend owns the language. Last time I looked, PHP was OS and no-one techincally owned the software.

Either way, it's an interesting buy-out. Oracle seems to be doing well for themselves... what's next: they buy-out MySQL and PostgreSQL? That would be the day....

dalecosp

I've actually been pondering it a bit, and wonder if it's maybe Oracle's way to get at MySQL/Postgres/$foo_competition by trying to affect PHP's development or whatnot.

Not whether or not they control the developers ... [although dream.scape shows us again his synapses are working by pointing out how closely several key persons in PHP are the Zend magnates (if you will)] ... but I'm thinking that we may see more of a push to get people using PHP to do so with Oracle db's instead of $foo.

So, Zend, under Oracle's umbrella, will release optimizers or other new products designed to make PHP + Oracle "a snap", "a breeze", "the perfect solution", blah, blah ...

And, if the developers of PHP are on Oracle's payroll, we might start to see more "beef" in the OCI extension, or push it into the normal configuration , or ...

dream_scape

bpat1434 wrote:
Last time I looked, PHP was OS and no-one techincally owned the software.

Actually someone (or maybe more than one) owns it. It is licensed as open source, which means everyone is free to have a license for it. But it is still a license none the less. If nobody held the copyrights to it, then it would be in the public domain, and there would be no need for a license. Permission to use someone else's intellectual property is the entire reason license's exist 😉

As to who actually own the copyrights on PHP, I really don't know how that works with contributing to the project. If each contributor retains the rights of what they contribute, then there are many owners. If they have to transfer their rights to the Group, then there is a single owner, the PHP Group, that is if the PHP Group is a legal entity. If not then probably all members of the group would have shared ownership. Or possibly something else entirely.

vaaaska

I've actually been pondering it a bit, and wonder if it's maybe Oracle's way to get at MySQL/Postgres/$foo_competition by trying to affect PHP's development or whatnot.

Lately I have been receiving email newsletter things from Oracle begging me to try out their database stuff...you know...because it works with PHP. Still, don't really know if there is much of a connection...but one could easily draw a line right there.

laserlight

As to who actually own the copyrights on PHP, I really don't know how that works with contributing to the project.

PHP is under the copyright of the PHP Group. Since the license text file also states that PHP "consists of voluntary contributions made by many individuals on behalf of the PHP Group", it looks like contributors do surrender their copyright to the PHP Group.

If they have to transfer their rights to the Group, then there is a single owner, the PHP Group, that is if the PHP Group is a legal entity.

The PHP Group has to be a legal entity, otherwise the copyright claim in the license file is bogus.

we may see more of a push to get people using PHP to do so with Oracle db's instead of $foo.

That does sound like it, but then I suspect PHP+Oracle will only be popular if Oracles offers more than a lightweight database engine for free under an open source license.

tisource

I don't know about the rest of you, but I think a Zend buyout by Oracle would be a really bad thing. To me, Oracle is just another Microsoft - I don't think they could resist "tweaking" PHP in some twisted sort of way, or using a more restrictive license for future releases. I don't trust them...

As much as I love PHP, if Oracle were to buy Zend, I'd consider switching back to perl for my CGI scripts...

piersk

Whoa there tisource!

Zend does not own PHP. The PHP Group owns PHP. As far as I can tell Oracle is (possibly) going to be buying Zend, not the PHP Group.

That basically means that it will be buying the company that makes Zend Studio, Zend Platform, Zend Optimizer, Zend Safeguard etc etc.

Admittedly it might mean that they will have to do some kind of funky licensing with the Zend Engine (which IIRC is quite a major part of PHP5), but other than that they don't own sheet.

Anyway, if they started to mess around with PHP, I'm sure someone would take the most recent version of OS PHP and continue the work from there.