Interested in crushing Ubuntu?

[ksJoe]

Technically, opensolaris is free as in beer and free as in freedom.

While its not the best desktop OS, it is what I use as my desktop OS at work. I'm a software engineer at Sun, so using opensolaris as my desktop is helpful for me. But if I wanted to, I could run windows or linux.

If they make some things easier, it would be a very appealing OS for home use (e.g. ZFS for home nas).

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted By: ksJoe
Technically, opensolaris is free as in beer and free as in freedom.


Point taken. But hardware support is even more, uh, "streamlined" than Linux's, and it's pretty much just the same ol' GNU userland, GNOME desktop and what-not piled on top of your kernel rather than the Linux kernel, no?

EDIT: Scratch the GNU part; that's probably not the case, and I'd hate Richard Stallman to start making me say openGNU/Solaris.

RE-EDIT: Tooooooo much time on my hands, apparently it DOES use GNU userland; at least the Nexenta implementation.

Originally Posted By: ksJoe
(e.g. ZFS for home nas).


I hear you, my NAS just hit the 1 infinibyte (= 1,024 bazilliabtyes) mark. Thank goodness for ZFS!

 

[ksJoe]

Yes, gnome desktop on top of Solaris kernel.

And drivers are what I was primarily referring to by "If they make some things easier".

So... you're using ZFS at home?

BTW, sometimes I hear FUD about it not being 'real solaris' or the x86 version not being equal to the sparc version. Neither is true. The sparc & x86 are built from the same source tree. And opensolaris / nevada is the source tree for the next big release of solaris. Don't know if it will be called Solaris 11, Solaris 10.1, etc. But whatever they decide to call it, its the next major release.

 

[ksJoe]

Re GNU:

Yes a lot of the userland tools & desktop, etc are GNU / GPL code.

Which is kind of ironic, when you think about it. GNU is an acronym for "Gnu (is) Not Unix".

 

[greenaccord02]

I, for one, cannot wait to see the day GNU/Hurd goes live as a stable OS. Only the asperger's-ridden mind of the most elder geeks can comprehend such an operating system. Saying you run GNU/Hurd on your production machine is going to be like benchpressing a Volkswagen for nerds. All the little nerd girls are going to start whispering, "OMG! Did you hear... I know so-and-so runs BSD, but that's nothing. He runs the Hurd! I heard it's free as in love!"

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted By: greenaccord02
I, for one, cannot wait to see the day GNU/Hurd goes live as a stable OS. Only the asperger's-ridden mind of the most elder geeks can comprehend such an operating system. Saying you run GNU/Hurd on your production machine is going to be like benchpressing a Volkswagen for nerds. All the little nerd girls are going to start whispering, "OMG! Did you hear... I know so-and-so runs BSD, but that's nothing. He runs the Hurd! I heard it's free as in love!"


I have hurd... SORRY, *heard* about hea hurd development for a lot of years. The scuttlebut is that since there is a really good F/LOSS kernel out there already, that they ain't many folk putting a lot of time into Hurd, and development is slow. I have even heard "Hurd" and "vaporware" used together in the same sentence.

Also, nerds will *always* bow to the Alpha nerds using a BSD variant. Also Slackware and Gentoo.

 

[greenaccord02]

Yeah, it's been in alpha since uhhhh.... like 1983 so it's not exactly got alot of steam behind it. Still, I've got to respect the dedication of those guys. There's not much software that's been in alpha since I was -2 years old.

 

[Pop_Rivit]

Originally Posted By: StevieC
Microsoft is like the BIG-3 it's over for them... They are on borrowed time and will crash like the BIG-3 are right now. People are tired of inferior operating systems that are a pig on resources. Why else would Linux and Apple be gaining so much market share?


Windows 7 appears to be a solid, popular OS. Care to revise your prediction for Microsoft? Or do you still have a time frame in mind for the "crash" of Microsoft?

 

[Kruse]

Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
Originally Posted By: StevieC
Microsoft is like the BIG-3 it's over for them... They are on borrowed time and will crash like the BIG-3 are right now. People are tired of inferior operating systems that are a pig on resources. Why else would Linux and Apple be gaining so much market share?


Windows 7 appears to be a solid, popular OS. Care to revise your prediction for Microsoft? Or do you still have a time frame in mind for the "crash" of Microsoft?


It it my OPINION that 7 will be a good OS. But on the news the other day, they showed that the percent of people using Mac has actually increased since the Win 7 operating system has become available.

 

[labman]

Originally Posted By: ToyotaNSaturn
I don't think so. They OWN the OEM pre-load market. It's the crown-jewel of everything computing. That isn't changing anytime soon!

...


It has been a long time, but GM once owned 55% of the market.

 

[BearZDefect]

Linux and many great open source software are awesome.

There is a thorn, however. Since there is no boss paying someone to do X and focus on X, different projects arise for the same purpose, scattering talent and energy, and giving the end user a 'choice' of things that don't work very well together. While this may be good, on one hand, so everyone doesn't go down the wrong path, in the end wouldn't it be best if efforts converge?

I am thinking specifically about the desktop - GNOME vs KDE vs XFCE, or GTK vs QT vs whatever. I find that a huge waste. Then some commercial enterprises have their fingers in there, as in QT.

The ever-so-popular MySQL also has commercial interest fingers in it. But that's another subject I won't get into because I have never liked MySQL.

You can argue that commercial interst improves these products. Proponents of QT say it is superior to GTK. But I'm sure some GTK proponents could say with justification that GTK is superior to QT.

How did Apple take free software, and make it better? (At least the graphical user interface.) Investment of time and talent (i.e. money) I suppose. Oh, and they came up with Carbon, Cocoa, whatever. Too bad they didn't perfect GTK and put it back in the free software community.

Commercial input can be good. OpenOffice (Sun) is an awesome product for free. It is nicely put together, if somewhat bloated, but bloat seems to be the norm these years anyway, whether from Microsoft or free software.

Just rambling here.

 

[simple_gifts]

Quote:

Windows 7 appears to be a solid, popular OS. Care to revise your prediction for Microsoft? Or do you still have a time frame in mind for the "crash" of Microsoft?


Problem is, the explosive grow will be in handheld and mobile devices. There are 6 billion people on the earth who could be connected and < 10% will be have access to a $600, 10lb PC, and unfortunately that is where MS makes it money and in fact the only area in which they can compete. "Light and agile" doesn't describe them as a company or much of what they produce.

MS underestimated the web, and lost; now they will underestimate the mobile market. The fact that Linux powered netbooks have a large market share should indicate something to them; it is about connectedness, not whether I can run MS apps.

Quote:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=2848

 

[ksJoe]

One of the challenges facing Windows is that the value opportunity is moving. Back in the 90's people bought a PC, then bought a lot of applications to run on it. For consumers there was little if any interaction with networks and other computers. Everything about the PC was centered right there. All the value creation happened right there. And the OS was the center of it all, making everything happen.

Now, most of the time consumers spend on their PCs are spent online. Surfing the web, email, arguing about software on oil websites, etc.

Look at it this way. In the 90's Windows was like the frame of the house, holding everything together. Now, it is becoming primarily a door onto the internet. When you're buying a house, door isn't the focus. It certainly isn't where you spend most of the $.

The opportunity to create value has moved, and Microsoft is still charging monopoly inspired prices. They will continue to get away with it for some time. But that doesn't change the fact that they are no longer the key to value creation in desktop computing. In the long run, prices have to match the value created. They're just so entrenched its going to take a while.