On Wednesday January 16th Sun Microsystems announced that it had agreed to acquire the extremely popular open-source database developer (and the “M” in LAMP) MySQL AB. The $1 Billion deal consists of $800 Million in cash and $200 Million in options.

With this acquisition, along with the open releases of Solaris and Java, it seems as if Sun is ramping up their open-source strategy.

But despite reassurances from all sides that this will not affect the set of languages/platforms or the ideals of MySQL, the reaction to this news has been mixed. While many people are excited about the possibilities, others are worried about LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP/Perl/Python) becoming SAMP (with “S” standing for Solaris). Only time will tell.

This news comes almost 2 years after Oracle tried - and failed - to acquire MySQL in 2006. (In related news Oracle has recently acquired BEA Systems).

Jonathan Schwartz, CEO and President of Sun, answers more questions here.

Kaj Arno, MySQL VP of Community Relations, explains what this means for MySQL.