Oracle announced Thursday that it has launched MySQL Connect, a user-focused event to be held Sept. 29 and 30 in San Francisco, the weekend before Oracle OpenWorld.

Oracle's proclamation comes just before the kicks off next Tuesday in Santa Clara, California. It's run by MySQL software vendor Percona.

That MySQL has two conferences must come as good news to users and developers of the open-source database management system. For the past few years, the fate of the MySQL Conference seemed more and more uncertain as MySQL itself was passed, through successive acquisitions, from MySQL AB to Sun Microsystems and now to Oracle.

After it purchased Sun in 2010, Oracle was mum as to if, like Sun, it would continue to support the MySQL event. Oracle typically folds user conferences for the technologies it acquires into its annual OpenWorld conference. So many assumed Oracle would not continue to organize, or even back, the gathering. O'Reilly, which ran the event by itself in 2010 and 2011, decided not to continue running the show.