“Two companies announced this week they’ve been financially slapped around–one to the point of bankruptcy, and the other to the point where Wall Street is screeching warnings to all who will listen. That both companies are in trouble is a clear fact–whether one will recover is still up for a debate that I don’t really want to get into.” Read the editorial by LinuxToday’s Brian Proffitt.
Open Source Needs Long-Range Plans
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Right now a long distance plan is to get their act together enough to write a long distance plan. *rimshot*
However, one has to remeber that SUN has alot of arsenal at their disposal. Their up coming Java Desktop System will help displace VB with Java. StarOffice 7.0 will allow macros to be written Java and custom written applications will now be even easier to write in Java via the new Rave development environment so that even the most programming challenged MCSE can write a Java front end.
The one thing I think they (SUN) should do, however, is to get behind Mono, which supports VB and C#. If a customer has a VB applications, wouldn’t it be best to say, “sure, no problems. VB.NET is supported via mono”, rather than saying, “sorry, you’ll need to completely re-write it in Java”.
The one thing SUN can’t grasp is this: if a customer has made a decision, don’t try to change it, accomidate it. If they customer is dead set on using .NET and C#, don’t say that they’re wrong and they should use Java, accomidate them, make Mono available on Solaris so that no matter what the customer wants, you as a solutions provide can accomidate it.
Mono is already 85% of the way there, put $100million into it and get the last 15% done promptly so that customers now can purchase a Solaris x86 server that can not only serve JSPs but ASP.NET if they wish. What ever the choose, you as the vendor benefit.
When Sun dies, Java will follow Sun down into the same grave of monoculture arrogance. No GPL for Java means Java will be buried in IP issues forever.
One can only guess that the programmers of the world will rejoice for their newly found “Freedom To Choose The Best Programming Language To Do The Job” instead of getting Java shoved down their throats.
Many companies will be able to take their gargantuan hyper-industrialized Java web infrastructures and replace them with lightweight and simple PHP systems, saving time and money.
One can only imagine the huge productivity gains if Sun croaks off. It’s enough to make the government tell Wall Street to make sure Sun’s stock keeps going down. We need Sun to die to save the global economy.
I’m not sure how the article relates to the headline… but are you talking about individual projects? The whole damn realm of OSS? Becasue I’ll tell you OUT of the first group, most projects already have a plan. It just boils down to making the projects better, more inline with user demands, or what the projects’s leaders think is progress. The whole damn realm of OSS having “a plan” would just be silly.
Comparing this to closed softwaare I think the exact same parapragh is true of them also.
Also.. just because it’s a movement does mean anyone controls it. Movements go where they want to and pick the leaders they want. All individuals can hope to do is suggest ideas.
It appears that numerous people in the open source community are fixed on wanting Java to be open source. The article provides a reason, and that is that making Java open source would allow it to outlive the company.
I’m not so sure that this would help open source though (open sourcing Java), infact it might actually harm it because open source technology is about learning how to implement systems as well as earning the knowledge and making discoveries, and sharing them with the community.
If Java dissapeared than you would find out where you stand with your investment in knowledge (open source). Java was not helping you if you are broke when it is taken away, it was hurting you because you were being prevented from learning.
Open source technology should allow you to stand on your own feet after someone pulls the carpet out from underneath…you want to be standing up. Yet the open source community does not know itself. You can not lead until you can see the path infront of you, the one that you stumble off of than come back to.
Open sourcing Java would provide research and development to the community, however we did not earn it, and few would be able to take advantage of it. And there is no victory without the freedom of we give ourselves in pursuing knowledge. Without discovering the way to learn, we would still be separated from our goal.
The open source community should focus on finding the best methods of transfering knowledge to each member so that we can all participate more effectively in the group. It’s like a network of relationships, and our technology should reflect that. This is not vendor technology, but organic and flexible.
Don’t be naive. When has there ever been such “Freedom”? Do you believe that C++, which is arguably the most widely used
in commercial software was freely chosen by the selfsame programmers that wrote those applications?
I highly doubt that SUN is going to disappear anytime soon.
They may shrink somewhat but that’s a far cry going belly-up.
Look at SGI: they’ve never had anything remote resembling SUN’s prescence in the business world and they’ve managed to hang on.
Besides, if you read a bit more deeply into the article, you’ll see that Brian Profitt is really touting the GPL as a survivability tool for software whose creators are in danger of disappearing – nothing that hasn’t been said or happened before.
Do you remember Sun in 1995? They were a workstation only company. They haven’t a single serious server to sell, and everybody thought they’ll be dead by 1997. Then they bought the E10000 from Cray…
So we’ll see…
“Their up coming Java Desktop System will help displace VB with Java.”
Do you actually believe this statement? what universe are you from? Thanks for the good laugh though.
Sun has shown itself weak for some time by its apparent suden shifts of policy. One day they are our best friends. The next day they tell us “You are on your own!”. Soon after that they bring out their desktop distribution. Soon after that they say Linux is only good for hobbyists. This shizophrenic reactions shows confusion and lack of direction from the top. These are not people you want to be in the trenches with. OpenOffice will be just fine as it is open source. Trustix was always weak. We will not succeed by becoming more like MS.
What’s so funny about that statement?
Victor.
“Their up coming Java Desktop System will help displace VB with Java.”
This doesn’t even begin to make sense. Prove it.
so who cares…open source its open source and its meant for the soft to achieve its best. Who cares if some major/minor company fucks up…..its about the software…not “some company”…my god…dont you get it???
Ah the good old personal insults start flying. Anyhow, here’s a tip – Joe Admin doesn’t write code. As for ‘quicker’ – that’s a blatant blanket statement if ever I saw one. Last, quicker doesn’t equate to a business decision that makes sense. The idea that a business can afford to change platforms just because an Admin made a quick query front-end to a database is ludicrous. Nice try though.
The icon used for this article is the Free Software Foundation’s gnu, which represents Free Software. The Open Source Institute does have a circular symbol, which would be appropriate when discussing Open Source Software. I’m sure I don’t need to tell the editors that the two are not the same.
That said, the article does seem to be more about preserving software projects by licensing them under the GNU General Public License. The author claims that the GPL will keep your code alive, leaving a business with the task of figuring out how to keep the project financed. In this case, the reference to “Open Source” by the author was kind of inappropriate, but the GNU icon made sense.
You moderate my original post down yet:
Smartpatrol (IP: —.kuwait.army.mil) – Posted on 2003-10-04 13:08:05
Kon (IP: —.dsl.lsan03.pacbell.net) – Posted on 2003-10-04 18:34:02
Have violated:
3. Whatever you got to say, say it in a calm way, and explain your reasoning as an adult, and not as a 10-year old kid.
9. Do not reply to already moderated-down comments. This will cause your comment to also get moded-down, no matter how good it might be.
How about some consistancy please. I’m not asking for “favours” or “special treatment”, but if you are going to have rules, they are to apply to all and to the letter.
Sigh. You’re not fooling anyone.
Your post was modded down 6 hours after I replied to it, so #9 doesn’t apply. As for what you violated, I believe these, including #3, actually apply to you:
1. No bad mouthing or cursing.
2. No attacks to other users or news editors of this web site.
3. Whatever you got to say, say it in a calm way, and explain your reasoning as an adult, and not as a 10-year old kid.
7. No off topic comments. No bad-taste sarcasm. No cyber-vandalization of any kind.
Two words: grow up?
Two words: grow up?
And I assume that is the language of an adult?
CaChoo, “grow up” is simply a Newspeak analogue for “troll”.
Kon is attempting to gain status in The Party by reviewing the content on the boards and clarifying Party policy.
Be grateful, CaChoo, that Kon is simply letting you off with a warning. The next time you will officially be prosecuted for thoughtcrime, perhaps even hatecrime.