Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 30th Apr 2007 23:08 UTC, submitted by irbis
"Amid falling sales of its bread-and-butter servers and mounting pressure on Schwartz to cut more jobs and boost a stock price that's dropped more than 22%, to USD 5.26, since early February, Sun is considering its most radical open-source move yet: releasing Solaris under the love-it-or-hate-it GPL. The move could reinvigorate Sun by putting one of its crown jewels into the thick of the open-source movement - or it could diminish the worth of one of Sun's most valuable pieces of intellectual property."
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RE[3]: Sun is in a bad place
by lord-storm on Tue 1st May 2007 03:45
in reply to "RE[2]: Sun is in a bad place"
Member since:2005-07-12
I agree solaris [random distro's] will actualy distroy opensolaris growth.
Linux distro's have the problem that new developers arnt working on their existing projects why? Because they are starting their own.
I agree there is a need for Free alternitive products like Centos and the like but solaris 10 has that.
Sun Microsystems have the means and the community to vendor trap some users. This is what they need and microsoft have done a great job. By Vendor trap I mean release some low spec sparc systems. I would buy a Solaris 10 Sparc server for 800USD like a new netra x1 @800-1000MHZ dual SATA 2 single Gigabit and LOM @ no graphics. But also on that note I wont pay double for their support either.
Linux is not in a good position on the sparc platform. ZFS everywhere is actualy bad for solaris10.
Sun Microsystems have also not seen development in embedded systems and might be taking drastic steps to improve the chances of such development.
Oh random live CD's of open solaris have helped to some extent but are always suspect to GPL issues.
I wonder what Ben Rockwood thinks.....
RE[3]: Sun is in a bad place
by Michael on Tue 1st May 2007 10:43
in reply to "RE[2]: Sun is in a bad place"
Member since:2005-07-01
The system isn't fragmented. This is one thing I worry about with the GPLing. ... the last thing I want to see is Solaris become Solaris + random userland stuff, like Linux. The whole stability thing goes out the window.
That's where Solaris has a big advantage over Linux. Linux is a kernel, not an OS so there's no definative Linux OS to devlop for (personally I think that's what Debian should be). Solaris, on the other hand, will always be the definative version of Solaris. A lot of people's problems with Windows come from having a load of userland stuff piled on top. There's always userland crud breaking stability. That's OK as long as there's a stable core to develop for.
RE[4]: Sun is in a bad place
by unoengborg on Tue 1st May 2007 18:26
in reply to "RE[3]: Sun is in a bad place"
Member since:2005-07-06
There's always userland crud breaking stability. That's OK as long as there's a stable core to develop for.
In Linux land that stable core would be the LSB. So, I don't think stability would more of an issue in Linux than it is in Solaris.
The interesting thing is what is going to happen with driver development. With Solaris going GPL there would be one more company to put pressure on hardware vendors to open up their specifications. That would be good for all free OS:es.
Another thing to hope for, if Solaris goes GPL, is that Sun starts to keep the stuff in /usr/sfw up to date and perhaps add gcc as a compiler. Sure Sun compilers generates better code, but a lot of free software out there requires a lot of tweaking to be compiled by it.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 20:46 UTC
"And so it is with Dell's Alienware X51 R2, a small form factor gaming PC in console digs. It's shaped similar to Microsoft's Xbox 360 Slim, and though it's slightly larger than either a 360 or PlayStation 3, the X51 R2 would be right at home in a living room setting nestled next to a large screen TV. Indeed, it's adept at running Steam's Big Picture mode, and if your primary objective is to play games in the living room, go ahead and consider the X51 R2 a hybrid game console." This is obviously not the only machine like this - still, these are very valid console alternatives even for those that don't like being hunched over with a cramped WASD-claw. Also, PC gamers among us: could you get away with the $699 model for gaming?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 17:32 UTC
From Bloomberg: "Microsoft, the world's largest software company, provides intelligence agencies with information about bugs in its popular software before it publicly releases a fix, according to two people familiar with the process. That information can be used to protect government computers and to access the computers of terrorists or military foes." The lid has officially been blown off.More News »
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Member since:
2005-10-09
I don't think it's going to have an immediate effect, as a lot of people seem to think it will. More of a long-term effect.
You have to remember the advantages of Solaris over Linux (insert random distro.) It's stable - you develop for it - it's going to work. Across releases. Companies such as Nvidia have learned to love that, and individual developers might come to love it as well.
It's also got a lot of funded development to bolster it. Sun spends an enormous amount on R&D alone, a good portion works towards Solaris. ZFS, Dtrace, etc - all the new "cool" stuff being trumpeted is a direct result of that. I've not really seen all that much groundbreaking development come out of the Linux camp for some time.
The system isn't fragmented. This is one thing I worry about with the GPLing. We've already got Nexenta and some other OSOL distros out there, and no offense to their projects - but the last thing I want to see is Solaris become Solaris + random userland stuff, like Linux. The whole stability thing goes out the window.
I could go on for ages, but I think the key is just the fundamental differences in design/organization of the project. Right now, there are a few valid (on some level) complaints concerning Solaris.
The biggest - some people are GPL only. I don't like GPL, personally - but I realize some people won't touch anything that isn't GPLd. GPL-izing Solaris will allow them to utilize the OS. Most people I speak with in the IT world know the advantages of Solaris, and of all the developers I know - the only ones who don't develop for it/like it are the GPL-only crew. This licensing change should make it a lot easier for them to give it a go, and enjoy the stability when programming.