Comments on: Has Solaris Turned the Corner?

By: DaveA

DaveA — Sun, 24 Sep 2006 18:13:11 +0000

You wrote: …credible advances in Solaris such as SMF

Your kidding right? I have used UNIX over 25 years and I see no sense in editing a BIG XML file for a little config change. There ARE places XML is just no good for, UNIX config files are one of them. UNIX so far has avoided the Microsoft registry hell but it looks like Solaris has seen its peek.

But the writing was on the wall in Solaris 9 with the naming of “directoryserver”. It tells tells me people are coding Solaris that don’t know UNIX, why not “dsadm”? Using long names and XML is a bastardization of the elegant simplicity of UNIX. Try writing a shell script to write much over verbose XML (and get it right the first time).

If Solaris 11 goes further down the XML road, I will jump to Linux. Might anyway, already have it running.

By: Phillip Fayers

Phillip Fayers — Wed, 19 Apr 2006 08:59:04 +0000

Philip: i don’t know that i agree. i’ve been saying for a while that when features that Solaris has truly make a difference - such as DTrace - begin to get customer traction and mindshare, you’ll see a focused response. i think we’ll see a concerted effort from the Linux community to close the gap in a couple of the areas. not all, perhaps, but Solaris will have to continue to innovate to stay ahead of where Linux falls short.

Sun have an advantage over the Linux community, they have a more focused development agenda. That focus has led to the creation of Dtrace and ZFS. Now Linux also has its own innovations and these are, obviously, focused on the needs of the Linux users. So Linux has faster package installation because people are always installing packages on Linux, an area which Sun haven’t focused on so they are behind the curve.

When I said that Solaris would stay ahead technically I suppose I ought to clarify that. Solaris will continue to have a kernel and supporting O/S infrastructure which is technically better for running enterprise and internet services.

By: James Governor's MonkChips

James Governor's MonkChips — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 16:07:30 +0000

37Signal’s David Heinemeier responds on lessconfig, the advantages of convention

I have been wondering about the advantages of lessconfig, that is, the maintenance advantages of delivering technology that needs less configuration, because, for example, the right defaults are chosen in the first place. Good open source package manag…

By: James

James — Fri, 07 Apr 2006 10:59:16 +0000

There are many enterprises who are considering moving back to Solaris from Linux. Maybe you could track down some of them and figure out the enterprise perspective.

Likewise, the vast majority of the “appliance” marketplace used to run on Linux but also are starting to move towards Solaris.

By: People Over Process

People Over Process — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 01:48:24 +0000

More on lessconfig: Package Management, Customization, and Context

The notion of lessconfig is still young. But there is some great discussion going on around it. Package Management Jaime Cardoso added some great detail to the lessconfig conversation, smartly pulling in Steve’s recent discussion of package management …

By: People Over Process

People Over Process — Wed, 05 Apr 2006 23:27:44 +0000

More on lessconfig: Package Management, Customization, and Context

By: iwan 'e1' rahabok

iwan 'e1' rahabok — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 14:36:10 +0000

Thanks for sharing your data points. I enjoyed reading non-Sun’s opinion/perception/etc. Customer’s perception, wrong or not, is my reality. Would love to read the complete report when you get there. A good time frame might be Q3 2006, because there are a couple of products we are launching (Solaris 10 Update 2 inclusive), which might propel the ‘acceptance’ further. Regards from Singapore, Iwan, IT Architect, Sun CSO, Asia South.

By: Jaime Cardoso

Jaime Cardoso — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 21:32:25 +0000

Hey, comparing “stuff” with Dtrace is kind of hard. Dtrace is really ground breaking and I ever saw few things that compare but, I would put pretty much at the same level the Network performance increase that it’s beein worked out for Solaris 11 and the linear performance scalability increases (when “comodity” hardware has 64 “CPUs”, that scalability will be needed)
As for the Linux - Solaris two way chase, for Linux to catch Solaris it will need to scale it’s Kernel up to way more than 100 CPUs, Solaris on the other hand, needs a new Package Management tool (just to use your example). That’s the diference I’m talking about.

By: stephen ogrady

stephen ogrady — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 20:39:52 +0000

Jaime: to that point, what are you, as an active user of Sun technologies, seeing in Nevada and subsequent releases that’s functionally as innovative as, say, DTrace? i’m curious.

as for getting Solaris to the Linux level versus the opposite, i’m not sure i agree. i think it’s much easier to copy - and improve on previously established features - than it is to build a community.

By: Jaime Cardoso

Jaime Cardoso — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 19:59:58 +0000

Stephen, The roadmap is already established for Solaris 11 and, I’ve seen discussions about Solaris 12 so, Solaris will evolve.
As for Linux, in the long run, I’m a lot more conservative, I think I’ll just have to wait and see how critical issues like the glib will be addressed.
One thing is true, getting Solaris to the level Linux is today (in the things he is stronger) is a lot simpler than geting Linux to the level of Solaris (in the oposite things)