
Apache ShardingSphere
A distributed SQL ecosystem that adds data sharding, read/write splitting, encryption, and other enterprise capabilities on top of MySQL and other databases, deployable as an enhanced JDBC driver or as a standalone proxy.
ShardingSphere positions itself as “Database Plus”: rather than replacing MySQL, it builds a standardized enhancement layer on top of it, adding distributed computing (sharding, read/write splitting, SQL federation), data security (encryption, masking, audit), and traffic control without requiring a new storage engine. It ships two access modes that can be mixed in the same deployment — ShardingSphere-JDBC, a client-side driver that works with any JVM ORM, and ShardingSphere-Proxy, a standalone server that speaks the MySQL wire protocol so any MySQL-compatible client can connect to it directly.
The project became an Apache Software Foundation Top-Level Project in April 2020 and is released under the Apache License 2.0.
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