12 ms·

@Oracle, please do the right thing and open-source Solaris. At least that's a proper way to die!

• exBarrelSpoiler 9y ago
  Imagine if Solaris could be used as a kernel for a mobile OS...
  • pjmlp 9y ago
    Sun used to sell Toshiba laptops with Solaris x86 pre-installed.
    • justincormack 9y ago
      And Sparc laptops too
      • DonHopkins 9y ago
        SPARCstation SLC: the "Silly Little Computer", with the computer built into the monitor cabinet. http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Systems/Sun4c/SYSTEM_Sun4c_SLC.html http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Systems/Sun4c/SYS... And the bizarre quazi-portable-but-definitely-not-laptop SPARCstation Voyager: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2CprTGEIS8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2CprTGEIS8 http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/SPARC-HOWTO-5.html http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/SPARC-HOWTO-5.html http://www.kevra.org/TheBestOfNext/ThirdPartyProducts/ThirdPartyHardware/NeXTSTEPonNonNeXTComputers/SunHardwareForNeXTStep/SPARCstationVoyager/SPARCstationVoyager.html http://www.kevra.org/TheBestOfNext/ThirdPartyProducts/ThirdP... http://www.ebay.com/itm/WORKING-Rare-SUN-Voyager-SPARCstation-Model-146-/131537725894 http://www.ebay.com/itm/WORKING-Rare-SUN-Voyager-SPARCstatio... http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Systems/SSVygr/4mSYSTEM_Sstation_Voyager.html http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Systems/SSVygr/4m...
      • spilk 9y ago
        The SPARCbooks (and the SPARCstation Voyager) were all made by Tadpole
    • vram22 9y ago
      Sun also bought Cobalt Networks (for $2 billion), the company behind the Cobalt Qube, soon after their successful IPO. The Qube was a cool Unix server appliance, targeted at ISPs, etc. [1] I worked for a short while at a startup that used one of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt_Qube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt_Qube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt_Networks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt_Networks [1] Sun's buy of Cobalt had bad timing, since the dot-com bust happened soon after.
  • ori_b 9y ago
    > Imagine if Solaris could be used as a kernel for a mobile OS... I'm imagining, and as things stand, my imagination is hinting at crappy battery life due to lack of tuning. But if you want to try, Solaris was forked long ago -- Illumos is out there.
• foo101 9y ago
  It is very unlikely that Oracle will do the right thing. Oracle, as a company, is known to be ethically challenged. A company like Oracle that is known for its apathy towards its own developers cannot be expected to make careful consideration towards the software it is killing. For those, who have not worked in Oracle or have little understanding of Oracle's internal culture, I recommend this nice article about why James Gosling, the creator of Java, quit Oracle: http://www.eweek.com/development/java-creator-james-gosling-why-i-quit-oracle http://www.eweek.com/development/java-creator-james-gosling-...
  • beefhash 9y ago
    On the topic of Oracle and its corporate culture, you may also want to see part of the talk "Fork Yeah! The Rise and Development of illumos" by Byran Cantrill[1]. The language he uses to talk about Oracle is rather colorful. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc&t=33m https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc&t=33m
    • digi_owl 9y ago
      Cantrill seems to have a flair for using colorful language in general...
  • pjmlp 9y ago
    Not defending Oracle here, however I have learned working all these years in the context of Fortune 500 company cultures, that they are not alone. The way Oracle as company behaves, is quite common in that universe. I will miss having Solaris around.
    • samoright 9y ago
      I have worked in Oracle for 2 years and I have worked at other Fortune 500 companies. Oracle, by far, is the most soulless and lethargic company among all of them.
      • pjmlp 9y ago
• davidgerard 9y ago
  Perhaps they could donate it to the Apache Foundation.
  • kingmanaz 9y ago
    IMHO, Just apply a BSD license and let the community handle everything else. Wish AmigaOS 3.1 would have done the same several decades ago.
• frik 9y ago
  There was OpenSolaris OpenSolaris is a discontinued, open source computer operating system based on Solaris created by Sun Microsystems. It was also the name of the project initiated by Sun to build a developer and user community around the software. After the acquisition of Sun Microsystems in 2010, Oracle decided to discontinue open development. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenSolaris https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenSolaris
  • floatboth 9y ago
    And it's been forked into illumos. That's where the old community went. Oracle Solaris was a dead end from the start. illumos is the true Solaris.
• mirekrusin 9y ago
  Oracle is filled up with developers' tears, it's goal is to never dry out, they won't do it.
• Crontab 9y ago
  Having tried various Illumos-based operating systems, I could care less if they reopened Solaris with one exception: ZFS. I would like to see them alter the licensing terms of it so that it could be properly integrated into Linux. I believe they should consider this because Btrfs, which Oracle itself started, it going nowhere fast; and because Oracle customers who run Linux will benefit as well.
  • tw04 9y ago
    It's entirely and likely possible that part of their settlement with NetApp included NOT releasing it under GPL. https://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/09/oracle_netapp_zfs_dismiss/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/09/oracle_netapp_zfs_d...
    • Crontab 9y ago
      I forgot about the whole NetApp thing. Good point.
    • walterbell 9y ago
      How is NetApp doing these days?
• severino 9y ago
  Well... it is already.
• shmerl 9y ago
  Oracle won't do it because they are Oracle. They actually had zero valid reasons to close OpenSolaris to begin with, so I suspect they'll care even less about their dead project.
• TazeTSchnitzel 9y ago
  Oracle silently closed-sourced Solaris 7 months after acquiring it, I wouldn't hold my breath.