Linux.com

I've frankly always wondered what the hell these people were trying to do...

they've systematically messed up every project they did, bad marketing, conflicting interests in the OS market, keeping java proprietary, ridiculously expensive servers that could have been replaced by clustered linux solutions, the list goes on and on.

goodbye sun, no hard feelings.

#

Sun has 5 billion in the bank and low debt. How exactly are they "doomed"? And have you ever heard of reverse splits (here's a guess, Palm did it).

However, it's time Sun spun off Java.

<A HREF="http://www.petitiononline.com/spinjava/petition.html" TITLE="petitiononline.com">http://www.petitiononline.com/spinjava/petition.h<nobr>t<wbr></nobr> ml</a petitiononline.com>

- A. San Juan

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HP is doomed, not Sun

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I applaud the excellent reasoning you have included along with that statement....

Let me see - Sun has poor sales in a limited market range, hp and IBM have broad spreads of products in many markets retruning good overall sales.... Nah, you must be right, it was stupid of me to think otherwise.

Mind you, this is a bit harsh - even Carly doesn't go this nasty on poor old Sun!

#

Carly
Itanic
Dell
IBM
Sun
Macrocrap

#

I think that HP's future as a computer company is pretty gloomy. Their products are still Compaq-esk 'open' but proprietary. Their sales force makes bold claims about not going to lose a sale to Dell for price (bullshit). Their first round of tablet PCs are a botch. And their Itanium pricing continues to be on the high side of price not to mention heat especially compared to AMD.

An analysis of the balance sheet says printing & imaging are paying the way and computers are at best breaking even.

Sun, on the other hand, went from us$3.8B in the bank in April to us$5.7B in the bank three weeks ago. It is covering it's operating costs.

Sun is not healthy, to be sure, their multi-threaded SPARC idea has yet to be proven (things like memory bus capacity really are worthy of being pondered -- but we're promised that they've got a rabbit to pull out of their hat). Their Linux non-strategy is a mess and any interaction between SCO and SUN is plainly offensive. N1 and thin clients still have yet to prove their worth or their ability to be integrated into the real world.

I think the answer is wait and see. They are cash-flow positive and as long as that is true they're still in the game. The same can not be said about HP's computer business.

-- Multics

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Most Sun employees have Macs at home, not Linux

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How do you know this?

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eg, <A HREF="http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1210897,00.asp" TITLE="eweek.com">here</a eweek.com>

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Not to split hairs but a Mac is hardware not an OS. For the record, Linux runs nicely on a Mac. In the article you linked to in your other message Swartz stated that most Sun employees own an Apple machine. I don't know if he really knows that to be true or made it up to help his wanting to partner with Apple. In either case, he never said they were running OSX on that Apple hardware.

I certainly don't know for sure what most Sun techs have at home but I would be surprised if Linux isn't one of the OSs that run in most Sun techs homes. Heck, Sun is even coming out with the Linux based Java desktop system so someone there must be using it.

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Only weirdos run Linux on Apple hardware

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>Only weirdos run Linux on Apple hardware

ah ha ha ha...

OK, whatever.

-Scooter
Who ENJOYS developing on his $500, $500 MHz ibook running YDL Linux (and also OSX... it is a multipurpose development machine)

Mac hardware can be expensive, but if you shop ebay you can get their VERY NICE laptops on deal sometimes. Linux runs a LOT better on Apple laptops than many of the PC laptops, like it or not...

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He was kidding.

#

I'm a guy who is gradually making the transition to Linux. I keep some dual-boot Windows machines at home mainly so the kids and I can use Windows games. A lot of people seem to do that. And I have seen reams of discussion on slashdot etc. about how Linux will have really really really made it on the desktop when games developers start porting to it.

I was vaguely aware that a person can run Linux on a Mac, and I never really thought much about it before. But -- don't most computer games have Mac versions? If I want to play something popular like Half Life or my kids' play their educational games, will those games run on a Mac?

If this is so, then why are the various sites like slashdot so quiet about this? It seems to me that this would be such a natural transition path for the desktop. The home desktop user could say, "Hmmm, I need a new computer. I'd better dual boot so I can still play games. But I'm sure tired of Windows crap. Hey, what if I bought a Mac, and dual booted it with Linux? Then I could play all the games I want to, explore all of the Mac's other goodies, but still keep using the Linux I'm starting to know and love...".

Etc. etc. You get my point. If a dual booted Mac with Linux on it, playing all the games you would want on the Mac side is *possible*<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... then why aren't people streaming to this alternative in droves? If this is so, then jeez, we need to start shouting about this alternative everywhere and every time we can.

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The only reason I see for people not streaming to the Mac is it is somewhat proprietary and more expensive than the x86 counterpart.

That is similar to the problem Sun is having and the reason for this article. Sun hardware/software is much more expensive than a cluster of Linux x86 boxen. Sun does have advantages in certain areas though, redundancy, reliability, more CPUs per single system, etc.

There are situations where it is better to use Sun hardware. Many would argue that the Mac is generally a better machine than a similarly powered x86 machine. You'll pay more for it but typically it is more reliable, etc.

I don't know, just rambling out loud.... At any rate, check out <A HREF="http://www.yellowdoglinux.com/" TITLE="yellowdoglinux.com">YDL</a yellowdoglinux.com> if you are interested in running Linux on a Mac. I don't own a Mac personally so I don't know the game situation, in fact I haven't been into games for years so it's no an issue for me. I believe there is a smaller subset of games for OSX than there is for Win. I have run Linux at home exclusively for the last couple of years and my entire family (wife and kids) have been getting along perfectly. My kids go outside and play games, just like I had to do in the olden days.

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Most PC games haven't been ported to Mac. For example, Counter-Strike doesn't appear to be available for macs (i'm not sure if Half Life is available).

I was able to get rid of windows when i got sick of the games and got a ps2. Now I single boot linux and my ps2<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:D

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Counter-Strike isn't available for Macs because it runs on Half-Life and Half-Life isn't available for Macs.

From the Counter-Strike website FAQ page (http://www.counter-strike.net/faq.html):

Why isn't there a Mac version of Counter-Strike?
A Mac version of Counter-Strike hinges on Valve Software porting Half-Life to the Mac. Their planned Mac port fell through. Thus, there will not be a Mac CS version (atleast not in the near future). In other words, the possitility of a Mac port isn't up to us.

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Mac is not an OS its hardware? hahahaha<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.... The Macintosh opreating system (MacOS X) runs on apple-based hardware powered by powerPC processors from IBM.

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Yes, MacOS is an OS, a Mac is hardware, just as I said.

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Your an idiot

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How so? Are you telling me that "a Mac" is not a computer? "A Mac" is certainly not software. MacOS X is software sure but that isn't the same thing as saying "a Mac". I don't understand your beef.

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I am a wierdo and i run linux on my mac! Yay! lol. actually I probably am. Currently, you three flavors of linux actually worth trying are Mandrake 9.1 PPC, Yellow Dog Linux (RH 9.0) , and Gentoo. There also is a unoffical slack port but the first three are offical. All i can say is its great, and it gave my 400 mhz imac new life (i can now play<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.avis<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-D with xine)

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Don't forget Debian...

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wierdos are cool! haha

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yes sir, I am a weirdo! I love being weird! The weird shall inherit the earth!

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You are being pedantic. When most people say, "I use a Mac" they mean "I'm running MacOS on Mac hardware." Same is true of people who say "I use a PC"--they almost always mean "I'm running Windows on PC hardware". Running Linux on either platform is the exceptional case, not the usual. When someone asks me whether I use a PC or Mac my response includes the fact that I'm running Linux.

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Why would they have Macs? And how would you know they all run Macs?

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Sun and its users always seemed to have an attitude that really annoyed me. I learned Unix on SunOS 4.? and I liked Sun. But the users always had an attitude that Linux was a toy and couldn't compete.... Of course, in those days (93-94), Linux wasn't where it had to be. But it didn't take a rocket scientist to see the writing on the wall. I guess the jokes on them.

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welcome to every Unix vendor out there. it's not just Sun that thought that Linux was a toy....it was Digital, HP, and IBM, too.

don't jump for joy about Sun. Solaris still does things that Linux can't, and that developers should and can learn from.

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I wonder why a company that lives and breathes UNIX would think they know more about it then joe schmoe who switched to compile their 0-day expl0its.

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I'm not saying that Sun doesn't know Unix.... But it was very presumptuous for them to think that no one else knew it... Sure Sun products can still do things that Linux can't. But the applications where that remains an issue are extremely few and far between these days.

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The world no longer needs over-priced sparcs. Sun has no means to make money with Java, and no ability to free it the way it needed to be freed so it becomes truelly common and well supported on other platforms. When one typically has to depend on un-optimized and/or otherwise obsolete or buggy binaries to get Java to run on ones Linux distribution of choice, to wait for someone to release native binaries on FreeBSD (which finally happened), etc, it is not a truelly usable or "common" platform. Sun can't make Java available in ways that the community can fix it and do these things on it's own, so Java is a dead-end on free platforms, the it could have gained most.

IBM doesn't need to make money from selling the right to make Java. IBM already has a huge business investment in Java being successful and functional everywhere. IBM could wait for Sun to die and buy it cheap, free Java, and make it into a real and universal standard, and actually make more money as a result! IBM is on a Sun deathwatch, waiting for the best price.


 

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Actually, IBM produce a very well engineered Java SDK that from most test results, prove to be better performing than the Sun JDK - at least on Linux. Their J2EE application server and surrounding infrastructure are also more popular than the Sun offerings. It is unfortunate that Sun could not do a better job here as they are keepers of the specs.

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Have you tried 1.4.2 for speed?

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Yes. But I am talking about J2EE-type loads. The new GC improves things a bit for multi-CPU Linux but essentially still the slowest JVM for J2EE. The GC tuning seems more complex for the Sun JDK and they don't have the wealth of tech notes that IBM produces.

That's why BEA have Rockit and IBM produce their own SDK for WebSphere. A lot of folks have found that JBoss runs slower with the Sun JDK than with the BEA or IBM implementations.

Don't get me wrong. Sun is good with the innovation part but doesn't seem to take it that extra distance to get high-performance and tuning out of the product - or at least easily explain how to achieve high performance.

#

What makes you think IBM would "free" Java? They only take that position when it's to hurt Sun. They have several clean-room JVMs they could have made open source any time in the last few years, but so far they've not even mentioned it.

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"Several clean-room JVMs"? Name one! Or rather, name one that contains anything that isn't already done almost as well by Free Software.

Sure, the VMs themselves are probably clean-roomish, but the Free Software community has several good free VMs already: Kaffe, gcj/gij, orp, IKVM/mono, etc.

What the Free Software community is missing are the libraries, especially the huge ones like Swing that are almost impossible to cleanroom (just ask the Classpath developers). IBM sure as hell don't have a cleanroom Swing implementation!

You seem to be suggesting that just because IBM hasn't "freed" the existing cleanroom VMs it may have (which would be useless anyway because they depend on Sun's libraries, and duplicate functionality that already exists Free), they wouldn't free the whole of Java (which would be *extremely* useful) if they had the opportunity. Of course I can't prove that they would - but your argument is a sheer non-sequitur. There's plenty of logical reasons not to release the VMs they may have now that wouldn't apply if they had full rights to the whole platform.

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King of Troll

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Sun should have embraced Linux as IBM did.

Both companies sold expensive UNIX systems with proprietary software.

IBM chose not only to offer Linux on their systems, but to fully support it, and to move to make their proprietary UNIX (AIX 5L) more compatable with Linux.

Sun chose to give in to customer demand and offer Linux on some of their hardware, but only the x86 based hardware (even though other Linux distributors supported Sun hardware), and without any real support.

Sun still has a chance to hang on -- if they grab onto the Linux lifeboat instead of trying to poke holes into it.

I guess we'll have to wait and see what they decide to do...

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didn't it go more like this:

1. MS introduces NT
2. IBM proclaims UNIX dead and starts selling NT.
3. IBM's unix customers move to Sun.
4. Linux becomes usable
5. IBM proclaims NT dead and starts selling Linux.
7.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>...

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Well, IBM seems to be ahead of the game all the time. MS did erode the proprietary UNIX market. But when Linux came, IBM was the only big corp to see that Linux will blow MS away. For its size IBM looks like a very smart corp!

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People don't need a linux-kernel based operating system. They want an operating system as powerful as linux and compatable with linux. geeez Linux should be the standard of all operating systems

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As ESR said, the Linux world has virtually no margin - how is that a lifeboat?

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Only one way out for SUN Microsystems before the last dying breath...

*Open up all the instruction sets for their SPARC CPU's.

* Drop some refubished Sun servers on the main guys at the Aurora project and partner with Red Hat.

* Finally strike up the deal the AMD and ASUS to use the 64-FX51's and build some x4 and x8 CPU boards and lose the properitary priced crap... ($250+ for a Sun dvd-rom? crack smokers! I bought a new pioneer CD-RW/DVD that supported 512kb reads for around $100) Other wise the money for the guts in a Sun box isn't worth the silcon it is fab'd on!!!

* Relaunch the lxrun program to allow all SUN applications/hardware to be compatible to run on Linux and vice versa... Should keep them floating until they can get away from strict Solaris and inovate the linux market with some of the good tools they already have (Solstice suite...)

* And have the damned exec board to QUIT THINKING like suits!!!!!

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What is proprietary about the SPARC? I thought the instruction set was actually a standard? (IEEE or ISO; I forget which). Or does that only apply to the 32-bit SPARC?

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As said by another poster, there's a good contrarian bet here. I give it a 1 in 3 chance that Sun stock could go up by a factor of 5. Not something to bet your retirement on, but what's old Terminator-Advisor doing?

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I wouldn't worry about OpenOffice Free Software has its own survival mechanism, development might slow down a bit until all the other GNU/Linux companies start funding it but it won't die.
we have loads of other projects surviving without direct support from some company and loads of projects surviving without support at all.

as for Java this might be the greatest thing to happen to it, Java will have to be Free now or die (both a good prspect IMO).

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Sun remains a force in high-end computing. They probably will for some time, these things have great inertia...try getting a million doallr CER through management at most companies and you will see what I am saying.

They are, however, feeling the heat coming from Linux AND (let's be honest) the Microsoft boys. Both are coming after them, and Sun has yet to reply with anything dazzling to get themselves to increase their technical gap to what it once was.

This is a normal evolution in computing, and it has happened before -- see IBM in the mid 1990's. But IBM has retooled and it is quite possible Sun will do the same.

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You should. If Java dies you have exactly one way to go...Microsoft.

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I actually think they've finally gotten the Linux message. However, they can't just stampede over to Linux without first having a reliable cash flow to replace what they make on Solaris. To do so would make the slow descent they are experiencing into a nosedive. This is the reason they are saying "we have no Linux strategy" while at the same time releasing a Linux desktop, making sure every Java release runs on Linux, and maintaining OpenOffice, a very important Linux app.

Sun is our last best hope for a Linux desktop. HP is now a MS lackey. IBM is perfectly happy to push Linux on the server and Windows on the desktop. RedHat just wants the servers. Only Sun hates MS enough to try to take them on on the desktop, and they know the only way they can afford it is by leveraging Linux and other open source apps. If they can figure out how to make a consistent revenue stream from Linux on the desktop, I predict we'll soon be seeing Schwartz in a Tux costume.

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I think IBM is still a little gun shy about going after the desktop after OS/2. IBM does not take failure well. I would not be suprised if IBM started to look at LTSP pretty soon. Frankly we may see a return to the Mainframe/Minicomputer days sooner than you think. A big honking server and a bunch of thin clients is easier to manage than a buch of PCs. Linx is begining to make that seem like a good Idea again. Look at Largo Florida.

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...or at least, not all of them. Sun is acting a bit MPD at the moment. If they do finally admit that Linux can do 99% of what Solaris can do plus some things Solaris can't, and switch to making their money on hardware and on the application layer, they'll survive... although they should be planning about now to lose their hardware market as well.

SGI do the high-end stuff much better, and honourable Taiwanese mobo maker won't take too long to figure out how to make his PC hardware truly reliable at half the cost once that becomes important to him.

OpenOffice.org is also important to Solaris, which is a big reason that Sun ran with it (the biggest, of course, was to burst Microsoft's Office bubble, which is happening big-time). The big thing with OOo is that it's hit critical mass with a big thud, it's too important to too many people now to expect it to languish if Sun bites the dust.

Actually, if they want to bite the bullet, Sun should adopt PostgreSQL, add anything they think is missing, then go hunting for Oracle.

If they could supply and maintain hardware, database and application in one package, they should be able to keep some decent market share, give Oracle a hard time where it isn't firmly entrenched, and pound the daylights out of MS SQL Server. Oracle seem to be cooling on Sun, so AFAICT they've got nothing to lose and everything to gain by doing something like this.

Scott gets to hammer Gates some more, Sun get to keep some database customers, PostgreSQL gets new features and probably extra regression testing, everyone involved wins.

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Linux can do 99% of what Solaris can do plus some things Solaris can't

Solaris can do 128 CPUs. Linux can do 4.

Solaris does real clustering. Linux has Beowulf - tying boxes together with bits of string, much like MS Windows clusters

Solaris has scalable disk management; Linux can go from<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/dev/sda to<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/dev/sdz - more than 26 and you have to start slicing things up.

Solaris has working, flexible volume management. Linux has LVM.

I could go on about MPxIO, IPMP, etc...

SGI do the high-end stuff much better - do they do a 106-CPU box?

Look into Sun ONE some time - application stack for $100.

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>>Linux can do 99% of what Solaris can do plus >some
>Solaris can do 128 CPUs. Linux can do 4.


        Actually, Linux has been able to do more than
16 cpus for quite some time now. This notion that
is has only been able to do is just Lemming FUD.
SGI is actively developing 64+ cpu NUMA machines.


        You remember SGI, don't you? These are the
people that Sun bought it's NUMA tech from.

>Solaris does real clustering. Linux has Beowulf >- tying boxes together with bits of string, much >like MS Windows clusters
>
>Solaris has scalable disk management; Linux can
>go from<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/dev/sda to<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/dev/sdz - more than 26 and >you have to start slicing things up.


        No, Linux does the same thing that Solaris
does: ALLOWS YOU TO INSTALL VERITAS SOFTWARE.
Also, Linux does application level clustering
quite well (better in the case of Oracle).


        Where is the Sun Cluster FS? Oracle provided
one for Linux.

>Solaris has working, flexible volume management. >Linux has LVM.


        See my comment about Veritas.

>I could go on about MPxIO, IPMP, etc...
>
>
>SGI do the high-end stuff much better -
>do they do a 106-CPU box?


        They do a 64 CPU Linux box.


        This is the problem with Sun people. They
think that their sh*t doesn't stink. They don't
acknowledge how badly Sun's original NUMA arch
scaled, Sun's humble beginnings, or the general
pisspoor performance of sparc hardware (vs other
RISC vendors)

>Look into Sun ONE some time -
>application stack for $100.


        I'd rather look at x86/Alpha vs. SparcIII
performance statistics. A Sun box needs 2x to
3x the cpus just to keep up with a decent
architecture.


        Why shell out for a datacenter grade box
(to get 12 or more sparc cpus) just to counteract
the sluggishness of the sparc processor? If there
were any justice in the market, DEC would have
put Sun out of business a long time ago.

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The problem is, that for most stuff --even high end stuff-- linux does it well enough. Back in the day, big iron meant something. Guess what? A 32 way Sparc II 116 MHz system is blown away by a 4 way Intel 2GHz cpu. You can jam gigabytes of memory into commodity systems. And you can have a terabyte of disk storage with only a dozen commodity IDE drives (which are way faster than SCSI was 5 years ago.) And with Gigabit (or even 100 MegBit) Ethernet, the network can keep clustered CPUs busy.

Solaris *can* do what Linux can't, but with modern hardware, Linux doesn't *have* to.

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SuSE is doing an excellenct job going after the desktop market. I think we will soon see a good deal of SuSE desktops in the future, Version 9.0 from what I understand will be a very good OS.

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In itself, the share price fall could be described as a correction returning to May 2003 levels. Current price is still 50% more than the low of October 2002. There's still an opportunity to get strategy right.
See <A HREF="http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=SUNW&t=2y&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=" TITLE="yahoo.com">SUNW share price.</a yahoo.com>

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I concur. And other posters have pointed the correct way forward. Bail on Solaris, standardize on SPARC/Linux. The hardware still has value just not the kind of value they seem to imagine. I'd rather see margins shrinking. It would demonstrate that they see the market share issue more clearly.

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Is this a case of Bad management , poor marketing, bad decision making.. ? Maybe these things were there all along but now with Linux around they can no longer get away with it. In my opinion you could see this comming, Linux will kill off the Unix systems first before moving on to Microsoft.. I can't help but thinking that one hand is cutting the other off. Raymond's essays and theorys from the Cathedral and the Bazaar come to mind. If linux is to form the backbone of computing in the next ten years the traditional factory models will need to shift into service models to survive. RedHat has allready shown that software is a service industry and in the future those who don't make the suit will be closing there doors with the big exception being the game industry. But at the same swing does a service based industry mean the lack of inovation? Sun needs to find something it does well and stick to it, I am not a Solaris user but I am a Star Office user, there is no question they can do things right I just thing they have to get some prioritys straight.. Are we saying that Linux killed Sun, I'm not sure that's true, I think Linux needs Sun to move forward for our next stop , Microsoft...

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Sure this is another iteration but Sun is selling best software on shitty hardware.
It would be really sad event for all Unices around: Sun has made from Unix what we know about it today. Be no Sun - would be no Unix. All standards - you will Sun teams behind them. NIS, NFS, NeWS, Java - that's just what I know.
They really was great company - but it looks like they are not able to swallow the pill of coming computing industry. They have tryed to be anti-M$ and learned a lot from M$ - and this is the major mistake they have made.
The thing is: man cannot make money on software anymore - since no-one can compete with M$. So Sun has found itself in position where is has a treasury which costs nothing - since no-one wants to buy it anymore...

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Have you ever read the full specs for their servers?

x86/Itanic hardware is shit.

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Like everthing else, it depends on what you're doing. The really insane thing is that, of all the Java JVM's out there, from what I've seen, the absolute dog slowest one is Sun's JVM running on SPARC! The Intel based JVMs - both Windows and Linux - run circles around the SPARCs. I've spent a lot of time in shops that run all three, and running on a SPARC is painful!

The worst problem is, even for their supposed superiority, they are BLOODY EXPENSIVE, unless you can buy them used... or pick them up as scrap when the boxes get replaced by cheaper, faster, x86 based servers. (How do you think I managed to get three Sun servers running on my home network?<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;-)

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Sun is usually priced LOWER than comparable crappy "solutions". <A HREF="http://www.sun.com/emrkt/sunfirev480/" TITLE="sun.com">Here</a sun.com> is an example.

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heh... Remember that the comparisons given are for running a server with WINDOWS. A good chunk of that price tag is the freaking MS tax you have to pay in order to connect any real number of clients.

Now, try comparing that with the same hardware running Linux.

(Having said that, your point is well taken that you really have to look at the full solution. The hardware is only part of the equation. Even the Linux box starts looking expensive when you add in all the licenses for RedHat enterprise level support.)

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We have bought CG (carrier grade) SMP (dual) server system.
We have bought Sun just because of its name in telecoms industry.
It costs 15 times more than my workstation - and works aprox 2 times slower. Fact. (*)
Comparable (by price) worstations from Sun (like Ultra 5/10) work roughly 5 times slower than my Athlon based workstation. Fact.
(*) Actually this kind of low performance was the whole point of buying SMP Sun system in the first place - to help performance.

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Try either please before you comment. As a guide to comparison you might consider the SPEC or TPC figures for each, only Sun has stopped emabarassing itself by competing in either measure.

If SPARCiv gets out in a reasonable time then Sun might have a chance at retaining some of the dwindling (but VERY lucrative) UNIX market, but Sun doesn't have a history of meeting roadmap deadlines.

My suggestion - Sun should switch to Solaris on AMD64 now (I'm betting it will outperform the current SPARCs anyway) and work damn hard with AMD to scale the architecture. Drop the price of Solaris to compete with commercial Linux packages and make damn sure it works well with Linux. That should at least hold of Itanium for a bit, maybe until Sun make their mind up about where they want to be in ten years time.

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Isn't Sun leading in most TPC-H benchmarks with their recent server line? AFAIK Solaris IS cheaper then commercial packages.

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I have used enough Sun/Sparc boxes (over 100 in our data center) to know. I have had more CPU boards, backplanes, and controllers fail on Sparcs taking down my production environments than I care to count. My IBM's first followed by HP, and Dell have significantly better track records.

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Sounds like a crappy datacenter, or bad hardware
practices. I have never had any of the above fail
on a Sun. Disks dieing is the only real failures
we have had in our datacenters.

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105 turtles strung together is still 105 turtles strung together. If you're LUCKY, the whole thing will scale well enough to perform as well as a smaller competitive RISC (or even intel) solution.

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Have you ever used a Sun Blade 100 / 150? Their IO system is downright horrible. DMA is not enabled on the disk controller. And if you sneeze anywhere near the system, the mainboard will fail.

Sun used to make really good hardware, but the Blade 100/150 is just a $400 eMachines PC with a SPARC bolted on the mainboard (right down to the crappy Mach64 on the board).

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You know, you should really edit/proof messages such as yours before posting them. It's really hard to take someone seriously when they can't even post an error free message!
Maybe you should take one of my composition classes!

Signed,
English Teacher

#

Hey Dickhead, English obviously isn't his first language. Let's see how well you communicate in his language before barfing your opinions on the rest of us. I feel sorry for any students in your class, you may well need to sign up for a class or two in compassion. Wanker...

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Sorry for my English - it is fourth language I have learned. And third most intensively used language by me. Sorry for inconvience.

P.S. Languages in order of styding: Belarussian, Russian, French, English, German. Cannot speak only French - wasn't using it for a long time.
P.P.S. On-Topic: my reply to my price comment is here http://newsforge.com/comments.pl?sid=33507&thresh<nobr>o<wbr></nobr> ld=0&commentsort=0&mode=thread&tid=&pid=73721#739<nobr>7<wbr></nobr> 3

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Well, it's probably not the only distro that runs on Sparc, but I've been running it for a while, and am very happy with the progress they've made. The <A HREF="http://auroralinux.org/index-aurora.html" TITLE="auroralinux.org">Aurora</a auroralinux.org> project has been around for a while, and is based on Red Hat (they are up to 7.3 at this point). Though they don't have a good automatic update service like Red Carpet, they do a pretty good job keeping up with the security bulletins from Red Hat so you can download the patched RPMs.

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Debian runs on anything<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:) I run it on sparc64, hppa..

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> Debian runs on anything<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)

True, but last time I checked, all the packages were something like 6 months to a year old! Debian is VERY conservative in releasing new packages. Nice thing is that they are stable, but don't expect to get all the new features that other people have already gotten used to on other distributions.

Aurora is a little behind the times, but I wouldn't be surprised if they are more than a half year ahead of the Debian packages.

(Of course, I'd love to have you prove me wrong...<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;-)

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Troubled, yes. An eventual buyout from a competitor (IBM) is a real possibility. But with due respect to the noted business analyst Eric Raymond, the fat lady hasn't sung yet. IBM was in a similar bind in 1992 before Gerstner was hired. Novell was also written off and may be making a comeback. Sun will dump McNealy, replace lots of top management, lay off thousands of workers, dump a few product lines and cancel some projects, and then we'll see what comes next. A lot of it is up to whoever comes after McNealy.

I thought the idea of OpenOffice.org is that it no longer depends on Sun for development.

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No way

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And apple would never, ever, *ever* dump Jobs, would they?

Oh hang on a tick, they did. Admittedly in the long run it didn't do them much good, and now he's back and running NeXT under a different name.

As for Sun, well, I use Sun gear and it's good but expensive. Solaris is a sturdy operating system, but unless you've been a Solaris BOFH since the planets were formed it does a lot to confuse you.

But to answer comments that Sun would've got on better if they'd embraced Linux, I think not. The Sun Way is to provide complete solutions. Hardware, software, support, updates, and so on all in one (admittedly expensive) package. Linux BOFHs tend to prefer to be given the hardware at a knockdown price, the software for free, and then not to worry about support because everything's available from TFM or TLDP or elsewhere. This is not compatible with The Sun Way.

And as for open-sourcing Java being their saviour, again I think not. Java licensing was about the only thing that made them any money in the 1990s.

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They sold lots of hardware in the 90's. Java licensing was piddling incomparison.

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"IBM was in a similar bind in 1992..." Really? Did IBM's stock prices drop as baddly as Sun's?

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I'm sick and tiredof everybody writing them off as a has been. THey are STILL profitbale although the 1 billion tax charge made them decline in profit this and next quarter. THey're making alot of new sales.

Companies that are not profitabl seem to have higher stock prices. They are innovative and wonderful and I think the media should just lay off.

Sun has had troubles in the past and surpassed them.they will do it agian

WE NEED CONFIDENCE THATS ALL

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They apparently didn't contribute to the Bush campaign...

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Puzzling Questions Arise from Bush's Campaign of Fear

With the chicken hawk-driven war on Iraq in high gear, Bush and Cheney have learned that the best way to silence the Democratic Party, distract from their miserable domestic outrages and provide the corporate and rich classes with favors is to envelop our nation in fear.

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Perhaps Sun is "doomed", perhaps not. All things end, but I'd like to remind you that people were saying the same thing about IBM about 10 years ago when they started losing a ton of money. Guess what, IBM is still here and stronger than ever. The doomsayers were very very wrong.

There are very few corporate deaths of this magnatude. Sun will unlikely ever really "die" as an individual corporate entity. If they show signs of steady earnings weakness they will likely get bought. Their product line and customer base is too big and well entrenched to just go away. Being bought isn't usually the same thing as a company "going away". What usually happens is the staff is reorganized, priorities and goals are reshuffled, and the product list is trimmed a little, then re-released. I'm sure there are greedy eyes turning Sun's way already by companies with the financial power to stage a takeover. I'm sure IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, are all keeping an eye on Sun and speculating about "mutually advantageous contracts" if not a complete buyout.

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With the current competitve legislation in the US it is unlikely IBM or HP would be allowed to buy Sun, and why should M$ or Oracle bother, they are software and not hardware companies?

Fujitsu-Siemens might have been a better bet if they hadn't pledged to use Itanium (they had the best SPARC design in SPARC64 too) or Hitachi?<nobr> <wbr></nobr>....maybe, but would the US goverment let a foreign company buy Sun? Unlikely. Sun will have a problem finding someone who has the cash, limited overlaps in products AND a need to partner, the goverment OK and the will to buy it whole. Someone like EMC maybe.....

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In a few more months I'll be able to buy it with the jar of quarters from my kitchen counter.

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I agree. Sun's large, zealous customer base won't let the company die, especially considering how good their technology is! I mean, just look at how those Alpha/VMS workstation users kept Digital alive!

Wait...

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While I will have hope for Sun, your example of IBM is easily countered by the example of Tektronix. It's true that Tek still exists and hasn't died, but it's just a shell of what it used to be. From what I've been told, in the '90s they missed the boat on the UNIX market by choosing a bad CPU (from what I've been told, it was even worse than Intel) and seem to have missed the boat on the consumer and mid-range printer market. They're basically kept alive these days by the high-end printer market.

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The difference is, that Sun's stock is so low, it is too easy for hostile influences to take over. If I were running Sun, I'd be buying back stock on a MASSIVE scale. I don't think they've floated any investment since they split at the height of the dotcom, so the stock price doesn't matter, but hostile takeover, or investment corporation boardmembers could force something really stupid.

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I'm a shareholder and I must say that when scott mcnealy decided to straighten the company out and place the tax charge to to this and next quater is great.

It's better that they take care of this than if they wait and add it to another quater. They are still profitbale although the 1 billion charge will pull them into red ink. Look at AMD, Transmeta, and other companies who are not making profits.

It takes time and patience. Plus, who could afford to buy out sun? Oracle? You'd have to have like 30 billion dollars in cash to buy them out. It's more likely that they will buy someone else out to try to make them more competetive.

The negative media just needs to get over it. I've seen this for years and Sun is still here. Sun just has a bad reputation. Whatever you do is don't sell your stock- youd loose alot of money. I think it might be wise to actually invest. If sun gets bought out then you make instant profit. If they don't youll have to wait until they get rid of the red ink.

ESR, why must you say crap that people have been saying for years and years about sun? guess what they are still here. They have superior products and I'm going to be using them.

If you think sun is going to die- think different.

If you think sun is going to get bought out, well tell me who has 30 billion dollars that would interested in buying sun

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$30bn and interested in perhaps buying Sun. Um, Microsoft (probably would be blocked), Oracle (yes I know they are software, but it makes sense from a technical and engineering standpoint to buy Solaris outright), Fujitsu, NEC, Seimens, SAP, IBM (probably would be blocked), Hitachi. There are any number of domestic and foreign corporations that have the liquidity, or credit power, as well as the technical merits of adding Sun hardware and software to their products and solutions lineup. At Sun's currrent share prices (~$3.50/share) a hostile takeover by a physically smaller corporation with alot of onhand cash would be possible too.

I'm not saying that's going to happen, nor that there are rumors of such. I'm saying that it's *possible*. If Sun doesn't correct it's schizophrenia as far as it's solutions and product offerings go, the tax liability may be the least of their problems. Sun's sales remain strong, but they *are* declining while there are other companies that have shifted their business plan to solutions provider instead of static product offerings that are increasing in market capture. IBM, Novell, HP, SAP, PeopleSoft, etc are all using services and solutions based strategies based on customer demand. Sun is slow to catch on to that bandwagon, and at the same time they publicly deride the same services bandwagon. (sarcasm) Wonderful PR there, Schwartz. My hat's off! (/sarcasm)

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Sun went around and bashed its competetors constantly at conventions and stuff rather than learning form the competition

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If you think sun is going to get bought out, well tell me who has 30 billion dollars that would interested in buying sun

Why pay $30B? Unless Sun does something to reverse its fortunes, the price will drop and continue to drop. The only question then will be whether anyone decides to buy before bankruptsy.

Now I'm not going to assert that this will happen, just that I have not seen anything that will stop it. Sun has a niche market: that niche will get smaller and smaller.

 
In my industry, Sun was the standard platform used for design. Now many companies have realized that for 1/2 the price (or less) they can get machines that are twice as fast. The only reason to buy Sun was when 64-bit applications were required. Now we have Opteron-based machines running Linux as an alternative for 64-bit requirements.

Sun's only remaining compelling advantage seems to be ultra-high availability -- hot-swapping CPUs, etc. But how large is that market?

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... and I can tell you that ESR is off his rocker on this one.

Don't get me wrong, folks. I have great respect for ESR, and I am not about to start saying that Sun is not having problems. Naturally, as an employee, I cannot discuss company strategy in a public forum. But don't write Sun off just yet. They have it where it counts, which is the engineers. I have never worked at a company with so many consistently talented people.

If Sun starts to lose too many of its engineers, that's when I'll be willing to say that the company is doomed, and not before. The media made way too much of Bill Joy leaving. He had not done anything really new for Sun for some time as it was. No company should be so delicate that it cannot weather the departure of some upper management, regardless of whether they were co-founders or not (sometimes people just get tired of doing the same thing and want a new challenge, you know?)

And this poster has a point about the media being negative. The media thought Sun nuts to implement the Sparc in the first place, and Sun wound up taking the number one spot during the dot com boom.

So, lighten up, ESR. You're getting a little trigger-happy with these proclamations of doom and gloom. Save them for someone who deserves it, like SCO.

Oh, and another thing: The idea that Sun is a "sugardaddy" to SCO is plain unadulterated BULLSHIT. Sun's relationship existed far before any of this SCO nonsense started.

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I think you are overstating SUN's value at the moment according to www.nasdaq.com they have a market value of $10 billion, IBM have a market value of $150Billion and M$ have a market value of $300Billion -- Just thought I would let you know

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Market Cap: 10.72B

Yes, however, there is no edit button<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;)
I do apologize for saying this

But, Scott McNealy will resist any buyout as he has said.

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ESR also said MS would be dead in 6 months. How many years ago was that?

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well..?

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http://lwn.net/2000/features/ESR/

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If you read the teaxt he doesn't say M$ will collapse in 6 mo he says that hardware prices will drop so much that oems will start installing linux instead of windows to make some more margin on their product. Still wrong on his timing but a different point

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Could explain a lot of AC postings on<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/. (-:

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Hey Eric I have to take issue with what you said in this article:

You said, "Nobody should cheer the prospect of Sun's demise" because you said "from wrecking Unix standardization efforts in the 1980s to throttling the dream of Java ubiquity by keeping the language proprietary"

I'll bet you think MS does this all the time and they should be punished for it. Why is it okay for Sun to be closed and proprietary and not MS? Is it because MS has figured out a way to make money doing it and Sun hasn't?

I smell a double standard. But then again this is typical of the open-source community.

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Because Sun uses open standards. It's not about open source or closed source. Sun uses open standards that anyone can use. Microsoft keeps their standards secret so no-one can compte with them.

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Sun might die, or they might not.

If they do die, it would be good to negotiate with them to get some of their technologies released as Free Software.

It's a pity ESR decided to attack Sun with this negative article (which won't be appreciated by a company in trouble). It must be awkward, trying to type with your foot in your mouth.

Ciaran O'Riordan

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I think not. Sun was formed by Engineers. There is a huge difference between a hacker, and an engineer. I hacker tries to develo psoftware without any plan or design. An Engineer on the other hand, go by design documents, code reviews, etc.

Linux may have been developed by hackers, but Sun sure wasn't. As evidenced by the technical superiority of Solaris over Linux. Look at the entire Linux source code, from the kerlen right upto Gnome. I'ts a fucking mess. Try building Gnome. Good luck.

Solaris has a bright future, as does Linux. Both will co-exist for years to come.

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Yep, sun produces great software, right down to their single threaded name service cache daemon (nscd) to their authentication daemon (authd). I would love to see the code for that (not). And although Gnome is not really related to Linux except that most Linux based distros distribute Gnome I find it interesting that you use Gnome as an example of Suns superior coding. If Gnome was so far below Suns standards of coding then why would they even mess with <A HREF="http://wwws.sun.com/software/star/gnome/" TITLE="sun.com">this</a sun.com>?

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I didn't say gnome was below Sun's coding standards, or mine for that matter. I like using gnome. I think it has tons of potential and am glad Sun has adopted it. I bounce between CDE and gnome all the time. I like gnome's potentia better. But have you ever really tried to build it? What a piece of crap. And I can say that, I looked under the hood, and did attempt to build it.

What I did say though, is that software developed by software engineers in a professional setting with design docs/reviews etc, is of a better quality than software developed by someone who referes to themselves as a hacker. Linux, Gnome and alot of stuff inbetween is developed by, well, hackers. I've yet to see any piece of open source software that is truly better than it's commercial counter part, sans maybe Apache. I use apache alot at home. I like it, but have actually never looked under the hood.

ESR might consider himself a hacker, fine. He's not a Software Engineer. He never attained an degree in Computer Science. So the hacker label for him is fine I guess. But don't refer to me as a hacker, ever.

Jim

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ESR might consider himself a hacker, fine. He's not a Software Engineer. He never attained an degree in Computer Science. So the hacker label for him is fine I guess. But don't refer to me as a hacker, ever.

There's more to Software Engineering than just a degree, you know. Experience rates pretty high on my list. (And experience is what top-notch hackers really shine on.)

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too bad - IMHO one of the greatest 'hacks' ever was the NASA _ENGINEERS_ who saved the Apollo 13 astronauts from 200K Mi away ! Talk about a seat-of-the-pants 'hack'. I always thought thought 'hacking' was the first (and foremost !) prerequisite for an engineer ! I met EEs in college who'd never 'hacked' apart their parents radio when they were 8 (like me) - they we're in Engineering 'for the money' (that's why we don't/can't design/make/produce at low cost _anything_ in this country anymore). The apparent fact is, the quick-thinking, fleet-footed FOSS 'hackers' of today are burying their proprietary counter parts. I think it has less to do with 'engineering design' than the 'management' of those designs. People diss GNOME - yet, on the other hand, it's pretty impressive software (like KDE) from 'hackers' - I'm actually pretty impressed it's as good as it is, despite what are now just becoming 'anoyances', not real design flaws (wasn't CORBA a standard approved by Enginners ?).

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Really, well having a BS in CS myself I believe that piece of paper to be 100% worthless when it comes to an indicator of how good of a programmer you are. Of all of the programmers I know (and I know a lot of them) the ones who really know their stuff are the hackers, whether they have that piece of paper or not.

Gnome is a very large and complex system that has been ported to several platforms. It's not quite the same as downloading and compiling the source for say "ls". Have you ever tried to compile CDE on Solaris? Oh wait, you don't have the source code for CDE, never mind.

Sure in some (not all) professional corporate programming environment they may follow the traditional practices taught in school a little more than what are done in the open source world (requirements documents, flow charts, code reviews, etc, etc) but I don't believe that in itself makes a program any better or any worse. Sure, there are some crap open source programs out there. There are also some very crappy proprietary programs out there.

In order to become a really good professional programmer there is a good chance these professional programmers love it so much they do it in their spare time and contribute to some of the open source projects. I bet if you break it down you will find that the driving forces of the larger popular open source projects are very well educated and are employed as engineers at high profile companies. Might want to look into Gnome for example.

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oh please, I've downloaded the Solaris 8 source two years ago when it was available under NDA. That stuff is layer upon layer of band-aids and patches. There's a reason a Sparc running Solaris is much slower than one running Linux or a BSD.

There are some things that Solaris has for the high end that are still being developed for the open source OS's, like hot-plugging API's for kernel modules, finely grained SMP, etc. But Linux and at least FreeBSD will have all that in 2 years tops. And already the low end, and most of the middle end servers can be replaced by 0pen source running Intel boxes.

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Thank you. I have just borrowed 9k to take the full solaris sys admin courses
and am seeing this for the first time. Not happy if Sun goes down if you
know what i mean... thanks mad

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yes indeed. A terrible virus infected American Engineering back in the 60's (why Deming had to go to Japan to be heard). It was called the 'MBA virus' and it (and it's Sloan-powered precursors) are a 'killer'. American Engineering and innovation-to-market has been on a downward spiral ever since. This country is now laywers and telemarketers - that's about it. The fact that we haven't, as a nation of so-called innovators, produced a sub-10K non-fossil fuel automobile by now is a sure sign that our Engineering talent (as a whole) is no longer focused properly. Other companies as well as Sun are being 'managed' to eventual death. No wonder all the good software is coming from the bedrooms, dormrooms and basements again. What's changed ? It's just the natural cycle of things to go grassroots when they get top-heavy. IBM just decided not to fight it. Sun, well...I think Eric is probably close on this...

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I have found Sun a very difficult company to deal with. While the commentary here is that "Sun was founded by Engineers" I was very disappointed with the quality of engineering that I found in Solaris 2.5 (the last one I used). The print subsystem simply locked up when it ran out of resources. It didn't give a nice error code, it didn't return an error value it just turned up its toes. really annoying when printing paychecks or other time critical things. That was bad enough, but to be told by my Sun rep that "I was an idiot" for expecting anything other than the designed behavior was more than I could take. That arrogance is really what has got them to the state they are currently in. Well that our experience with single points of failure on the "Enterprise" class servers (E10000 no less) that just weren't reliable. When you have that much hubris, it isn't surprising that customers will desert, especially when there are lower priced alternatives available.

This author does not pretend to argue that any company has better (or worse engineering) - they all seem to have strengths and weaknesses. I don't argue that other componies don't suffer from hubris - it is just that this one cost me more time, more effort with less hope of resolution than any I have ever worked with.

Chris Bird
Dallas, TX

Since I am logged in as anonymous, apparently, I wanted to own up to my own comments by giving my name.

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SUN scrapped their Openstep initiative in the 90's, thinking that Java could give them something better. Alas, they were wrong and now Solaris is a moribund and hideous workstation OS (while doing good as a server OS, but probably doomed in this space too).
With their Openstep strategy and NeXT alliance, they would now have the equivalent of what Apple has now with Mac OS X, the best OS out there for workstation sand personal computers, in addition to a great server OS .

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... and instead of learning from old mistakes, they still sit on the sources to all those excellent Lighthouse projects -- instead of reviving them or hand out the source into the open.

See <A HREF="http://www.petitiononline.com/laafs/petition.html" TITLE="petitiononline.com"> the Lighthouse Petition</a petitiononline.com>.

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I stopped making Java apps because I felt the damn thing so heavy, have you noticed the long load on the Internet pages, surely there are better ways and I'm using them.

I won't miss them.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)

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java is getting better and better and better, and there isnt really an alternative to it.

Sun should form a foundation for java that is funded by major companies like IBM to improve java.

It's secure. It's enterprise grade. It's VERY useful.

you still using 28k er sumthin?

the cross platform language is great

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java is getting better and better and better, and there isnt really an alternative to it.

That's an empirical statement. What is it that can be done in Java, the programming language, and not in other programming languages? As far as innovation in programming languages are concerned, Java has introduced nothing new at all.

the cross platform language is great

Java, the programming language, is not cross-platform. It is tied to the Java Virtual Machine and programs written in Java would run only on a JVM.

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The issue with Java is that the majority of the non-Microsoft enterprise application platforms are built for J2EE. The standard has evolved, it is cross-platform and it provides the same underlying framework for hooking into enterprise infrastructure. Functionally, it is equivalent to<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.NET except that the specifications pre-date<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.NET, and it adheres to open standards.

Should there be a similar enterprise application framework for Linux/UNIX then we'd gladly adopt that, but in the mean time, we need J2EE.

MHO.

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If sun fails, there will be no more java. what will we have to look to for online programs.. Dot Net? I dont think so. The linux community needs Sun just as bad.

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If Sun were to "die", JAVA would go dead almost immediately.

The only thing that has kept JAVA alive is Sun hanging on to it so Microsoft couldn't directly or indirectly nuke it if it was a fully "open" platform.

Sun has been declared dead multiple times in the past 20+ years. They are still here.

Moving forward, total SYSTEM integration, maintainance and testing are what will rule the day.

Commercial UNIXi understand SYSTEM integrity, BSD mostly understands SYSTEM level integrity, Linux has a long way to go although Red Hat "enterprise" and SUSE "enterprise" are a move in the right direction caused by IBM's leaking of SYSTEM integrity ideas into the process.

I think most people don't understand the long term implications of Sun's $100/$150 flat fee pricing. This will SERIOUSLY damage the revenue streams critical to Microsoft, IBM and HP's survival; look at where these companys actually get revenue and its the fact they can drain ALOT more than $100/$150 per seat. Without that revenue they will be in bigger trouble than Sun...

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Ummm, no.

Look at the dozens of companies that have a huge vested interest (and investment) in Java technology: IBM, Oracle, Novell, HP, Borland, BEA WebLogic, etc. Not to mention the huge open source support from the Apache Group and JBoss. Do you honestly think that if (and that's a big IF) SUN were do disappear entirely, so would IBM WebSphere or Oracle 9i App server?? At best your statements are naieve and misinformed.

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dot net? go mono!

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I never use Java anymore for online apps because java is too slow to download apps and swf's are much faster. Java excels at the server/desktop environment, not online. If java were to die php || perl || c || python could easily take up the slack while flash does the front end.

Java is a joke. Dependance on Java is even more so.

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Regardless if you're for Sun or against Sun. We're all in this together. Our ultimate fight is against Microsoft, not each other. Sun has the means to combat Microsoft and the desktop dominance of Windows. We need to be behind Sun to help bring about our independence from the 800 lb Gorilla, or we'll be left with Microsoft to decide how our computing world is to operate. I really do think Sun is on to something here with its Java Desktop System' initiative. We need every resource possible to fight the Redmond giant. Doing this without Sun, it will be nearly impossible. Little Linux companies like Redhat and Suse just don't have the resources, the size nor the experience to deal with Microsoft aggressively. It;s time to drop your difference, no matter if you're in the Linux camp, or the BSD camp and unite for the common good of free world computing!

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I agree friend. We do need Sun, and we need to fight microsoft, not each other. I like your comment.

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If you see stock price as an indicator of health, maybe we should be worried, but I think the dot com bubble taught us how trustworthy of an indicator this really is. I trust investors about as much as I trust Ahhnold Swartzenkopf to be Governor (not at all).

Sun may have paid a billion dollars in taxes, but the fact is that they have many billions in the bank. If they stay NEAR the black, they can afford to pay this charge for at least 20 years. Plus, they are downsizing like crazy to compensate for the drop in sales. If all you are concerned with is current profits, then this is pointless, but Sun is a huge R&D company, where some investments may not pay off for several years. With that kind of investment you can't throw in the towel at the first (or second, third, or fourth) sign of trouble. IBM taught us that way back in the great depression and look where they are STILL at.

Granted, Sun has made mistakes. Should they have ditched Solaris for Linux 3 years ago? Of frigging course not. People who pay the big bucks for Solaris didn't WANT linux then, and probably don't now. It isn't mature enough (yet). Sun can jump into the Linux game any time it wants (isn't that one of the points for having open technology?).

Speaking of open technology, don't forget that sparc is an open architecture. If you are japanese, you likely get your sparc systems from Hitachi. Also, don't forget that they have multi-core and wafer integration research coming down the conveyor in a couple years. Maybe that won't be worthwhile, but maybe it will revolutionize the hardware industry... *shrug*. What does that have to do with Linux? Nothing.

Sun's big problem right now is that they've created a bunch of technology that they seem to have no skills using. Sun java software STINKS!!! The management console? Netbeans? Their app server? The pet store (joke)? All sucky. What is the point of creating this new platform if you don't know how to use it? Sun needs to show that it can make useful things that function tolerably with Java.

If Sun manages to finish and sell their desktop technology (the stuff that could save 10,000+ seat companies millions of dollars) and leverage Java to do it, they very well could take a big part of the corporate computing market from HP and IBM. Nobody else has a compelling enough package. Seriously, take a look at the Sun Rays and the portable session technology they've got. If they can integrate this stuff with voice-over-ip and wireless networks, it could seriously change they way we think about corporate computing. Nobody wants to manage MS pc's on a thousand desks anymore. Nobody wants to deal with 10,000 phone PBX's anymore. Sun wants to scratch that itch.

Will they do it? Dunno, but I don't know who else is going to right now. Suse could shoot for it, since they seem to be appropriately focused at where the desktop meets the server. Suse doesn't have the funds, but various elements of the EU does and they seem willing to pay for the development (get ready for MS-sponsored WTO battles when Germany or France really starts sponsoring big scale OSS R&D).

Anyways, my point is that Sun is just starting to figure out what it wants to sell for the next ten years. More importantly, they finally figured out that it isn't going to be Solaris+Sparcs alone. They've got good ideas, have excellent research, and a good technology base to work with. Importantly, they've also got the money to do it.

I'm not willing to count them out yet, but I'll agree that they better do something quick before their image is completely shattered.

Sun Microsystems, the Novell of the new decade.

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You said: "Sun needs to show that it can make useful things that function tolerably with Java."

That's on point. SUN is having parts of its core business commoditized. Without replacement revenues, they will shrink. One problem is that SUN has no experience in mass market products. So, that's the squeeze.

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Do mine ears deceive? Did esr actually claim that IBM was less than a shining example of a good open-source company? Can it be that esr has some memory of a scant handful of years back, when IBM wasn't hiding the stick behind the carrot as it is now?

Wow. I'm amazed at how quickly esr can condemn SCO for pursuing IBM on monterey, and then whisper about the evils of IBM's heavy hand out the other side of his mouth.

I've seen this "No, I meant it THIS way" kind of talk from pet psychics who've been surprised by the petitioner being on the wrong end of the bell curve, but never this kind of slippy ideals from someone we respect as much as Eric.

Is IBM a trustworthy supporter of OSS, someone to defend vs SCO, or are they someone with whom we may want to play carefully when it comes to OSS? Your recent posts suggest one answer, one with which this recent article conflicts.

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Where is the conflict? Why is it contradictory for ESR to say, IBM, we appreciate your support, and simultaneously to say, It might be dangerous to put all our eggs in just IBM's basket?

Of course companies are self-interested. It's nice that IBM sees Linux aligned with its interests right now. It would not be nice to give IBM or any other individual great power over Linux.

These aren't contradictory thoughts. They are perfectly compatible and reasonable, far more so than your post.

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I think he is just making the point that IBM is our ally because it is mutually beneficial, but IBM is still a corporation, driven only by the bottom line. So it would be best not to lead them into temptation by giving them a stranglehold on too many key technologies.

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Couldn't we just ask Sun to release all of Java under the GPL? Why not set up an entity that will take donations in order to try to buy a majority share in Sun with the mission of releasing its software under the GPL?

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Alot of java would have to be placed under LGPL if it is open sourced or the free software community may wind up facing more lawsuits from proprietary software companies that use java and java libraries than it may be able to handle. For the compilers and the virtual machine I would say GPL but for the run time and other libraries I would say LGPL or exemption from the GPL under certain circumstances much as The GNU C/C++ Compiler does.

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According to johnathon of sun, he says if the companies sell alot of java desktop system products to generate alot of money then the company will strongly consider open sourcing it.

It's the whole ransomware thing over again like with virtualmin

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"Johnathon of sun" - great source.

Who's he? Your local hardware engineer?

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Jonathan Schwartz, Vice President of Software for Sun Microsystems said that in a news conference of their Q3-03 Launch Event.

I don't think he he engineers software - I think he engineers software.

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ESR has lost his mind ladies and gentlemen, perhaps he should seek an appointment with a counseler and get perscribed some medication.

I think SCO is keeping him up late hours of the night, well, lets blame it all on SCO<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:P

You know, if SCO is right about IBM, which they probably aren't, It's going to be a huge slap in the face for all of this "open source community suppots IBM 100%" stuff

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I don't get it -- what does ESR gain by writing such comments?

Another time Sun was being written off was in 1997, with NT4/x86 vs Solaris/SPARC. NT4 was supposed to doom Sun as well.

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their marketshare didn't disappear overnight, that's all

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They already provide linux desktops, they are using solaris for big data servers 'cos solaris handles these better and has always done so, linux is new to this whereas solaris had a long history of doing so. If it comes to the worse then could switch the big data servers to linux and it'd become an all linux enterprise and desktop solution. They provide "systesms", thereby commoditizing software, whereas IBM provides "services".

As for hardware, they could use their legendary R&D to simply come up with something insanely innovative like apple has been doing, and if that is unlikely, they could just commoditize when they switch to linux across the board. Their solaris expertise would sure serve them well if they switch to linux and would remain valuable.

I guess sun realizes the niche market is shrinking, and they'd have to commoditize on either software or hardware. So far they seem to be commoditizing on software. Let's just see how their "systems" concept goes and then judge. I've been hearing doom stories about sun for a while, I am yet to see that day happen.

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Sun are commoditizing software, because they're a hardware company.

When did anyone here last pay for Solaris? The Sun ONE stack is $100/user, OpenOffice.org is free, StarOffice is something like $75 max.

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to swoop in and buy its way into the enterprise market. Think of all that installed SUN hardware at Fortune 500 companies. Apple could get these customers for a song! Imagine what Solaris could do for Mac OS X's guts and what Mac OS X could do for Solaris' ease of use.

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Ie that Microsoft would die or they whould go bankrupt trying. Now they are just following the game plain. Low divided equals Low share price.

Now No linux plan that is a joke SUN is hoping SCO wins on one hand because SCO will not get licences from most but SUN will(they bought the right kind of licence from SCO) Now long term SUN unix will disappear. Linux is being used in the low end line made by SUN. Now all SUN need to do is move it up into the high end I guess they are sitting on this until kernel 2.8.0 what will have the features to match there UNIX.

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Most of Sun's techies are running Linux on their PCs at home. They can see the handwriting on the wall.

Here in the UK most are running Solaris on their laptops; many run Linux too, at home and/or on their laptops.

The writing's on the wall, alright - for PC OS vendors - good job Sun have never been in the PC market. They started out on high-end workstations, and now produce kit like the F15k. I won't get away with saying this here, but with 4+ CPUs, there's nothing to touch Solaris, on x86 or SPARC.

I work for a Sun partner, and all Sun people would agree that Linux is great on the desktop (Sun recently got some rights from SCO for x86 drivers) but c'mon Eric, you know as well as I do that there's a huge difference between a quad Xeon and a 64-CPU F15k domain (okay, the F15k goes up to 106 CPUs, but that's not a common configuration)

Solaris and Linux may be similar on a low-end x86 box, but that's never been Sun's main focus.

Sun can't run at the lean profit margins that are all a commoditized Linux server market will support

Who'd want to do that? If lots of people start getting interested in Skodas - good, low-cost cars - it doesn't mean that there's no market for Mercedes and BMW. Quality engineering is in a league of its own.

If Linux were to steal SMP code, it could do worse than stealing it from Solaris (not that any rational being believes anything from SCO)

One great comment I heard recently was that Linux on a 3GHz PC is faster than Solaris on a 366MHz Ultra10 - a 6-year old workstation!
Don't believe all the Wall Street hacks and "interesting" people like ESR too readily when they want to write off Sun; think of Magrathea (HitchHikers Guide) - with $5.7b in the bank, Sun can afford to ride this without having to do anything (not that
standing still is McNealy's way!)

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As far as performance - check out the spec site (www.spec.org). Because Sun was late on the sparc III, they're about a generation behind in CPU and system performance compared to IBM Power series, Alpha. Itanium, or x86. (Although they may not have to worry about Alpha for much longer). What's really miserable is their Java benchmark performance.

Since most server software today provides some mechanism for horizontal scalability enterprise architectures are built more on a larger number of smaller systems. The only real application for those large systems may be data ware-houses where the database vendor lacks a scalable product. The 15-k's are dinosaurs. The action is in th 1-4 cpu range, and that's where Power 4, x86 and even lowly AMD are going to eat Sun's lunch.

And as far as Solaris for x86 - miserable performance with IDE drives and very little software. If you're going to go through the torment of installing x86 Solaris (I used to do it for Nuance applications) you are a self-hating masochist.

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"Bureaucracy is job #1" said one friend at Sun who shook his head at the millions of dollars routinely spent on consulting for internal problems, which one or two people could, and often did, resolve. Sun's internal politics are impossibly frustrating, even for their executives. It's because of the layers and layers of self-aggrandizing departments, and their weight and strain on the budget.

It's not a company of unix hackers. It's a company of white-collar administrators. How can you relate the approach of the free software movement to that of any of these giant, megalithic corporate machines? They're as different as night and day. Each of these money-sucking beasts (Microsoft, IBM, HP, SUN, SGI etc.) that disappears will increase the chances for small bands of local hackers to serve in their place. That means more real work. So good riddance.

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Sun is Dying!

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Why write off Sun because they do a lot of R&D (which is what is behind this latest drop in share price)?

Didn't we learn anything in the<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.com boom? Like share price and true value are not related?

Sun has $5.7b in the bank; I assume ESR has less in than that, so first let's discuss who's going to maintain Fetchmail (oh... wait, no; nobody uses that).

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A famous businessman named Wanamaker once said, "Half of my advertising budget is wasted. My problem is I don't know which half."

Raymond comes up with about 20 new ideas a day. He could probably generate enough new material to fill a site like this one singlehandedly. However many of his pieces aren't worth reading, except for shock or entertainment value. For example, saying that Sun Microsystems is already "doomed" sounds more like Yahoo message board fodder than responsible journalism. But you can't dismiss him as a crank because some of his stuff *is* worthwhile. Maybe if he had someone to bounce his ideas off of first.... nah, then he wouldn't be Especially Suited for Ranting.

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While it is a nice little dream to think that PC's can replace the big iron, in reality it is not true. PC hardware is not at the same level as SPARC.

We recently replace a PC cluster with a sparc cluster. The PC's cost about 20% less, and output triple the heat. We were able to sell our air conditioner for the server room. I grant that the PC's performance was slightly higher, but not enough to justify the downtime (h/w related). Our cluster nodes run at 90 to 100% cpu useage 7 days a week. It seemed like there was always something that needed replacing on one of the nodes. Our sun cluster has had over 200+ days of uptime on all nodes.

Much of our code benefits from 64bit CPU's, that leaves HP, SGI, SUN, IBM.

Sometimes you need the big iron instead of a cluster. Some of our batch-jobs require vast amounts of memory ( i.e., 20GB). Not many PC's can take 20GB of RAM. Our server has 24CPU's, how many PC's can take 24CPU's? If software wants to take advantage of clustering, it must have clustering in mind when it is written, this is not so with SMP.

While I prefer using Linux over Solaris, Linus Torvalds isn't selling servers with 24 cpus, w/ 30GB ram, and 4 T3's. I prefer using Linux mainly because it tends to be more advance in user level features, and has more desktop software available. (There is probably more enterprise level s/w for Solaris, but I don't know this for sure). Most benchmarks show linux outperforming solaris. But there aren't many benchmarks for reliabilty, though for my purposes, they are both pretty stable. (I use linux at home, at work it is solaris, I am curious to see how linux would stand up the the pounding we put solaris through).

I think sun is missing the boat by not offering linux on their high end systems. I am not saying Linux is better than Solaris, but give the masses what the want. Let the customers decide which is more stable. I for one would love to test drive a 6800 with linux (pre)installed.

I think much of sun's bad publicity is undeserved. While they did lose money last year, the only reason they did is b/c the absorbed the losses of a smaller company. They have cosistantly turned profits other wise, and they have 30 bill in the bank.

I know I sound like a sun zealot. I used to be a linux zealot/anti-Sun, but when I started working here with large systems, you learn to appreciate Sun's h/w. Having said this, I have not worked with HP's or IBM's high end stuff. I have worked with SGI stuff, which was excellent, but their customer service was non-existant. Their Calgary office is a ghost-town. Sun's customer service is excellent. (almost makes up for their grossly inflated h/w prices)

Wow what a rant.

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Someone mentioned stocks as a prediction of Sun´s future. I wouldn´t use stocks to try to predict a companies future. Look at SCO, thir stock hit the roof because of their media scam. Do you really they have a future?
As for Sun, I think that Linux need Sun as much as Sun need Linux. It´s just not clear to them both "camps". Linux needs the tools that Sun provides<nobr> <wbr></nobr>,like Java to compete in webservices for enterprise solutions. And what ever you say, but Sun has som really outstanding HW. It´s way to expensive but still<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.... x86 and Intel corp. just isn´t there yet (not said about AMD, they take giant steps in inovation...).
Well, don´t expect sun to go down just yet. They may need to wake up though...

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Sun needs to cater to the lowend space.
I really think there storage products are great like the T3 series. They should expand the lowend area of SAN and specialize in comoditizing Sun supported SAN networking and delivering a complete solution at a low price.

The need to partner with intel and start building and selling highend 64 x86 gear at a low prices.

They also need to figure out why Oracle customers are leaving Solaris for Linux. They need to match the support of Oracle/Redhat ent somehow.

Also why isnt sun assiting in developing Linux or OpenBSD for the Sparc platform? It worked great for IBM. Now the OS390 runs linux, how cool is that. Linux runs on everything nowadays, why not optimize it for their own hardware.

Randy Poznan

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They also need to figure out why Oracle customers are leaving Solaris for Linux.

The only reason is nonexistance of Oracle 9i for Solaris x86, and some customers do need 9i for their modern applications, although this version can not be called "stable" or even "usable" (for me).

Now the OS390 runs linux, how cool is that

No, thanks<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:) It's only for popularity, no one can benefit from using Linux on 390s, primarily because the quantity of 390s' admins is quite similar to the quantity of 390s<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)

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Have you ever tried to buy something from Sun?
My company has tried, to no use. It is like they are only interested in selling hundreds of units to giant companies. They have no interest in the smaller customer. Unfortunately for Sun, most high tech companies are at the smaller end of the scale.

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Nobody should cheer the prospect of Sun's demise.

I'm sorry, I don't agree. Sun supported SCO by paying them licensing fees in order to sustain their attack on Linux. That more than cancels out any good they have ever done.

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sun purchased stuff SCO developed to enhance Solaris for the x86 platform. When sun licenses stuff like that they make sure they have the equivilent to ownership.

It's not like they purchased it to "respect intellectual property" like MS did.

Oh yeah, and there IS unix code in linux, SGI admits it, but SCO are evil bastards for trying to kill off linux like this.

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It's journalist and gurus' business to come up with final judgements. They have to do that if they want to be heard.

I don't think Sun will just go down. As long as engineering remains at the core of its focus, they will have a chance. If they go down the buzz word and 'marketing only' mindset, they'll go down for sure.

Microsoft has made its way in companies because of the huge margins Sun and others ran in the server room for so long. Now, it's Microsoft that runs huge margins on a market that's far bigger than the server room in the 90s. And it's only Suse that seems to have realised how much fat that represents.

Sun seems to want to attack that big pie and they are right to do so. But it will require a long term commitment to shift Windows and Office even so slightly. But the payoff, albeit low in margin, is on millions of computers and pretty much all the work has already been made by the open source community.

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Are Sun Server overpriced?
If you compare the price of a V440 with 2 Ultrasparc IIIi processore running 1Ghz+ with a DELL 6650 with 2 intel Xeon at 2GHZ with the same configuration you can find they have a similar price.
So i cant get that story of sun selling overpriced servers.

I would go for a 64 bit architecturre at the same price... but maybe the ppl saying overpriced meant "i cant install a windows server on a sun server".

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Benchmarketing.
Try to work on their hardware & software.
I'm working time after time on Sun Ultra 10 & Netra 20. Not nice experience for their prices ($1.200,- & $20.000,- respectively).
But overall impression is very good (I'm not signing the bills<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-))). Very reliable & stable platform in all respects.

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http://esr.1accesshost.com/

Repeat after me:
ESR is a nobody.
ESR is a nobody.
ESR is a nobody.

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I just ate some icecream. It was real good.

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I work for Sun and yet I don't see the same problems that everyone is talking about.
I thought it might be some irrational fear of being made redundant, but oh no! The Sun I see every morning when I arrive for work is the same engineering driven, technology and innovation focussed culture it ever was. The comment by ESR in his article about unix hackers for unix hackers is still so true.
When will people stop flocking like sheep and make their own opinions?

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Linux is still lagging far behind Solaris for mission critical stuff. I run serveral linux servers with 2.4 kernel, there are problems with reliability and stability. My servers were also infected by LKM vrirses which were hard to get rid off.

Linux still needs time to mature in server space.
I think HP-UX is dead, AIX is dead, they will all be replaced by Linux, but Solaris still has the edge against Linux.

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Sun - fast becoming a company without an identity.

Desktop: Who is buying Sun Linux boxes for the desktop? I suspect not many. This is a total dead end space for Sun. Guaranteed. Razor thin margins, little momentum, etc.

Server: Yeah, there are situations where SPARC/Solaris is a good fit - those 'mission critical' applications. Mostly database server implementations. But, let's face it. There aren't really enough of those to sustain Sun in their current model, since SPARC is really all that generates any significant revenue (product & services). It's hard to compete against hardware that sells for a fraction of the price (literally). You can build cheap clusters - think Google - and scale as you need to. No need to sink $20-30K up front for that fat SPARC box. It's a better model for MANY shops.

Java: Taking on a life of its own. And Sun can't make much money on it. No licensing revenue (except for the ever-changing app server - whatever it's called these days), and who thinks of Sun for services and consulting for their Java projects?

As far as stability and reliability goes: Of course, mileage varies, but we run Linux for our J2EE app servers and have had great success on it. And it's hard to argue this point with folks like ETrade moving to Linux. Hard to think of more mission critical than that.

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For some reason, people always say, aaawww... look at pour Sun... 'buu-huu'. Personally, I say good riddens! Someone will aquire them, and others will pick their dead body for its remains. I didn't like how they did business anyway. My opinion... Good Riddins!

p.s. Yes, I think HP should buy the company.

echodots...TINK!

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Don't get me wrong - I love Sun. Working with Solaris, Java, Sun ONE (or iPlanet) directory server, Calendar server, and the Sun sales channel put food on my table for the last five years.

But they just don't get it. Despite huge investments in software they continued to view themselves as box-pushers. Even their sales people were rewarded primarily on hardware. That is not a bad thing except that hardware margins have always been falling - and will continue to fall even in 64 bit land. On top of focusing on server sales Sun's marketing has all the focus of a hyperactive squirrel. I don't think anyone knows what Sun's message is, anymore.

Because of this (IMHO) they stopped releasing key software components for any O/S outside of Windows and Solaris for SPARC. (Why is their Java app server only available for on Sparc and Windows?) On top of that, the quality of the software has steadily gotten worse and it isn't cheap. Directory server is probably thier best product along with Forte, but most of the rest is crap. Software is an excellant way to produce revenue - the marginal cost of selling one more copy is much less than building another server.

As long as they keep relying on sales of expensive but slow hardware (see www.spec.org for 'objective' results) they will go the way of DEC. I don't know if they should embrace x86 or go AMD, but they definitely screwed the pooch on the software side. Given that more Sun boxes than Windows boxes are replaced with Linux, their luke-warm comments about Linux makes no sense. Maybe being Linux friendly they could sell Sparc-Linux boxes and reduce the overhead of maintaining Solaris? (Which they don't sell anymore - outside of some special circumstances - so it has to be mostly overhead).

It's sad, really. I learned about real operating systems in grad school, on Sun workstations.

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ESR you are being biased against sun and not reporting anything good about the company. Perhaps if he saw it bothways.

This writing is a good example if SCO writing you off as a loon, your hurting your public image.

As much as I love ya, I gotta say you need to get some sleep and watch what you say because your a public figure now and you must understand that just writing bullshit can hurt your image.

Also, When you told us that you were representing the open source community against SCO, well, guess what you don't represent me. I'm an open source software programmer and I dont want a leader writing bullshit opinionated writings to the open source community.

ESR, YOU are spreading Fear, uncertainty and doubt with the community over sun microsystems.

Stop the FUD ESR. Watch what you type ESR. Watch what you say.

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It's a shame they didn't die before giving birth to the monstrosity known as Java.

A nice idea gone horribly, horribly wrong. And then McNeally has the balls to scold system architects for "overbuilding their infrastructure"? They did it to run his bloated pig of a language at a decent speed!

Maybe if Sun had released Java to the open source all those years ago, we would have had a real virtual machine. But of course, that wouldn't have sold much big Sun iron.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-)

RIP, Sun

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l am so f-cking sick and tired of the self-congratulatory, sanctimonious bullsh-t trowelled out by linux propagandists. ibm switched from aix in a strategic move to torpedo sun, not because it was better. in case you all haven't noticed, ibm has switched their focus from the commodity model to the service model. back in december of last year ibm signed a $5 billion dollar support contract with jp morgan. this is on top of other multi-bilion dollar contracts they have signed recently, in which they support everythng from win95 to vms. they sold their hard drive business to hitachi, and with the technology hitachi got in the deal they were able to produce the finest large-capacity consumer drive in the market. check out tom's hardware for details. sun was threatening ibm in the enterprise level unix server market so ibm decided to play hardball. they certainly have the money to do so. in one fell swoop they hurt sun and get free pr from you bunch of chattering linux parrots. reading your posts is like listening to a cage full of birds talking, they all repeat the same sh-t back and forth until they are all chirping in concert.

now a few words about linux itself. linux is not a mature operating system , and neither are its operators. you people are spewing propaganda to each other like you were at a g-dd-mn sixties peace rally. l use this analogy advisedly. the linux movement- more on that in a minute- is infused with the same self-important 'the people/united/will never be/defeated' mentality that so plagued college campuses long ago. they both have their inception in the same simplistic populism. technologically, linux is now where the commercial unix variants were ten years ago. some of you reading this are old enough enought that the word 'betamax' should ring a bell. well, linux is vhs. the technologies in solaris or aix are years ahead of what linux has to offer. separate operating systems operating simultaneously on the same hardware, the ability to reboot a disk image without affecting other partitions, and hot swappable processors are just a few. the open source movement has shown little ability to innovate; most of the projects l've seen are simply trying to reinvent wheels perfected long since. the open source model is wonderful for churning out bloated, ego-driven projects, but less good at timely progress. l've seen innumerable post on slashdot and freshmeat forums complaining about just that. frankly, the whole model is reminiscent of the infinite monkeys theory of play authorship. linux torvalds resigned from transmeta to devote his efforts to the kernel project because it wasn't making acceptable progress. too many captains and not enough oarsmen.

microsoft likened linux to a virus, a cancer destroying the American Way of Life. l remember the fun all the linuxians had with that. 'user friendly' had some very amusing comments on the subject. actually, linux is a cause, a crusade, and like all other crusades, it is driven by an ideological zeal that defies rationality. 'computers belong to the people, not to The Man Who Keeps Us Down', or to put it into a movie paraphrase, 'supreme computing power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical capitalistic ceremony'. [macintosh, by the way, could be considered a cult. ignatius loyola, the founder of the jesuits, wrote 'give us your children for the first ten years and they are ours for life'. those of you who have dealt with apple users know how prophetic that statement was. apple's educational strategy bore much fruit. like any good cultist, a mac user is simply incapable of rational thought about the object of her worship.]
open source is a source of great amusement to me, starting with the vehement objections of richard stallman to the name and the model it represents. 'open source' is one of those taut modified nouns that [mostly] americans seem so fond of- 'amateur athlete', 'noble savage', 'basement inventor', 'family farmer'- because they are implicit paeans to the spirit of the average man. if you insult linux, you not only insult the technology you insult the whole 'can-do' spirit behind it. oh, look. another one of those combinations l was talking about.

denigrate aix to an aix admin and he will likely ignore you and get back to work. demean solaris to a sun certified architect and he will say 'whatever, man' and dismiss you from his consciousness. insult linux to a linux hobbyist and you have insulted not just his technology, but his morals, his loyalty, his convictions, his intellect, and his mother. 'linux is the greatest operating system known to man, and if you EVER talk smack about it again, l will F-CK YOU UP, BEEYOTCH!'. this is not to mention all the internal sniping between the various distros. reading threads on the subject is like going to a gaming site and following the 'ati vs invidia' or 'ps2 vs xbox' threads.

the business world is moving to linux for the same reason consumers buy hyundais. if its less expensive than a bmw and more gets better mileage than a chrysler it must be good. the problem with that is that the adoption of linux will do more to strangle technological advancement than microsoft. ibm, hp, dec, and sun were able to grow as large as they did because they had unique products and proprietary technologies, and if you wanted widget x you had to go to the company that made it. in short, they worked off the commodity model. captive markets or dominating market shares led to or were indicative of large profits, which could then be invested in new and improved products. l am sure most of you are familiar with the granddaddy of all such enterprises, the old att, and the fruit of there monopoly, bell labs. there was a period when bell labs was a nobel prize factory for physics the way the university of chicago is for economics. the world has changed much since then, as we all know. look at what has happened to hp, which developed so much of the technology we now take for granted. ibm has been through the anititrust wringer and has had its ass handed to it by microsoft and its own imperiousness. nevertheless, the model these companies adhered to is responsible for the majority of the advances that have led us to where we are now.

l don't see red hat or suse picking up that torch and carrying it further. the gpl, l think, has seen to that. red hat is trying to get away from that for its enterprise software and os, but that is like macdonald's trying to get away from all that nasty beef. you dance with who brung ya.

oh, and one more thing. it is pronounced 'lie-nucks' [no irony/pun intended], not 'lin-ucks'. it is a long vowel. l have had it with self-styled purists and cogniscenti sneering at me for following the rules of english grammar. maybe they are scared of losing their hard-won cred. 'it sounds like a peanuts character when you pronounce it like that, not a rich, robust operating system, so you better pronounce it right!'. that's right,it is an operating system, not a cup of coffe, so get new adjectives, and f-ck you and your sneering condescension, you pretentious pseudo-orthodox d-ck. actually, it should be 'leen-ucks', as anybody who has listened to the linus torvalds sound file should know, but this is america. besides, if the whole point of linux is to roll your own os, to stand up for you individuality and your self-sovereignty, surely l can pronounce it how l want.

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Dude, some people talk crap, some people are gullible enough to believe anything. You just live with it, and try to correct them with facts, and if they don't listen then it's up to them.

denigrate aix to an aix admin and he will likely ignore you and get back to work. demean solaris to a sun certified architect and he will say 'whatever, man' and dismiss you from his consciousness.

I guess you haven't met Seth yet.

Anyway, proprietary operating systems are all centered around the company that OWNS the code. Open Source operating systems are FREE, you don't have to worry about lock-in, monopolization tactics, extortionate pricing and forced upgrades.

People value their freedom.

it is pronounced 'lie-nucks' [no irony/pun intended], not 'lin-ucks'.

Not in Finland it isn't.

surely l can pronounce it how l want.

Of course, but you'll probably get corrected or people would look at you strangely.

It would be the same as if somebody called "solaris" Solar-rice, you'd immediately think "Ha! He said solar-rice!!!"

And although your spelling and grammar don't reflect your intelligence in reality, perception of somebody that has bad spelling and grammar is that they lack intelligence.

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Heh heh, that was beautiful! I'm one of those hard core Linux hippies but that was a very well thought out piece of work and a very good read. Most of it is right on the mark. I'm an ex-AIX/Solaris type and have had a taste of the purple Linux koolaid over 10 years ago. I still work with AIX and Slowaris, and I work with people who deal exclusively with those OSs that I now make fun of and you are right on about the reactions.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)

I almost want to ask you if I can make some minor spelling corrections and post it on my site. I hate to see something with this much thought go to waste and just roll off the front page and into the great bit bucket.

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void main

please and thank you. l actually had a version that was better vetted but between tabbing between windows and hitting the 'preview button' l managed to biff it. thankfully l had copied parts to note pad to edit otherwise l would have lost everything. help yourself and be welcome.

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I remember talking to some Sun engineers after the release of java "1.0" - pure marketeer, they said. Apologies all around, they said. It will all be fixed in 1.1. The Sun is setting on the McNealy dynasty. It is all about marketing and little about engineering now. The good old days of Sun are long past. It's time to get over it and move on.

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What does eric really know, the fear from the microsoft camp is only beginning to show. Lets not dismay or be confused. Lets unite even stronger together with Apple, Sun, Linux and all companies who put their money into R & D so the world at large can be a better place.

Individuals like eric may cirp up from time to time but it is us, the individuals with a passion for excellence who inform and lead the world on.

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http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/applications/0,3<nobr>9<wbr></nobr> 020384,2137395,00.

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Eric Raymond would know about companies going bankrupt, viz. the company on whose board he sits.

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My $0.02.

Though the departure of Bill Joy is big blow to its spirit of innovation, I am positive that sun will get its act together to become a profitable business again.

Sun could have also used three major opportunites

1. The infamous swing (Look at the Eclipse)
2. The stymied JINI
3. The opportunity to become a big WebServices player

to make handsome profits and marketshare in the past but they failed miserably to do so.

I think If Sun fires Mr.Scoot or Scott whoever he is and redrafts its battle plans to deliver value in this open source world, I see a comeback for Sun.

Hoping for a rising Sun in the coming months.

Rajkumar.VP

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Remember when DEC ruled as #2 after IBM? Just like DEC, SUN is a bunch of Engineers thinking about the computers, not thinking about costs and direction. I think IBM buying SUN would be great, just like HP is improving the best parts of the DEC lines.

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I think Sun is looking to Apple for some much needed help. Apple is a company jumping on the open source bandwagon and is becoming super successful with OSX. So I am super sure that if Sun is giving up assets, which Merrill Lynch advised them to drop Java (and other assets). I'm sure that the first company Sun is going to turn to is Apple. I would absolutely bet money on it. If you're Sun and you hate Microsoft, your gonna support Apple anyway you can.

Save us Apple won Kanobi! You're our only hope!!!

IBM, ya right, IBM's gonna turn right around and say, you tried Apple first? Cause to IBM java is an unecessary burdon that they'd rather leave to the open source community. But Apple would take it in a heartbeat cause they'd have a new marketing toy. I mean, the most powerful language in the world with the most powerful OS, on the most powerful (and fastest<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:)) computer in the world!!

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Someone inadvertantly hit it on the head when he pointed out that most Sun employees run Macs at home.

Till now, one of the mainstays of Sun has been setting up complete solutions for businesses, that includes their own hardware. But they have mostly been targeting the larger companies with their OS and their Solaris.

Now however, Linux is precisely targeting those same things. It is a hard core operating system (maybe not the best, but good enough), supported by major companies (IBM) offering their own, cheaper hardware (IBM again).

They must change their business strategy. What I am about to suggest may or may not work. They may be able to find another way regardless, but if they were to do the following, then they would have to go all out or just go home.

In a nutshell, target the home user. They tried something similiar with the All-Java computer. It flopped b/c Java wasn't fast and the hardware wasn't cheap enough to justify the cost.

They must do this in three directions:

1. On the hardware level
2. Proprietary software
3. Easy integration with other systems.

I will first elaborate the three points, then make the arguement for each, then show the cons, then respond to each.

To elaborate:

On the hardware level:

They must break into both the PC and Mac markets. This will require them to reengineer their technology, "tone it down" so that it can be affordable to the average user, yet more powerful than the typical PC.

Proprietary Software:

Native apps have to be available for this system. Ideally it should run FreeBSD or Linux. Since these are both "good enough" OS's, and they will not have to reinvent the wheel. There are a huge number of apps available for these OS's, which is a major selling point for the desktop user over Solaris.

Obviously, they cannot pull a Microsoft, duplicating each app in existence. The resources simply aren't there. And the average user is quite comfortable with what they already have. Nor can they buy up every single alternative proprietary app in existence.

They will have to coordinate their efforts with other, seperate companies who also want to break into the current MS stranglehold.

Ease of Integration:

Regardless of whether or not they are wildly successful in the above two points, it will be irrelevant unless they can absolutely run any app from Mac9-MacX to MS. Note that I included OS9. The goal is not to "outdo" or even "steal" users, the goal is to build up a solid base of users that will give the company enough of a profit to build on.

The arguement:

While here in the US one will either go for a PC or a Mac, the same is not necessarily true for Europeans or in the Asian countries. Europeans still remember the Amiga (and why that one went down I'm still trying to figure out). They also resent the Americans dominating everything. "Americans" in this case meaning "IBM" or "MS".

The possibility exists for an alternative company to come up with a different way of doing things and breaking into a market that is currently taken for granted.

There are, despite appearances, software companies that make programs like Quicken, ie. Kapital (thekompany.com). It is not necessary for Sun to make Staroffice into a copy of Word. But it is necessary for them to have as much software available that does as good a job as what is available on other computers, simply to make it feasable to use it.

Linux is currently designed with the PC in mind. But the PC is NOT designed with Linux in mind. Don't forget that. It may not seem important, but it is.

We already know that a large number of people are switching to Linux on their PC's. Especially in Europe and Asia. But if I am going to use Linux, and the choice is between two simliarly priced computers of different design, one which is built from the ground up to run Linux, the other which Linux is able to work on, the choice is clear.

Back to software. It will be impossible to design all the software themselves, and even if they could, the costs will outweigh the gains. Especially since the odds are stacked against them.

Remember, people are comfortable with what they have, you are NOT going to steal users. You are only going to get the users who ALREADY want to switch. The software makes it POSSIBLE.

To do this, you must find every PROPRIETARY company that is interested in making their tech cross-platform. Then coordinate. Figure out what each guy needs to simplify the job of making cross platform natively, then bring as many companies as possible to the table who can do that job or have the tech for it (Trolltech comes to mind). Find out what these people want, what is it in an ideal world they would like to see. You won't get most, you may get none, but find out.

These companies must also agree not to step in each others way, that is, their goal is not to "shut each other out". They must further coordinate their efforts to making their apps work directly with each others. This is where Sun and/or other companies come in. They can provide the underlying infrastructure that makes it possible for these apps to work together with a minimum of effort (COM objects, Corba, the entire QT set), and effective use. Notice how KDE can open up a terminal in it's browser, or how the browser can act as a KWord window, etc. I don't see this in Explorer, or on the Mac. hell, I don't even see it in Nautilus. I don't care much for KDE, but they are obviously the more powerful of the two desktops.

THIS is what you are gunning for.

It is not my intention to suggest that we create a patchwork behemoth to "tackle" MS. Quite the contrary, that won't work. My suggestion is to create the STRUCTURE that will allow any app or company to work with another. Sun will work with others to provide that structure on hardware that is designed from day one to work with these APIs.

Imagine if Sun and Trolltech were to integrate QT with the hardware.

We've already seen this in other forms and suggestions. Look at the graphics cards that speed up the OpenGL and DirectX APIs or the suggestion (nutty at the time, still nutty now) of a "Java chip". But a computer whose hardware and operating system is geared directly towards implementing an API will do a better job than one that just "tacks it on"

Furthermore, the biggest pain of using Linux is the lack of compatibility with the latest hardware. It's definately better than it was 5 years ago, but it can still use work. Take a page out of Steve Job's book. A computer with the best hardware, all of which is guaranteed to work with Linux on that system no matter what.

The cons:

1. It's nuts.

Yes, but it's an idea. Come up with a better one. Or maybe there isn't except figuring out how to die with dignity, I don't know.

2. Corel tried the cross platform thing, and the "user friendly Linux thing" see how well that worked.

Corel overreached. They needed to build a base and work from there. That wasn't their strategy. Furthermore, only a lunatic is going to base their app on FrankenWine. The apps have to be native, otherwise don't bother. They also were doing this mostly on their own (yes, they involved Wine, but that's not what I mean - involve the other Proprietary companies)

3. Mac is already an alternative.

Mac is also boring as hell. I have one interface, one way of doing anything, if I want to run KDE, I have to run it using a crappy version of X. Furthermore, the Linux versions for the Mac have the hardware support problem to an even worse degree than PC's do. Mozilla has freezed up my friends computer a few times already.

4. If you use Linux you'll have Open Source apps that will kill any proprietary efforts.

Free is always an incentive. But people don't just buy apps for the price. They buy it mainly for the USE. Why do you think people stick with Word as opposed to StarOffice? Or why people stick with PC's as opposed to Macs? They are used to the PC, and Word is simply more powerful. (I think)

Instead, make your software interchangeable with the Open Source apps. Your app can do things the free one can't, but since the user of the free app can easily work with both, he doesn't have to worry about relearning every single thing in order to use your more powerful tool. The learning curve is no longer a barrier. And he doesn't have to give up a favored way of approaching a particular problem.

But this would hold true even between proprietary apps themselves. Any wanna-be Office imitator has to contend with doing every single thing MS already does or else it's no show. Nonsense. I don't need that. I need different ways of doing the same thing depending on the situation. Show me that Gobe (now dead), Koffice, Staroffice, etc. Can work easily together, and I'm likely to use all three depending on what has to get done, and if each tackles the same problem in a unique way. I need to get work done, give me tools to do it.

5. What do you mean integrate with the OS? Linux does everything already!

Really? Then why are we always using XFree? Xig is far better, if you believe their stats, they actually have a higher framerate for some cards using their server than on windows itself. THERE, RIGHT THERE is a perfect example of a possible market for a different version of Linux. A version that GIVES ME the PROPRIETARY apps I WANT. Instead of having to hunt down every thing.

The folks at Xig sell their stuff for anywhere between 70-120$. What if they were offered a chance to bundle their servers with the targeted hardware?

What if I have an OS that runs Java natively? A version of Linux that takes that directly into consideration? Or a version of Linux who implements the entire wish list of the Troll Tech staff? Or a computer built to the specifications of Linus Torvalds? How about if ID software chipped in with what they'd like to see in a graphics card for this computer? Where instead of Radeon and Nvidia trying to get other computers and OS's to work with their hardware, the hardware vendor designed his computer to only use those two particular graphics cards? A version of Linux where I don't have to hunt down every proprietary solution, they are all right there.

More: A company that takes the Open Source apps and has a staff dedicated to modifying those apps to the needs of any company, and if they can't do it, they know who can.

6. This seems really dicey.

No @#$#ing kidding! Even if it works they will not make anywhere near the profits they made before. But if it works - they have a CHANCE. Offer the European and Asian software DEVELOPERS as well as customers a platform where their needs are specifically targeted. Give them something solid, but modest, so we know it won't go away. Hell, I'm no engineer, I haven't the slightest clue if any of this has a chance of working, probably doesn't. But at least think!

-ron

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