5 ms·

IPS does allow install scripting, just not immediately at pkg install/remove time but deferred so that such scripts only ever run in the context of the running

IPS does allow install scripting, just not immediately at pkg install/remove time but deferred so that such scripts only ever run in the context of the running OS. This is patently wrong: if I'm running self assembly from SMF, that has nothing to do with IPS. If I invested the tremendous amount of engineering and funding, I could do the exact same thing from SVR4 packaging, which I have done in some packages. What do I need IPS for then? I don't! But wait, there is more!: Back in the days of SVR4 packaging, the scripts had to be extremely limited in what user-land features they could use because they had to be able to run in many different environments, including a) two minor releases back (so, S8 for S10 pkgs), b) netboot, c) boot media. This was insanely hard to support Auto- and thin client capability was ditched, so the very argument used to fuel this nonsensical course of action was made moot. And even with Auto- and thin client argument, that was not enough to justify the atrocities committed by IPS. No thanks. If I can't have IRIX inst(1M) or HP-UX swinstall(1M), I'll stick with good old SVR4 packaging. Since Snoracle killed AutoClient and thin client support anyway, configuration management with SVR4 works wonderfully. I have my scripting in the immediate installation context for configuration management in tandem with SMF and it's great. IPS can remain an obscure packaging technology nobody's using anyway for all I care. And that is good so: it's a totally botched implementation of inst(1M) and swinstall(1M). By deferring execution of pkg scripts, IPS avoids the problem altogether. Instead, the scripts can only run in the running OS instance on which a pkg was installed (or from which it was removed). This is much, much cleaner than traditional pkg scripting. So much so that I'm shocked this technique hasn't been more widely adopted. That is exactly what killed the adoption of IPS and severely handicapped the adoption of OpenSolaris and all operating systems which were IPS based. I cannot believe you (plural) are still refusing to see it! As if the entire Solaris ecosystem didn't have enough adoption problems, this just piled on and made it far worse. To someone like me who grew up on and deeply, deeply cares about Solaris and illumos and SmartOS, it's absolutely infuriating. You made your own lives easier but it cost you the company (Sun Microsystems), and it cost me having to primarly work on GNU/Linux based operating systems these days. We all lost. Empathy is still a core engineering value. With IPS, there was no empathy. All your customers wanted was more freeware bundled with the OS and automatic dependency resolution for easier patching, things which could have been easily added to SVR4 packaging. They didn't need or want someone's doctoral disertation implemented as an experiment.

cryptonector 9y ago
The SMF service that runs the scripts should really have been a first class feature of IPS, but whatever, it's there. I don't even remember how many userlands had to be supported by SVR4 packaging at its peak, but it was a lot, and it was difficult to test. That some of those were removed eventually hardly matters: the problem remains, only slightly reduced in magnitude. Moreover, I want less package scripting. So many Linux packages want to do stupid things like... interact with me when Ubuntu/whatever is just updating the system. It's never appropriate for, e.g., a PostgreSQL package to create a postgres account and configure a postgres service running as that account -- this is not how I want to run postgres, and if you stop this madness then suddenly a postgres pkg is just code and no pkg scripts. If doing stupid things in pkg install scripts is what you call empathy, then I want none of it. And by the way, IPS had nothing to do with Sun's failure. That can be chalked to a long line of terrible executive business decisions, such as: - suspending/killing x86 Solaris support in 2002 - killing SunPS (especially considering how much money IBM made with theirs) - acquiring Cobalt and then promptly killing it - buying MySQL - not seeing the writing on the wall for Java ME when iOS came out - and much more Oracle is not doing well either. They killed OpenSolaris, which was Sun's way to rebuild mind-share. Oracle is built on mind-share (and subsequent vendor lock-in) but they don't even know it. They gave the impression that they don't care about Solaris x86 (oops). And much more.
- Annatar 9y ago
  It's never appropriate for, e.g., a PostgreSQL package to create a postgres account and configure a postgres service running as that account -- this is not how I want to run postgres, That is exactly how I want and do configuration management! The main PostgreSQL package brings on the software and the SMF method. It depends on the postgres-user package which creates the technical user account and group. That's exactly what I want, because I plug that into JumpStart and I can churn out database servers all day long! The postgres-application-db configuration overlay package depends on the postgres-user and postgres packages, starts the database via SMF, and then runs CREATE DATABASE in the postinstall. That's exactly what I want! It works a treat for Oracle databases, it works for anything. I can churn ready to run database servers all day long. I love it. That's exactly how it should work, infrastructure with no human interaction whatsoever: plug in the cable, scan the chassis serial barcode and call it a day. Sun had many problems, but IPS was the final nail in the coffin, as a customer, and as a professional whose bread depended on that ecosystem, and who is now forced to work with substandard, shoddy Linux, I feel I have a much better insight and far more right to decide what has been done wrong at Sun Microsystems. That's for us as customers to say, not for anyone else. And ultimately customers voted with their wallets. I know I sure did, I ran Solaris 10 on generic intel 19" rack servers (and I still do) because it is a far better value for the money. Overpriced hardware and unwillingness to listen to people like me, who were your core customers was like turbo acceleration of the company's demise. And if you lose your core customers, you lost your business. You lost the purpose of your business' existence. Proof is in the pudding, Sun is no more, and as usual, I'm right about the wrong thing. If I'm paying you, you don't argue, you do as I say, or you have no business. Now there is no business and competition rules supreme. It's a terrible business decision to argue with one's customers, because they are the ones who decide what they will give you money for. IPS is not a thing I would ever give Sun or any other company which uses it money for. IRIX's inst(1M), I'd give tons of money in a heartbeat if I knew how; but IPS - never! IPS is the single reason why I don't run operating systems which sport it, like OmniOS.

cryptonector 9y ago

The SMF service that runs the scripts should really have been a first class feature of IPS, but whatever, it's there. I don't even remember how many userlands had to be supported by SVR4 packaging at its peak, but it was a lot, and it was difficult to test. That some of those were removed eventually hardly matters: the problem remains, only slightly reduced in magnitude. Moreover, I want less package scripting. So many Linux packages want to do stupid things like... interact with me when Ubuntu/whatever is just updating the system. It's never appropriate for, e.g., a PostgreSQL package to create a postgres account and configure a postgres service running as that account -- this is not how I want to run postgres, and if you stop this madness then suddenly a postgres pkg is just code and no pkg scripts. If doing stupid things in pkg install scripts is what you call empathy, then I want none of it. And by the way, IPS had nothing to do with Sun's failure. That can be chalked to a long line of terrible executive business decisions, such as: - suspending/killing x86 Solaris support in 2002 - killing SunPS (especially considering how much money IBM made with theirs) - acquiring Cobalt and then promptly killing it - buying MySQL - not seeing the writing on the wall for Java ME when iOS came out - and much more Oracle is not doing well either. They killed OpenSolaris, which was Sun's way to rebuild mind-share. Oracle is built on mind-share (and subsequent vendor lock-in) but they don't even know it. They gave the impression that they don't care about Solaris x86 (oops). And much more.

Annatar 9y ago
It's never appropriate for, e.g., a PostgreSQL package to create a postgres account and configure a postgres service running as that account -- this is not how I want to run postgres, That is exactly how I want and do configuration management! The main PostgreSQL package brings on the software and the SMF method. It depends on the postgres-user package which creates the technical user account and group. That's exactly what I want, because I plug that into JumpStart and I can churn out database servers all day long! The postgres-application-db configuration overlay package depends on the postgres-user and postgres packages, starts the database via SMF, and then runs CREATE DATABASE in the postinstall. That's exactly what I want! It works a treat for Oracle databases, it works for anything. I can churn ready to run database servers all day long. I love it. That's exactly how it should work, infrastructure with no human interaction whatsoever: plug in the cable, scan the chassis serial barcode and call it a day. Sun had many problems, but IPS was the final nail in the coffin, as a customer, and as a professional whose bread depended on that ecosystem, and who is now forced to work with substandard, shoddy Linux, I feel I have a much better insight and far more right to decide what has been done wrong at Sun Microsystems. That's for us as customers to say, not for anyone else. And ultimately customers voted with their wallets. I know I sure did, I ran Solaris 10 on generic intel 19" rack servers (and I still do) because it is a far better value for the money. Overpriced hardware and unwillingness to listen to people like me, who were your core customers was like turbo acceleration of the company's demise. And if you lose your core customers, you lost your business. You lost the purpose of your business' existence. Proof is in the pudding, Sun is no more, and as usual, I'm right about the wrong thing. If I'm paying you, you don't argue, you do as I say, or you have no business. Now there is no business and competition rules supreme. It's a terrible business decision to argue with one's customers, because they are the ones who decide what they will give you money for. IPS is not a thing I would ever give Sun or any other company which uses it money for. IRIX's inst(1M), I'd give tons of money in a heartbeat if I knew how; but IPS - never! IPS is the single reason why I don't run operating systems which sport it, like OmniOS.