Daily Network Monitor

Developers at open-source player MySQL are hard at work on a project code-named “Merlin”, which is designed to make it easier for customers to manage and maintain the company’s database software, a source close to MySQL says.

Merlin is a server-based database monitoring and advisory service which continually scans a user’s database network for any likely system crashes, bottlenecks or security vulnerabilities, the source said. Under development at MySQL for 22 months, Merlin is due to debut late in the fourth quarter of this calendar year or early in the first quarter of 2007. It’s unclear whether Merlin contains any third-party software or if MySQL developers have modeled the offering on any existing database monitoring and advisory service.

The aim of Merlin is to simplify MySQL database administration for both small to midsize businesses (SMBs) and enterprises. While SMBs often can’t afford to employ database administrators (DBAs) to look after their MySQL implementations, larger firms are running into difficulties trying to find sufficient DBAs with specific MySQL skills. Customer demand was a strong factor in the vendor deciding to create Merlin, the source added.

In a recent interview, Marten Mickos, chief executive officer at MySQL, declined to comment on the project. However, he said that one of his company’s main focuses in the coming year will be to provide tools and other offerings to make life easier for MySQL DBAs.

You can read the whole article here.

EMC has announced an upgrade to its application discovery appliance, the Smart Application Discovery Manager, which is designed to help users better understand and map relationships among applications and infrastructure components.

ADM gives users an inventory of applications and maps how they are linked to IT resources, such as servers, network devices and storage arrays. A built-in dependency catalog lets enterprises keep track of software and hardware configuration changes and compare them on a server-to-server basis.

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As detailed in an article in C|net News, Britain’s BT Group has snapped up U.S.-based Counterpane Internet Security for a sum of more than $20 million as part of a continuing commitment to the security offering and overall growth of its Global Services business.

Counterpane provides managed network security services.