The aim is to alter libsvn_fs (and much smaller parts of svnadmin, and libsvn_repos) to support storing filesystem data in a MySQL database. Configuration data will be stored in a repository directory, along with the existing non-BDB repository stuff.

The practical reasons for such a scheme may possibly include increased efficiency, integration with existing SQL databases, another interface to the data (using simple SQL statements), and buzzword points. Since, AFAIK, this hasn't been done before, I'm hoping that the one practical outcome of this experiment will be to provide exciting new data on the above.