Very Computer

Sun starts on the right road 5 years too late imo.  It will bundle Red Hat
with most of it's hardware from now on.

Can you clarify?
Thanks,
John

--
Bruce Porter
XJR1300SP, XJ900F, GSX750W, GS550, GSX250, CB175
POTM#1(KoTL), WUSS#1 , YTC#1(bar), OSOS#2(KoTL) , DS#3 , IbW#18 ,Apostle#8
        "The internet is a huge and diverse community
         and not every one is friendly"
http://www.ytc1.co.uk        
There *is* an alternative! http://www.openoffice.org/

        Happy to have cleared things up for you,
                        Don

--
***************************   Q: How many frenchmen does it take
* Rev. Don McDonald, SCNA *      to defend Paris?
* Baltimore, MD           *   A: No one knows, it's never been tried.
***************************
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/oldno7/TheFrench.mpg
Reluctant Yamaha YZF-R1 Owner

Quote:>  ITYM with most of its x86 hardware from now on. And I still fail to see
> why reverting to what is essentially SunOS is viewed as a good thing.

--
Bruce Porter
XJR1300SP, XJ900F, GSX750W, GS550, GSX250, CB175
POTM#1(KoTL), WUSS#1 , YTC#1(bar), OSOS#2(KoTL) , DS#3 , IbW#18 ,Apostle#8
        "The internet is a huge and diverse community
         and not every one is friendly"
http://www.ytc1.co.uk        
There *is* an alternative! http://www.openoffice.org/

Mind you these days running a SunoS 5.8 (Solaris 8) system is starting
to become a pain when compared to Redhat Linux.

Must be getting lazy in my old age, I just get bored having to install
and compile most of the packages I use. Also the last time I setup a
solaris development box I ended up replacing (with GPL software) most of
the native binaries.  Just can't beat those GNU bin/file/sh utils.. Plus
the compilers plus the debuger etc.

Still the Solaris multi-threaded kernel is not to be beaten by Linux, if
only sun would put that functionality into Linux we would be laughing
all the way to a nice stable O/S.

<Wave>

Quote:> I've still got a working SunOS 4.1.4 (SS5) system but I must say its a
> lot of work to keep running.

> Mind you these days running a SunoS 5.8 (Solaris 8) system is starting
> to become a pain when compared to Redhat Linux.

> Must be getting lazy in my old age, I just get bored having to install
> and compile most of the packages I use. Also the last time I setup a
> solaris development box I ended up replacing (with GPL software) most of
> the native binaries.  Just can't beat those GNU bin/file/sh utils.. Plus
> the compilers plus the debuger etc.

> Still the Solaris multi-threaded kernel is not to be beaten by Linux, if
> only sun would put that functionality into Linux we would be laughing
> all the way to a nice stable O/S.

--

Quote:> Why would they want to give away one of the best things they have
> (the Solaris kernel)?

--tim

For every 1 hour I spend in Linux doing maintenance (which
fortunateley isn't SVR4), I spend at least 3 in Solaris.  Ancient,
venerable and stable.... there's a price to pay I suppose.

That may be in part due to familiarity with the systems.  I find
for every admin-type task I try to perform on Linux it takes me much
longer than Solaris since I know how to do it in Solaris without
resorting to googling for HOWTO's or wondering why noone made Linux
autofs properly support /net yet.  And half the things I learned how to
do on RedHat 7 I need to learn new ways to do on RedHat 8, since
linuxconf is gone and various other changes have been made.  

--
________________________________________________________________________


  Working for, but definitely not speaking for, Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Don't get me wrong, Solaris is solid and somewhat well supported
(somewhat since the support seems to be degrading over time).
But as the Rev will gladly say... GNU Linux is not Unix... and
that's a good thing IMHO.  Time to move away from the folks
who prefer lawsuits to supporting customers.  Are there some
very important elements in Unix that appear to be working
better than Linux, perhaps so... as the Rev would say, Linux
is a "hobbiest" OS... that is to say, it's in a constant state
of evolution.  And moving forward is not a bad thing, though
it moves people away from their comfort zone of dealing
with the "tried and true" older and perceived to be more
stable technologies.  Ultimately, it's about making money.
People like old and reliable.

My GNU Linux host uptimes are usually twice as long as Solaris just
because of better live upgrade/patch features found in GNU Linux.
The Solaris answer is throw expensive HW (virtual or otherwise)
at the issue (live upgrades through redundant hw).  Certainly any OS,
even Windows, can use that approach to "reliability".  But it's a
band-aid kind of approach to sys admin (one which avoids the
radical changes it would take to implement in Unix/Windows).
Of course, I don't run Linux on extremely high hardware.  But
I have replaced $75K-150K Sun boxes with <$10K Linux platforms
without any change in performance or reliability.  Not sure
about replacing the $500K-$xM types... there really is no
Linux equivalent today (apart from some not quite ready for
prime time stuff... or the z-Series efforts).

I can't say if Sun is working on a next generation Solaris or not.
But I think it would be a great idea for them.  But I doubt
seriously they have the in-house expertise to even fully
comprehend the menagerie that is Solaris today (well, the have
expertise, but probably not the time to unravel the mysteries).
Certainly they understand parts of it, but they didn't write 50-75%
of the code base.  Microsoft (though to a much lesser extent)
faces some similar issues due to attrition over time.  So realistically,
I think we can expect further small steps of evolution in
future releases of Solaris (just like we've seen going from
2.0 to 9) mostly centered on augementing and fixing of
the existing code base.  This of course is great for
corporate enterprises because they don't like radical
change (even when the cost benefits are high... "if it
ain't broke, don't fix it").

Sun, being a hardware company primarily, has a natural
advantage against Linux and Windows because of the
benefits of operating on their own platform.  I'm amazed
at the benchmarks where Linux ousts Solaris.. I mean,
if you can tie yourself so close to the hardware, you
really shouldn't lose any race?!  Again, I attribute
that to the normal corporate politics of big business.
Can it be fixed?  Sure, and I'm sure that over time
Sun will address the deficiencies (as they are priortized
in the light of other market driven requests) and in all
fairness.. Sun should win EVERY time (against Linux and
Windows in particular).  I'm just amazed when they don't.

Sorry about the long message.  Solaris is a great OS.  But
it's not likely that Sun (even combined with HP and IBM)
will hire every "top of their class" techie in the universe
(probably never), so Linux continues to move forward (obviously
there is a mix of experience levels working on Linux.. which
is also a good thing IMHO).

I'm more pragmatic instead of dogmatic.  I won't say
run Solaris ONLY (like many say on this group)... likewise,
I won't say run Linux ONLY (also said by many in this group).
Use what works and makes the customer happy.  Even when it's
Windows (as the Rev pointed out, in his opinion that's a
better choice than GNU Linux... but that's being dogmatic
again).

Quote:> One could
> just as easily argue for the features in the Linux kernel to be
> placed into Solaris (in fact, the list is much longer going that
> way).  

Quote:> I'm not convinced of the superiority of the Solaris
> "multi-threaded kernel" implementation... but it certainly
> has the maturity that Linux lacks.

> Don't get me wrong, Solaris is solid and somewhat well supported
> (somewhat since the support seems to be degrading over time).
> But as the Rev will gladly say... GNU Linux is not Unix... and
> that's a good thing IMHO.  

Quote:>  Are there some
> very important elements in Unix that appear to be working
> better than Linux, perhaps so... as the Rev would say, Linux
> is a "hobbiest" OS... that is to say, it's in a constant state
> of evolution.  And moving forward is not a bad thing, though
> it moves people away from their comfort zone of dealing
> with the "tried and true" older and perceived to be more
> stable technologies.  Ultimately, it's about making money.
> People like old and reliable.

Quote:> My GNU Linux host uptimes are usually twice as long as Solaris just
> because of better live upgrade/patch features found in GNU Linux.
> The Solaris answer is throw expensive HW (virtual or otherwise)
> at the issue (live upgrades through redundant hw).  Certainly any OS,
> even Windows, can use that approach to "reliability".  But it's a
> band-aid kind of approach to sys admin (one which avoids the
> radical changes it would take to implement in Unix/Windows).
> Of course, I don't run Linux on extremely high hardware.  But
> I have replaced $75K-150K Sun boxes with <$10K Linux platforms
> without any change in performance or reliability.  Not sure
> about replacing the $500K-$xM types... there really is no
> Linux equivalent today (apart from some not quite ready for
> prime time stuff... or the z-Series efforts).

Quote:> I can't say if Sun is working on a next generation Solaris or not.

Quote:> But I think it would be a great idea for them.  But I doubt
> seriously they have the in-house expertise to even fully
> comprehend the menagerie that is Solaris today (well, the have
> expertise, but probably not the time to unravel the mysteries).
> Certainly they understand parts of it, but they didn't write 50-75%
> of the code base.  Microsoft (though to a much lesser extent)
> faces some similar issues due to attrition over time.  So realistically,
> I think we can expect further small steps of evolution in
> future releases of Solaris (just like we've seen going from
> 2.0 to 9) mostly centered on augementing and fixing of
> the existing code base.  This of course is great for
> corporate enterprises because they don't like radical
> change (even when the cost benefits are high... "if it
> ain't broke, don't fix it").

        <...remaining misplaced LINTEL advocacy
        and confusion over how enterprise IT
        works snipped...>

                Hope this helps,
                        Don

--
***************************   Q: How many frenchmen does it take
* Rev. Don McDonald, SCNA *      to defend Paris?
* Baltimore, MD           *   A: No one knows, it's never been tried.
***************************
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/oldno7/TheFrench.mpg
Reluctant Yamaha YZF-R1 Owner

                Hope this helps,
                        Don

--
***************************   Q: How many frenchmen does it take
* Rev. Don McDonald, SCNA *      to defend Paris?
* Baltimore, MD           *   A: No one knows, it's never been tried.
***************************
http://www.veryComputer.com/
Reluctant Yamaha YZF-R1 Owner

Quote:> Must be getting lazy in my old age, I just get bored having to
> install and compile most of the packages I use. Also the last time
> I setup a solaris development box I ended up replacing (with GPL
> software) most of the native binaries.  Just can't beat those GNU
> bin/file/sh utils.. Plus the compilers plus the debuger etc.

--
David Magda <dmagda at ee.ryerson.ca>
Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under
the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well
under the new. -- Niccolo Machiavelli, _The Prince_, Chapter VI