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Sun Microsystems Software Linux

Where Is Sun Going With Linux? 224

Posted by timothy from the any-which-way-but-loose dept.
jg21 writes "LinuxWorld has an interview with Sun's head software honcho John Loiacono which provides an opportunity to gauge Sun's intentions with regard to Linux in particular, open source in general, and where Solaris fits in. In spite of the assertion "Sun was founded on the principle of open source. We have contributed more lines of open source code than any other entity on the planet except for Cal Berkeley," Sun seems to view Linux somewhat grudgingly, judging from Loiacono's tone: "Linux is something that we'll have to interoperate with because it may exist far beyond whatever Solaris turns out to be." An important read, if only because a Windows-free Loiacono notes that he's been using the Linux-based Java Desktop System for a year. "It is not perfect by any means," he concedes though. Refreshing honesty from Sun's top software exec."
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Where Is Sun Going With Linux? More

Where Is Sun Going With Linux?

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  • More and more Sun seems to becoming the thing they hate, despite the fact that they also seem to be trying harder and harder not to.

    I really hope someone can prove me wrong about this.
    • They aren't trying to not become what they hate - they hate Microsoft because they envy them. Sun wants to be Microsoft. The problem is that they aren't, and there is only room for one Microsoft in MS's markets.

      • Re:They sound like Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jdray ( 645332 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:37PM (#10802303) Homepage Journal
        I don't think they're trying to be Microsoft, as they offer hardware, too. And they're not trying to be Apple, either, because they're small potatoes on the home user front and have hardly anything in the corporate environment. No, I think Sun is trying to be the Sun that someone envisioned many years ago; the provider of stem-to-stern computing environments for an enterprise, from the server hardware to the IM client and everything in between. They won't succeed, though, without addressing the home user. You can't get mindshare without it.

        • Re:I don't agree (Score:5, Insightful)

          by symbolic ( 11752 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @06:38PM (#10802947)

          That's like saying that in order for IBM to sell mainframes to large and medium-sized corporate customers, they have to gain the mindshare of home users. There are two different markets here, and the one of interest is business-to-business. While I might agree that getting mindshare of the home user might be important in some cases, I don't think an enterprise information system is one of them.

          • Re:I don't agree (Score:3, Insightful)

            by 1lus10n ( 586635 )
            No. Because selling mainframes alone is not what sun is trying to do. I still think the parent post is wrong since he thinks in order to sell to bussiness's you need to sell to home users. Its the other way around. Once you start effectivly selling your desktops to bussiness's people will want the same thing at home. This is EXACTLY how MS came into power, and why it has stayed there. Schools and shops run MS so people run it at home.

            Sun has not had a cost effective end user desktop. Ever. I know because

            • Re:I don't agree (Score:2, Interesting)

              by bob beta ( 778094 )
              I once worked at a company where there were several whole floors filled with cubicles with QA people in them, all with Sun Ultrasparc Desktops.

              Some of them were proud, even zealous about it. Not many. And they were in the process of replacing them all with cheap Clone PCs.
      • They are not smart enough to be Microsoft.

        They are too small to be an HP or IBM.

        They are too big and slow to be a Redhat.

        They are not unique and creative enough to be Apple.

        However, despite all the stock prices and layoffs, they are doing far better than SGI, SCO and Novell.

        • They are not smart enough to be Microsoft.
          They are too small to be an HP or IBM.
          They are too big and slow to be a Redhat.
          They are not unique and creative enough to be Apple.

          That was more or less wrong.

          They are not martketing savvy enough to be MS.
          Their top level management is not bussiness savvy enough to beat MS.
          They dont have a unique enough goal to be apple.
          Prior to the mass exodus of a few years ago Sun had about the same amount of brain power as any other computer company. Brain pow

  • Linux and Sun (Score:4, Insightful)

    by terminalrecluse ( 830632 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:03PM (#10802001)
    With all the support sun has put into Solaris I can understand why they would look upon Linux with some aprehension.

    • Re:Linux and Sun (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Kethinov ( 636034 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:07PM (#10802024) Homepage Journal
      You don't just pump money into something and say "make it good". If Sun isn't happy with *nix on the desktop, then they should start hashing out some specifics on what needs to be changed / added.

      Personally I'm quite happy with *nix on the desktop minus a few largely inconsequential nitpicks here and there.

      • Re:Linux and Sun (Score:5, Insightful)

        by sysadmn ( 29788 ) <{sysadmn} {at} {gmail.com}> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:23PM (#10802166) Homepage
        Actually, Sun did. Who do you think pays for the bulk of the work in GNOME to make it meet various usability guidelines?

        • Re:Linux and Sun (Score:4, Interesting)

          by LnxAddct ( 679316 ) <sgk25@drexel.edu> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:57PM (#10802514)
          Red Hat. They've done a hell of alot more for Gnome in every regard including usability guidelines. Gnome 2.8 is an excellent product, its the first time I'm using gnome over kde. But don't go giving Sun too much credit, check the change log sometime, you'll see lots of red hat.
          Regards,
          Steve
        • Actually, Sun did. Who do you think pays for the bulk of the work in GNOME to make it meet various usability guidelines?

          When the sun guy comes here to talk to us, he brings his PowerBook with him. Hmmm.
          • Would you expect not to see any GM products in the FORD factory parking lot???
            (Except for Japan, I expect the answer would be yes.)
            • Err ... I am brain dead. I meant to say, only in Japan would you see ONLY see Fords in the Ford parking lot.
            • Would you expect not to see any GM products in the FORD factory parking lot???

              Actually, I know that Ford does not allow anything but fords on their factory parking lot. At least for their employees.

              I don't know about the vice-versa.

              • I work as a contractor right now at an OEM that produces components for GM cars/trucks. One of the main QA people I work with talks often about how he drives a Chrysler vehicle.

        • Re:Linux and Sun (Score:3, Interesting)

          by discogravy ( 455376 )
          Is that why the majority of all Solaris versions ship with Gnome 2.0? The only version of solaris that doesn't use the incredibly ancient 2.0 is the Solaris 10 Beta Build 69 for the x86 architecture. I couldn't get it to run on a dell desktop machine that I installed the beta on, and none of the sparc builds have JDS...hell, even XFCE would a welcome change from CDE.

          So they've spent a ton of money to improve gnome....so that they don't use it?

    • Re:Linux and Sun (Score:4, Interesting)

      by grahamsz ( 150076 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:07PM (#10802025) Homepage Journal
      The way I see it, solaris is converging with linux. Sun plan to provide a consistent UI so that end users wont see any difference between Java Desktop on a dell system and Java Desktop on Sparc or Operton running solaris.

      Solaris does have some features which are missing in linux and Sun have the advantage that solaris is designed to work with Sun hardware... much like MacOS is designed to work with Apple hardware.

  • Solaris interoperating with (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ElitistWhiner ( 79961 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:05PM (#10802012) Journal
    ... the enemy. They did to OPENSTEP the same that is in store for Linux. Obsolescence!

  • They are probably going to.... (Score:3, Informative)

    by i_want_you_to_throw_ ( 559379 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:05PM (#10802014) Journal
    hell. Seriously.

    I know that a lot of folks when thinking of the Open Source wars think that it's about Linux replacing Windows but where I work we are replacing Solaris with Linux.
    It's mucho easy to do.

  • Deja Vu (Score:5, Insightful)

    by 4of12 ( 97621 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:06PM (#10802015) Homepage Journal

    Sun seems to view Linux somewhat grudgingly,

    Somehow I'm reminded of the imperious Ken Olsen of DEC dismissing UNIX in the late 1970's despite the popularity of his company's computers being used in all kinds of UNIX niches. A very different alternate reality might have developed if (a) Ken Olsen had jumped onto UNIX and (b) successfully put it onto desktop PCs early on.

    I owe a debt to Sun; my Linux experience isn't where it would be if Sun hadn't contributed so much to UNIX standards.

    They could do it again, or sit back while Novell does it instead of them.

    • Re:Deja Vu (Score:2, Funny)

      by jinxidoru ( 743428 )
      A very different alternate reality might have developed if (a) Ken Olsen had jumped onto UNIX and (b) successfully put it onto desktop PCs early on.

      Alternate reality?!? That sounds awesome. Would I be able to fly and pick up large buildings in that reality. If so, it's probably wise that Ken Olsen dismissed UNIX back in the 70's. I can assure you all that I would not have used my powers for good.

    • Re:Deja Vu (Score:5, Interesting)

      by killjoe ( 766577 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @06:43PM (#10803000)
      Even though they had fantastic engineers DEC was run by morons. When the PCs (Z80 based CPM ones) were gaining popularity DEC had a PC with both a 8080 and a Z80. This machine could run DOS and CP/M. It had high resolution color, it had a 132 column screen with smooth scrolling, it had built in VT100 emulation. It was the best PC on the market and they could not sell it.

      Very soon after that they shrunk the PDP-11 into a desktop machine. A sixteen bit PC with thousands of applications running on it. It had HUGE (for the time) storage both hard disks and floppies. Oh and get this it had a GUI straight out of Xerox Parc. With menus and resizable windows and everything!. They could not sell it.

      Very soon after that they came out with the micro-vax. This was a minicomputer on your desk. Way more powerful then any PC on the market and it ran more software then DOS. They could not sell it.

      Then they came out with the alpha chip. A screamingly fast 64 bit machine in a tower case that destroyed any PC in terms of performance. They could not sell it.

      How a company can create one fantastic product after another and still get it's ass kicked like a 90 pound weakling is beyond me. I can only attribute to the incompetence of people like Ken Olsen and his top level staff.

      By all rights Digital should have ruled the desktop.

      • It isn't that (Score:3, Insightful)

        by wombatmobile ( 623057 )

        Then they came out with the alpha chip. A screamingly fast 64 bit machine in a tower case that destroyed any PC in terms of performance. They could not sell it.

        How a company can create one fantastic product after another and still get it's ass kicked like a 90 pound weakling is beyond me.

        "Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes."

        - E.W. Dijkstra

        • Re:It isn't that (Score:3, Insightful)

          by T-Ranger ( 10520 )

          That was a reflection on the difference between software and hardware.

          But the unstated point is true: history has shown that sucuess and failures of both hardware and software systems have little to do with their capabilities, and their capabilities in relation to other things available. Its all about business and marketing. DEC in the 80s, Microsoft, the Super Foonly, OS/2, the Amiga, etc, etc, etc. All projects whose fate was unrelated to their quality.

      • Re:Deja Vu (Score:3, Informative)

        by FortranDragon ( 98478 )
        Even though they had fantastic engineers DEC was run by morons. When the PCs (Z80 based CPM ones) were gaining popularity DEC had a PC with both a 8080 and a Z80. This machine could run DOS and CP/M. It had high resolution color, it had a 132 column screen with smooth scrolling, it had built in VT100 emulation. It was the best PC on the market and they could not sell it.

        Ah, the DEC Rainbow 100. I have two of them. ;-) (All Rainbows have the Z80 and an _8088_, not the 8080.)

        The problem was compatibilit

      • DEC: famous for poor marketing (Score:5, Funny)

        by devphil ( 51341 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @09:34PM (#10804283) Homepage


        There's a standard industry joke that if DEC were in charge of marketing for Kentucky Fried Chicken, the advertisements would be for "warm dead bird". Their technical staff was brilliant, and even their general management staff had some bright bulbs in their, but the marketing was utterly inept.

  • LWM's senior contributing analyst, Bill Claybrook, spoke with John Loiacono, executive vice president of Sun Microsystem's Software Group about his new job, and what he has in store for Sun's Linux strategy.

    Q: You replaced Jonathan Schwartz several months ago as Sun's software leader.
    Jonathan was very visible. Is this the way you are going to do it?
    A: In my previous job as VP of Sun's operating platforms group, I was more visible than over the past few months simply because we were making some changes inte

  • Interesting, Lies? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Cuchullain ( 25146 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:07PM (#10802028) Homepage
    "Sun was founded on the principle of open source."

    This seems patently false. I could be wrong about this, but his claims that Solaris contains huge amounts of open source seems like a purposefully misleading comment.

    He lists a bunch of programs, but none of them were developed by Sun. Can anyone correct me on this, or is he just Mr. Marketing?

    Cuchullain
    • OpenOffice.org was what happened when Sun released most of the source code (except for third-party stuff that they were not allowed) to what was at the time StarOffice (5.1, IIRC).
      • They may have released the source, but it wasn't developed by them. They aquired StarOffice from a German company (IIRC Star Labs or something). I used to use it in the late 90s until Sun bought it.
    • Well, it's != GPL, anyway. And everyone seems to think of Open Source as the GPL. So. :P

      Vast chunks of early commercial unices integrated large amounts of BSD Unix, which used the BSD License. This license, summed up, is essentially "do whatever the hell you want with this code just so long as we're credited for writing it."

      So yeah, Sun - SunOS/Solaris- is built on "Open Source". Open Source they don't have to give back. :P
      • And everyone seems to think of Open Source as the GPL. So. :P

        They do? News to me.

        In fact, my experience is much the opposite; many claim that programs which come with source but lack the freedoms that make a program open source are open source. Java is a good example, in fact.

    • Re:Interesting, Lies? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AKAImBatman ( 238306 ) * <akaimbatman AT gmail DOT com> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:19PM (#10802125) Homepage Journal
      "Sun was founded on the principle of open source."

      This seems patently false. I could be wrong about this, but his claims that Solaris contains huge amounts of open source seems like a purposefully misleading comment.

      Maybe he was referring to the fact that SunOS was BSD based? The key developers when Sun was founded, also did a lot of work on the original BSD codebase.

    • Re:Interesting, Lies? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Sun developed NFS & RPC, and the specs were open sourced in the 1980s when you were in daipers.

    • Re:Interesting, Lies? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Baki ( 72515 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:28PM (#10802216)
      Sun has given away more (important) source code than any other company. They contributed to BSD Unix, defined many of the later UNIX sysv standards and gave them away. They created RPC's, NIS, NFS, xview. All of it was given away under a very liberal licence. UNIX and thus Linux would have been dead without Sun. Many Linux users are scandalously ungrateful and have no sense for UNIX tradition and history.

      Also, Solaris is a pure and clean UNIX. I can imagine that it must hurt the engineers of such a beauty that they are surpassed by a "bastard" UNIX. However that is a reality they shall have to live with. But I can understand their hesitance.
      • "Many Linux users are scandalously ungrateful and have no sense for UNIX tradition and history"

        Well you realize why right? I mean its not like Sun didn't earn Linux user's scorn will the BS they've put out about Linux over the years. Should Linux users be grateful? Fine. Should they like Sun after all of the Linux bashing? Why would they? You can't honestly be surprised, although being that it appears your a big Sun fan I guess for some odd reason you are.

      • Re:Interesting, Lies? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by steve_l ( 109732 )
        They didnt, of course, get involved with X11; pushing NeWS instead; shame that little beast died.

        To an extent, Solaris is a better kernel than Linux, at least from an enterprise perspective. Hey, even AIX has some better features there. Too often in Linux we cheat and take the "recompile everything" tactic of backwards binary compatibility.

        But: where is the ACPI support in Solaris? The power management needed to make it work on a laptop, or the dynamic WLAN binding? And the Java APIs to go with them? Miss

      • Re:Interesting, Lies? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by killjoe ( 766577 )
        You are referring to the SunOfOld. That sun does not exist anymore. That Sun was also a dominant force in the world of computing. It was also a very successful and respected company.

        that sun does not exist anymore. Now you have sun run by jokers (some of whom were with the old sun) who are flailing around trying to grab on to something that might make them money while watching MS and Linux eath their lunch. This sun has executives who write the most assinine things imaginable on their blogs and give press

  • My take (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gregarican ( 694358 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:15PM (#10802091) Homepage
    He sounds like he has his head screwed on right from what I read of TFA. He concedes the in certain markets Solaris won't reach the status that Linux has. True. And he also states how that Linux disto branches are more disparate than has been the case in the past. Red Hat does seem to hold a tremendous market share. Whether this is a good or a bad thing is up to the reader.

    As for the posters who are claiming that Sun is just another Microsoft and whatnot, just because a company is large and competitive doesn't mean that it's always patently evil. To me I believe that Sun is trying to adapt to a changing environment to keep their collective heads above water. Much akin to Novell's migration toward SUSE and all of the Linux inclusions in their new services.

    If most **experts** view Linux as the most serious threat to Microsoft these former big players are trying to grab a life preserver. Hopefully they can help elevate and improve what they are latching onto, however. If not then things will get more fragmented and more financially endangered in the end.
    • As for the posters who are claiming that Sun is just another Microsoft and whatnot, just because a company is large and competitive doesn't mean that it's always patently evil.

      Sun isn't evil, but they are dangerous. They are dangerous because they still effectively own a widely used platform (Sun Java) while at the same time their business is seriously threatened.

      Imagine Java on Linux became the standard way of running web applications and Linux desktop systems; the majority of Linux servers and desktop
      • Sun reminds me of Caldera at the time Ransom Love was trashing the GPL. It wouldn't surprise me if they pulled a SCO when their stock goes far enough down the drain.

    • Re:My take (Score:5, Insightful)

      by _damnit_ ( 1143 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @08:40PM (#10803861) Journal
      I work at Sun. I have for many years. I have my own opinion of where things are headed which is not based off of hallucinations from the company Kool Aide. I agree with a lot of your comments. Since I don't post a lot here I'll just rant for a while...

      I was one of many who were completely pissed when they cancelled Solaris x86 development. Users and internal employees howled for months until someone pulled their head out of their ass and recommitted to the platform. On a couple of fronts, they did a good job with it. They didn't turn up the hype machine to 11 when it clearly wasn't ready for use and they decided to incorporate open source where it was needed (a la the Xfree86 drivers and gnome). Is it ready now? Not really. Not if you are looking for the /. users desktop (especially those with ids >500000). It may never fit that bill.

      However, the incessant whining on /. about Sun's halfhearted support of Linux needs to be tempered with a reality check. Sun has the number one Unix OS in volume. Unix developers write apps for Solaris because it is the largest OS base. Solaris is the only reason anyone buys a Sparc box. Selling Sparc boxes is Sun's main form of income. Everyone stop and put 2 and 2 together here...

      Sun cannot show any waivering on its support of Solaris. Period. Keeping developers on Solaris is vital to its survival. Without the apps
      can't give the slightest impression that they are waivering on Solaris' future. Sure, they can sell linux. They can't run around touting how much better Linux is than Solaris, though. That would be suicide. [Beside the fact that it's just not true.]

      It is a delicate tightrope act that others (HP in particular) have not done well. Does anyone know where HP is going? One day they are in love with Itanium, the next they are for Xeon. Everyone please move your HP-UX apps to Itanic (oops) cause that's where we are going except for workstations now.

      I believe Sun was waiting for the 64-bit transition that didn't happen. It's coming, but slower than anticipated. Solaris 10 will be one of how many true 64 bit OSes (user and kernel land) for x86-64? There's no HP-UX or AIX out there for x86. [BSD zealots punchin your timecards now.] OS choice is a Good Thing. That's was one of the mantras when I started using Linux (slackware baby!)

      [BTW I know the 64bit version is not due until Q1 or Q2 next year. Since I am going to get flamed anyway, does linux support 64bit apps yet? Not just support for system memory above 4GB, but a full 64bit API set? Just curious as I don't know.]

      For years I warned people on /. that RedHat was a for-profit company that would eventually abuse the very people it claimed to help. It's a shame that what happened to Unix in the Unix wars looks to be a possibilty for Linux too. The only hopes I ever had for truly compatible distributions were either Debian or one of the United Linux type groups. None of them worked. Debian is an example of how not to organize a group. They lost any chance of being the base from which other distros are created by always being 6 months behind even their own schedule.

      It is a connected world and Solaris will never be the volume leader. It must interoperate with other OSes. That is the general direction it is headed. As examples see Janus, NFS, Java, Liberty Alliance and the Microsoft settlement. Sun can be a middleware company, a support services provider and a high-end hardware provider. IBM is an example. They are trying to differentiate themselves from IBM by formenting the idea that IBM locks you in and Sun gives you choices. Is that true? I admit I am biased on that so I'll shut up.

      Where are they going? I think they/we are headed in the right direction finally. There are still a lot of areas where we are screwing up. I get pissed off at management often enough to keep looking at my alternatives. But, altogether things are getting brighter for Sun.

  • The funny thing is... (Score:5, Funny)

    by BrianWCarver ( 569070 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:16PM (#10802105) Homepage
    All of Sun's executives saw the headline, "Where Is Sun Going With Linux?" and dropped everything to quickly find out themselves.

    Then they realize this is just an interview with another Sun executive, and they go, "Ahhh. Crap. I thought I was going to actually learn something!"

    Honestly, when someone figures out where Sun is going with Linux, Open Source, Java, Microsoft, etc. please tell Sun!
  • I hate to ask but why not bundle there java desktop with Solaris x86 instead of Linux? Can Solaris X86 run Linux binaries?

  • More like... (Score:4, Funny)

    by GillBates0 ( 664202 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:22PM (#10802154) Homepage Journal
    We have contributed more lines of open source code than any other entity on the planet except for Cal Berkeley

    The WHOLE solar system.

  • I'm still amused... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jd ( 1658 ) <imipak@ y a hoo.com> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:23PM (#10802168) Homepage Journal
    ...that Sun believes that counting lines of code is important. Linux today has maybe a few tens (or hundreds, depending on how you patch it) lines of code. Linux 0.1 had something like 10,000 lines of code. Linux today is far and away more powerful than version 0.1 was, but it is NOT 1,000 times or 10,000 times as powerful.


    As for where Sun is going - I get the distinct feeling that they don't know. They say that interoperability with Linux is important, but since Linux cannot be tightly defined, how do you define interoperable? At the IETF protocol spec level? At the POSIX level? These have nothing to do with Linux, and most OS' do all that already.


    If we're talking IBCS-style binary compatibility between Linux and Solaris, that could be interesting. Linux developers have largely dropped that path, though, preferring to build a structure for native apps (and pressuring companies to provide them) than translating between system calls and system quirks.


    I don't see why Sun would chase that path, unless they see Linux evolving from being "just" a kernel and/or OS and into a Unix-like standard in its own right. POSIX and Unix98 certifications are much rarer than 'compliance', because the certification requirements are so obnoxious. A truly open/free specification that ANY company can "certify" would be vastly superior.


    The idea that a "Linux Stanard" could appear, against which Solaris could be compliant or certified, would strengthen Sun's hand. It would also fit with the anti-Linux hostility from Sun's head honcho, as Linux as a kernel doesn't need to exist for a Linux specification to be around. Indeed, a surviving Linux kernel would mean a moving target, which would be harder to meet.


    The idea Linux would out-last Solaris is interesting, as this implies Sun are developing a replacement in the same way Solaris replaced SunOS. It also implies Sun expect to ditch Solaris relatively soon, as what is understood by "Linux" today is NOT what will be understood by "Linux" by version 3 and certainly not by version 4.


    I don't feel any beter for knowing more of Sun's plans - it feels too much like a hostile take-over bid designed to enable Sun to ship an OS that can "steal" Linux' market share rather than fight fair over it.

    • If we're talking IBCS-style binary compatibility between Linux and Solaris, that could be interesting.

      Sun calls that Project Janus. They need it because more and more apps are certified on RHEL and SLES, but not Solaris x86. Thus to run those apps Solaris must run Linux binaries. ...Linux evolving from being "just" a kernel and/or OS and into a Unix-like standard in its own right. ... The idea that a "Linux Stanard" could appear, against which Solaris could be compliant or certified, would strengthen Sun'
    • Well, considering Linux .1(and point .01, and most of the 0.x branch) did not even have a networking stack in it, I would argue that v2.6 IS 1,000 times better than v0.1
    • That should read tens or hundreds of MILLIONS of lines of code. That is, unless Alan Cox and Linus Torvalds have talked Transmeta into reimplementing Linux as a gigantic VLSI processor core...
    • Counting lines of code *is* important, just not for estimating how "powerful" a program is (what the hell does that mean, anyway?)

      It's a good metric to track on enterprise development to get a handle on time usage of a development team, as well as progress towards whatever source estimates you originally set for a particular method/class/program.

      There are a number of build-system integrated SLOC estimators like JavaNCSS and SLOCCount that help with tracking it, and will also provide other useful style-ind
      • Let's say you optimize the code for space, halving the number of lines, then double the functionality, doubling the number of lines. You end up with something twice as powerful, at the same size.

        A more accurate measurement is the number of paths through the code, because (typically) one path represents one complete operation you can perform, regardless of how you actually go about implementing those operations.

        The best measurement of all, though, is to translate how the code works into what the code doe

    • Having said that, gnu/linux before openoffice.org arrived was very much in the geek's toy category.

      Pretty much everyone needs an office suite, and the likes of KOffice, Gnome Office and so on weren't really up to the task. They just weren't ready, and some could argue that they still aren't.

      Openoffice.org for all it's faults is a pretty worthy msoffice competitor, and that, probably more than anything else, has made gnu/linux on the desktop a viable proposition.
  • Sun has been quite schizophrenic about Linux for years. They have done good things and bad in roughly equal amount. They've said good things and bad in roughly equal amount.

    The result of this is that while I don't really consider them an enemy of FOSS, I sure don't feel they can be trusted. I'd rather trust MicroSoft. At least with MicroSoft you KNOW that they are intending to 0wn your soul, your pants, and everything in between. So you can understand what they mean. With Sun you haven't got a clue,

  • Sun specifically will not under any circumstance include GPL'd code in the Solaris kernel. Sun was recently somewhat screwed by Intel. Sun had been waiting for Intel to release wireless drivers (mainly for Solaris x86 laptop/wireless users). When Intel finally did release the code, they did it under GPL. Thus, completely screwing Sun's ability to include the drivers in their distribution. Technically, they could add the drivers, but they strictly adhere to the idea that NO GPL code will become part of the



    • they strictly adhere to the idea that NO GPL code will become part of the Solaris kernel


      Hm... FreeBSD has a similar policy, and so does Apache - what's the problem?

      • But FreeBSD DOES have a few components of GPL code (ext2fs, the *good* floating emulator) in the kernel, they're just usually omitted in release builds. It will still warn you that your kernel is 'tainted' when you compile it in.

        But being anti-GPL in kernels is a Good Thing. Let's face it, kernels are where a lot of good useful tech resides, and they're what go into embedded systems. GPL makes it too messy to borrow code (you have to open-source the host program, and if you derive a significant portion f
    • And Microsoft and Oracle etc. won't use GPL'ed code in their main products either. That has nothing to do with Sun being "founded on open source".
    • Considering SunOS is a BSD derived operating system, and that Sun has developed and given a massive amount of opensource sourcecode to the community, I would think that the statement "Sun is founded on opensource" is correct. Opensource is a LOT more than the GPL, but sometimes I think people only see what they want to see. Theres a whole nother world out there, and it isnt GPLed, its BSDLed.
    • Sun took the BSD code developed at Berkeley and built a proprietary system out of it. I think that counts as "being founded on open source", just not in a good way: their source code went from fairly open to quite proprietary.
      • And most of that development was done by Bill Joy, the same guy who wrote the original code in the first place - he just kept on doing what he had been doing, but Sun paid him to do it.

        That's the BSD license, like it or dislike it. Nothing to do with "good" and "evil".

    • CNET News.com November 4, 2004 Open-source details hold up Solaris release [zdnet.com]

      Schwartz said Sun hasn't ruled out releasing Solaris under the General Public License (GPL), the license that governs Linux. That would mean that elements of Solaris could theoretically be adopted in Linux, or vice-versa, though integration of core features could prove technologically difficult.

      • GPL, LPL, BSD, X11, MIT.... It's all good. I think it'd be news if Sun was seriously considering any of those. In the end, that will be too much to expect. I think a SISSL type license is far more likely. That would be less than a good thing as well. Linux and BSD devs might have to fall all over themselves in a future court case proving a negative: that they never were exposed to Sun's "Open Source" code.

        I think the most interesting thing they could do is pick the LGPL. The license is incompatible wi

    • Sun specifically will not under any circumstance include GPL'd code in the Solaris kernel. Sun was recently somewhat screwed by Intel. Sun had been waiting for Intel to release wireless drivers (mainly for Solaris x86 laptop/wireless users). When Intel finally did release the code, they did it under GPL. Thus, completely screwing Sun's ability to include the drivers in their distribution.

      So how does this prevent Sun from licensing the drivers from Intel under a different license? GPL isn't the ONLY lice

    • Sun specifically *can't* include GPL'd code in the SunOS kernel. (technical nitpick: Solaris is the OE; SunOS is the kernel).

      The GPL states that they can't - or, at least, they'd have to rip out everything that they've licensed with anyone else, in order to include some GPL'd code.
      Quite frankly, why would they want to? Linux has better x86 drivers, but apart from that, SunOS is a far more stable, scalable kernel than Linux.
      This isn't intended as flamebait - I use Linux on my desktop daily; my website run

  • Misleading statements (Score:3, Insightful)

    by sloanster ( 213766 ) * <ringfan@@@mainphrame...com> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:28PM (#10802217) Journal
    Today, Solaris is far less expensive than Red Hat or SUSE. The list price on a two-way Red Hat is about $799 per year. My first year price for Solaris with service and support and the right-to-use license is about the same as Red Hat.

    Of course, you CAN find expensive versions of Linux - how much do you want to spend? I'm sure we can find a way to accomodate you. Big corporations tend to go for the expensive options when it comes to OSes and software.

    But what the man doesn't want to mention, is that you can get suse professional for $59 and set up a desktop, server, or whatever. updates for 2 years via suse/yast, or install apt, and get upgrades & legacy support that way. Many small businesses are quite happy with that arrangement.

    Suse Linux runs just fine on my laptop, or on my 4-way opteron server, or on the mainframe, if I want it, and the Suse tradition of reliability and solid engineering continues under Novell's leadership.

    • Yeah, and you can get that one copy of Suse Pro and stick on as many boxes as you have to hand.

      They do have a point about the RH pricing model; my home machine(s) and the work box ('but not the laptop) are all Suse 9.1, with a 9.2 upgrade planned. The laptop is winXP as (a) its a dodgy ACPI BIOS that everything hates (even XP), and I need a windows box to cross test the java stuff I write to make sure it still works on the old platform.
  • If everything you have copyright on that is available under an open source license counts than the FSF might have a good bunch of code going for them.

  • Linux Schminux (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MisterP ( 156738 ) * on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:36PM (#10802286)
    For the record I was once a Sun fanboy and I maintain several hundred sparc boxes for a largish ISP.

    I think they are mixing up FOSS and Linux. I would guess that 95% of Sun's customers don't care about a kernel. Solaris as good as it is would be much more appealing if I didn't have to install a few dozen OSS packages in order to get the system usable. Give me Apache, Tomcat and all the good GNU stuff that comes with any standard Linux distro.

    I believe it was Bruce Perens (maybe ESR?) in Revolution OS that said before Linux was around, he would spend days GNUifying Sun machines. It's the same damn thing 20 years later!

    Oh and ditch sparc already. Give me a quad Opteron on a board that uses OpenBoot.
    • believe it was Bruce Perens (maybe ESR?) in Revolution OS that said before Linux was around, he would spend days GNUifying Sun machines. It's the same damn thing 20 years later!

      Yeah, I remember those days. You didn't even have gzip to work with.

      However, with Solaris 8 and beyond, they have been including many GNU goodies, plus there is a suppliment CD with the systems that has many other common OSS stuff we have all become used to (sudo, kde, etc).

      Solaris ships by default (from memory) with less, zsh
    • Ummm... Solaris comes with most of those packages now. Even if the ones you want aren't included, just put them on the jumpstart server of on an NFS share like /usr/dist or something. Are you new to this? That's a pretty good endorsement for Sun if that's your only complaint.
    • Yup, they're all there.
      If you had RTFA, you'd have read that Apache, SAMBA, and others were mentioned.
      Tomcat is on the Companion CD, and as much of "the good GNU stuff"

      href="http://wwws.sun.com/software/solaris/freewa r e/
      Click on (say) "Solaris 9 Companion Software individual packages download", then (say) "Solaris 9 Companion Software x86 Platform Edition", you get this:

      Depends Package, English (Depend-intel-pkgs.tar.bz2, 7.75 MB) Download Now!
      Printing package, English (Printing-intel-pkgs.tar.

  • A few facts (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gtoomey ( 528943 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:40PM (#10802324)
    - Sun was co-founded by Bill Joy, the original author of BSD

    - they have given the community Java, Open Office, NFS, & RPC. While Java is not strictly open source it is widely used.

    - Sun's John Bosak created XML.

    - they still make most of their money from hardware and services

    - just about all the machines they sell can run linux (and bsd)

    • Re:A few facts (Score:3, Interesting)

      by geg81 ( 816215 )
      Sun was co-founded by Bill Joy, the original author of BSD

      Yes. More importantly, he took the BSD code with him and made it proprietary. That's how Sun was founded.

      they have given the community Java,

      They haven't "given" Java, they still own it.

      Open Office,

      Yes, that's nice. They didn't write it and it's a bit flaky, but it's still nice.

      NFS, & RPC

      Junk. And even then, they only "gave it" once it was clear it wasn't worth much anymore.

      While Java is not strictly open source it is widely us
  • Since they lost that patent suit to Kodak, w.r.t Java, does that mean any chance of Java being GPL'ed are null and void because it's now officially patent encumbered?
  • When I read this title, I imagined Bill Gates, six-shooters in hand, sneer on his face:

    "Where you think yer goin' with that Linux, Sun?" ... or...

    "Drop the Linux, Sun, and nobody gets hurt, see?"

  • I didnt read TFA, but... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by floydman ( 179924 ) <floydman@gmail.com> on Friday November 12, 2004 @05:50PM (#10802421)
    from my own experience at work:

    We have several clusters from work from different vendors, Sun for starters, IBM, SGI, Dell.
    The worst and the one with more downtime nodes and most incosistent is the Sun nodes. They were the first we bought, and their problems made us automatically switch to other vendors.

    Their first reply was :"You guys are sure you dont wanna go back to Solaris??!!"

    So personally i was not impressed, and i assume they are only going with linux because if they didnt, they are gonna miss the train.

  • Bah (Score:2)

    by bo0ork ( 698470 )
    We have contributed more lines of open source code than any other entity on the planet

    It's quality, not quantity, that counts.
  • Sun can contribute millions of LOC to open source projects and still hold on to crucial portions of the code or crucial patents. Take, for example, the Java Desktop System. It may run on top of Linux and be mostly Gnome. Sun might even donate all the Java code that is part of the Java Desktop System under an open source license. But no matter what they do, what makes it work is Sun Java: there is no open source implementation (and, in fact, no implementation that doesn't include some Sun-licensed code)
    • There is one small point you are missing. "Java Desktop System" is a marketing ploy. For the most part, it is a Gnome desktop running on an obsolete version of Suse with a few Java desktop toys thrown in to justify the name. What they intend to do at some point is replace the Suse backend bits with Solaris. Either way, there is very little Java in the Java Desktop System.

      Incidentally, if WORA is the point of Sun maintaining control of Java then that battle was lost a long time ago. Leaving MS' naughti
  • Sun's Linux roadmap is headed in the same place that all of Sun's plans lead - dwindling sales and bankruptcy. Until Sun's board grows some balls and fires Scott McNealy's arrogant ass, that company is just going to keep pushing one lame idea after another until nobody can remember what it is Sun does well enough to justify using Sun kit.
  • [snip] Windows-free Loiacono notes that he's been using the Linux-based Java Desktop System for a year. "It is not perfect by any means," he concedes [snip]

    Are you suggesting Windows is perfect?

  • Between their constant focus shifts and their newfound friendship with Microsoft, I don't think Sun can be trusted anymore. I also think that Sun is having its business gutted by free Unix-like operating systems running on cheap x86 chips.

    It's a shame when you consider what Sun could have been. Nowadays, it wouldn't me if Apple sold more Unix systems than Sun does.

  • Well said! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by tyrr ( 306852 )
    "My intent is that we need to bring Linux and Solaris together more rather than bash or trash one or the other."
    Very true. Especially now.
    I am a big fan of Solaris and RedHat. In fact I like RedHat (vs. SuSE, Slackware, Gentoo, Debian) because it is build with the same ideas I came to appreciate in Solaris distribution. Until RedHat Linux renamed into RHEL it was marriage in heaven. I was getting solid, feature-full, tested, distribution for $0. Now with Fedora's fast development cycle wide deployment is ve
  • A tad overpriced, but you could take one of these Netra 1280s I'm managing, tie it to a chain on the back of your truck, and drag it down the freeway for 10 miles without it being the worse for wear.

    I'm sick of fooling around with cheap-ass Dell and ex-Compaq DL-series hardware. Of course developers are getting better at writing 100% cluster-capable applications and thus life with cheap hardware is getting better, but it always seems some boxes are mission-critical regardless.

    We have a new toy, a rack-ful

  • Sun should GPL Solaris Now (Score:3, Insightful)

    by taj ( 32429 ) on Friday November 12, 2004 @11:00PM (#10804714) Homepage


    For the sake of their employees.

    It takes time to fit into the Linux community, work out the legal bits, work our internal processes. If I'm not mistaken SGI had a terrible time with all of this but are now in the process.

    But its not about making Linux better. Linux is going to walk all over Solaris. It has the momo and brick walls wont be stopping this freight train.

    If Sun employees want to be marketable in a Linux world, working on a Linux like OS wont cut it. They need to get into the process. Stake out some respect and a niche of expertise in the community. Otherwise someone else will be there and Sun engineers will be filing bugs with the rest of the end users out there.

    It would be sad to see a bunch of kernel developers become evolutionary dead ends and then have the company go belly up.

    Taking a bullet for inflated dot com egos is not what Sun engineers should be put up to. Sun should enable their engineers and join the rest of the world. Sun isnt big enough to keep a disneyland in the backyard to live in.

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