[mythtv-users] Using Microsoft Access as a front-end to the MythTV database: HOWTO

David Segall david at segall.net
Thu Jul 26 15:40:32 UTC 2007



Richard Freeman wrote:
> David Segall wrote:
>> Unlike Linux and other GPL software which uses the LGPL for required 
>> libraries, MySQL uses the GPL. The JDBC and ODBC drivers are licensed 
>> under the GPL so MySQL can claim that any program that incorporates 
>> their libraries is a derived work and must therefore be open source. It 
>> just happens that they have a license that they will sell you if you 
>> cannot open source your program.
> 
> None of this is really an issue for Myth as it uses the GPL.  I'm sure
> that if somebody came up with something like ODBC that could be applied
> to linux software in general (and that wasn't tied to a single language
> like JDBC) and it became a standard then you'd see more plug-and-play DB
> solutions for linux.  Unfortunately, right now everybody uses
> DB-specific libraries to access their databases and nobody wants to
> rewrite their software to support somebody's favorite RDBMS.  As a
> result the network effect pretty-much guarantees that MySQL will be with
> us for a long time - nobody wants to run two DBs on their server if they
> can help it...
I don't disagree with anything you have said but what happens in the, 
not unlikely, event that the negotiators at Schedules Direct 
<http://www.schedulesdirect.org/> conclude that a fifty dollar closed 
source program is the solution to paying for the U.S. TV program guides.

There are other scenarios in which a MythTV user may want to use a 
closed source program to access the MythTV database including using 
Microsoft Access as described in my original post :)


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