OSNews sent over to Sun Microsystems ten questions for a Q&A session with Sun’s product team working on Java Desktop System. Read more for the full Q&A.1. Which is the target market of Java Desktop System? To which consumers and/or businesses it is best suited for?
The target market for Sun’s Java Desktop System includes companies and
governments in emerging markets, small to medium business as well as
larger enterprises. Our target market includes any company who want to
lower the cost of managing their desktops; an easier and more
straightforward licensing model; a more secure, less virus-prone desktop.
The target users for Sun’s Java Desktop System includes knowledge
workers and transactional workers. The Java Desktop System meets their
needs with a familiar user interface and by providing a broad based of
productivity applications from mail, calendar, office suite, browser,
instant messaing and more.
2. What enhancements exactly the Gnome and XFree86 codebase has seen from Sun’s JDS engineers as opposed to the vanilla versions?
Sun engineers are one of the major contributors to the GNOME project and
have made it available not only for Java Desktop System, but also to all
Solaris Users. Additional enhancements to GNOME from Sun’s engineering
team include accessibility, globalization and usability enhancements.
3. Which are the main differences of JDS when compared to SuSE, Red Hat or Mandrake Linux?
The following are the primary differentiators of the Java Desktop System:
– Enhanced familiarity for existing Desktop users, for instance users
who are trained on Windows. This is done through a unified look and feel
throughout the applications via the Blueprint theme as well as from
using a well thought-out layout for the launch menus and desktop icons.
– Sun versions of the following applications:
* Java 1.4.2
* GNOME 2.2
* StarOffice 7.0
* Mozilla 1.4
* Evolution 1.4
4. JDS’ desktop subsystem is to be ported on top of Solaris, we heard.
When do you expect that this will happen? Will the Solaris version for
AMD64 will sport the new GUI?
Many of the key components that make up JDS are already available for
the Solaris OS, including the GNOME Desktop, the Mozilla browser,
StarOffice, and Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition. However, we do intend
to update these components and deliver a complete Java Desktop System
for Solaris OS platforms in the second half of 2004.
5. Any estimated release of Looking Glass 2? What is its status? Will Sun work
on a 3D-based X server similar to the techniques used on Longhorn or
Apple’s Mac OS X?
The Looking Glass 2 product team is working to define the requirements
and deliverables, there is not a publically available release date.
There are no plans for 3D-based X server at this time.
6. What is the release cycle of JDS like? How can administrators or
users upgrade the system? Do you use SuSE’s YaST2 to deliver updates online?
JDS is following a quarterly release schedule.
– Sun Java Desktop System, Update 1 introduces the following features
– System Administration tools for centralized application deployment and
user configuration
– Online patch delivery
– Improved support for Chinese (both Simplified and Traditional)
– Korean language support
– Japanese language support
Q2CY2004:
– Java Desktop System, Update 2 introduces the following features:
– Support for assistive technologies for people with disabilities
– Usability improvements
– Bug fixes
– Java Desktop System, Developer Edition
In the first release of Java Desktop System, system patches can be
obtained online using the Sun Java Desktop Online Updater.
In the March release, whe the system management tools are available,
administrators will use Sun’s Control System to download from Sun and
manage & deploy patches in their desktop environment.
7. Do you have plans on moving to kernel 2.6 any time soon after its
release?
Moving to 2.6 is on our roadmap, but can not be disclosed at this time.
8. How’s multimedia support on JDS? While JDS is enterprise software,
many engineers… listen to mp3s at work, while marketing departments
need support for Windows video formats that their advertisement dpts
send over for approvals…
JDS has excellent support for multimedia, including the ability to play
back MP3 audio. We include a CD Player utility as well as a Java Media
Player capable of playing media in a variety of popular formats using
the Java Media Framework — see here. The
popular RealPlayer utility is also included under license from RealNetworks.
9. Will JDS be sold to individuals? Will it be bundled with Sun or
non-Sun PC hardware?
Yes, in December when the product is introduced and generally available,
there will be a single user license for individuals and mulit user
licenses for companies and governments. The December release does not
include Sun bundled hardware, we are working closely with our hw OEM
partners who will deliver the hardware components.
10. Once you said that you are going after Microsoft with JDS, and not
after Red Hat, but what do you think of the recent Novell-SuSE merger?
Does this have an impact on JDS’ targets?
Sun has always believed in a strong and growing Unix/Linux marketplace
because it provides greater open choices to customers. This move signals
that the Linux market is consolidating much faster than anyone had ever
predicted around two major Linux distributions: SuSE and Red Hat. It
happens to leave Sun in a very compelling position since we provide
customers terrific choices with our new low-end systems, which offer
both Solaris x86 and a choice of Linux.
More importantly, as every vendor attempts to move ‘upstack’to catch up
with Sun’s groundbreaking Java Enterprise System with its $100 per
employee pricing model (and availability on both Solaris and Linux), we
think this makes Sun the safest and most comprehensive choice today.
On the desktop, Sun’s new Java Desktop System is clear and compelling
choice for customers looking to save money and improve security of their
enterprise clients. Sun’s competitive position is strong because of its
ability to deliver better choices end to end from server to desktop.
My one question is, was this whole system developed in Java or is it more of the .Net Scheme. Where you have one product and then you name all the products after that one name.
It is just a Linux, with XFree86 and Gnome 2.2. And it has the Java SDK/runtime installed by default, plus some better integration with Java overall. That’s all.
BTW, did you check out the Looking Glass 2 mpeg4 video as linked from our article? I have seen it live in a demo Sun did for some journalists a few weeks ago and it was cool.
Looking Glass 2 mp4 video is realy cool. (release it please!)
“Trade-in your existing Windows or Linux Desktop and receive a 50% discount off your purchase of the Sun Java Desktop.”
http://see.sun.com/Apps/DCS/mcp?q=ST7005TFRywuZi
Think I’m going to take them up on this offer…
“Trade-in your existing Windows or Linux Desktop and receive a 50% discount off your purchase of the Sun Java Desktop.”
I saw that, and am interested, but the pricing scheme seems way out of line. This is along the lines of using RHEL. Yearly fee, and if you do not want to pay up you are supposed to remove the software from your computer. So, running this will cost me $50/year with the tradeup, for the first year, then $100/year after that, plus extra for support if I want it. Seems awful expensive to me. Maybe I am not reading the whole thing right?
Hmm, I think you are reading it right, but how could be $100 per year and not a one time fee? That can’t be right.
JDS is pretty cool. Suse for now solaris for the future that makes it much more marketable. All the companies that have Solaris workstations really could benifit from JDS.
I have been interested in 3d user interfaces for a long time. I have tried 3dwm. I have watched the videos microsoft has put out. I have even watched movies for the sole purpose of seeing how they imagine a 3d interface would work.
By now I has written 3d desktops off as just a way to provide eye candy. eg what apple has done, what microsoft has show in longhorn demos. I had come to believe that until we came up with a new way of interacting with computers, a usable 3d gui would just mean regular 2d gui with glitter.
Watching that looking glass demo (adn expose) has caused me to regain some hope. While most of the spinning window effects looked useless and confusing, the angled windows at the side of the screen looked kind of useful.
All of this has got me quite excited about freedesktop.org’s xserver. Hopefully when all kinds of developers have the ability to create their own composition managers we will see the same sort of innovation we have seen with window managers.
gimme a link to ” Looking Glass 2 mpeg4 video ” please
Read the article and you will find it.
Pure and simple, this is Sun entering the corporate market ofering an unix workstation variant to windows.
With recent events, novel + suse, we all would expect a sun + redhat move, but since both companys cant hold their selfs. The solution is to wide the offer and show new products, specially on the linux segment.
Now, when all CEOs had heard of this “linux thing” beeing cheaper than Microsoft licenses.
Well that can happen not to be true if those big Coorps get naive and mislead what drives the penguim.
I like the idea of bundling some comercial software (even if it’s Real Player, which I don’t like at all).
I also like the themes they’ve designed. If they pack some good hardware with this desktop for a reasonable price, I’ll consider it for my next computer pursache. I don’t like the idea of paying a 100€l fee each year, though.
Are they really going to charge $100 per year for Linux with Gnome on top of it?
Didn’t find the movie-link , only some lame pictures… 🙁
Come on, B a good sport!
JDS is sun transitioning its product line to GNU/Linux. sun was very pro-Solaris anti-GNU/Linux for a long time and it hurt them badly. now adays no one wants to buy an expensive sun server when they can just buy cheap x86 systems running GNU/Linux so sun came up with a GREAT way to sell sun servers again… by bundling them with cheap GNU/Linux desktops! so you get GNU/Linux desktops for cheap but when u do you HAVE to buy expensive sun servers.
unfortunately sun can’t keep making money like this. x86 will keep getting cheaper and cheaper. GNU/Linux has literally millions of people developing it, while meanwhile solaris just has a handfull. sure solaris had a head start and it’s written by pros, but now pros from both IBM and SGI are working on GNU/Linux! how can solaris POSSIBLY keep up? it can’t
Sun is making the right moves now though! a strategic deal with AMD means they are finally planning on moving away from the antequated SPARC architecture, towards the much more powerful Opteron architecture. We can expect them to start pushing GNU/Linux servers too, but it seems like Sun will be way behind SGI with the Altix. Altix will support more processors than the SunFire 15000 and so will GNU/Linux and the Altix will be faster because it uses Intel instead of SPARC. Sun needs to whip out a 512 proc Opteron system running GNU/Linux soon, or SGI will steal all their market with Altix!
Has the pricing/licensing been defined for single users? I see that multi-users will be charged $100 per user per year. But I haven’t seen anything about the cost for single users on their home PCs.
The Looking Glass preview page said the media can be played with RealPlayer… but it seems that RealPlayer doesn’t play MP4’s? I guess QuickTime is the only option? I will try that.
John
If Sun ever want Linux programmer – especially GNOME programmers – to work with Java then need to release a JDK under a license that makes it possible to distribute it with projects like Fedora – as long as it isn’t distributed as standard, programs can’t require it. Kind of sad that they can’t see that.
http://www.xtremetechshow.com/shows/lg/media/lgcommercial.mp4
Yes, when is Sun going to pull their head out of their ass and release the Java source code under the GPL. The GPL will protect their IP, and they can still keep their own proprietary branch of Java, but the GPL branch will let the open source community take Java in new and exciting directions and integrate it into their products better.
Instead, I think what we’ll see happen is the open source community embracing .NET/C# instead of Java because Mono is GPL. Just another example of Sun being stupid about open source… McNealy and all the Sun VPs need to be fired and replaced with people who are in touch with reality. It’s just Ken Olsen and DEC all over again, DEC thought VMS was “better” than Unix somehow, and because they kept toughting their “better” VMS over Unix which was the standard, they were bought by Compaq. Maybe we’ll see Sun bought out by RedHat soon
Just where do you get that the Sparc architecture is antiquated? Is that why Sun and TI is spending big bucks on the UltraSparc IV (article at ArsTechnica)? Who would I buy 64-bit processors and hardware based on that architecture from, AMD and Intel who are nothing more than “johnny come latelies” to the 64-bit world. Or a vendor with more than seven years experience delivering 64-bit hardware and supporting it? And SGI is delivering a specialized machine with the Altrix, this would be to compete with NEC and Cray. You would not use this for your data warehouse, where I would use a SunFire or a p690.
The solution to many vendor woes is not cheap boxes running Linux where the profit margins are paper thin. And when you mention IBM, as much as they are developing for Linux they are not throwing out AIX just yet, and neither are they thinking that cheap Intel or AMD boxes is going to save them . Otherwise IBM wouldn’t be spending the money they are on the Power5 processor.
Sun is looking at an opportunity to take away some desktops from Microsoft, and they are doing it by standardizing Open Source applications and creating a “look and feel” that might appeal to people wanting to switch from Microsoft products. And if they can provide something that appeals to companies great.
AMD, Intel, and A host of hardware vendors not accoustomed to building 128 CPU machines have a long way to go before I will recommend one.
are any of these responses not pure marketing B.S in action?
Gnome has been reimplemented in Java, that’s how I interpret it.
>>but the GPL branch will let the open source community take Java in new and exciting directions and integrate it into their products better<<
Could you provide some examples of these “new and exciting directions”?
J
How could I give examples if Sun’s overly restrictive license doesn’t even let them happen?
But some examples would include things like operator overloading and unsigned types
Hah, spoken like a Sun employee worried about Sun going out of business! You mention TI, well they are making SPARC processors with a highly antiquated .13 micron process, when Intel and AMD are already moving on to 90nm! And what’s with the “johnny come lately” FUD? What good is a “proven” architecture if it’s dog slow? Opteron may be new, but so is all good technology… older technology is just that, old and worthless.
And who’s to say you can’t use Altix in a datacenter. You certainly could! In FACT, SGI has partnered with Oracle to deliver Oracle for the Altix, and we will see the Altix used as an extremely powerful Oracle server, much faster than anything that Sun can offer. IBM is transitioning their product line towards x86 too with the xSeries. This is a good way to go, and they’ll probably keep Power processors around for awhile, but deep down they know there’s no way to compete with Intel and AMD.
And really, no one cares about your recommendations. SGI is building 512 processor machines with Intel processors, and I’m sure SGI knows a hell of a lot more about multiprocessor systems than you do.
Testing the system and it don’t look so special to me, what’s the fuzz???
older technology is just that, old and worthless.
Yeh!!! Other technology that’s old and worthless:
Doors.
Fire.
Knives.
The Wheel.
Idiot.
You’re just another ignorami spouting nonsense (for example, that Red hat, a tiny and inconsequential company, could somehow takeover Sun..) Sun has all sorts of technology and makes all sorts of sales to huge businesses – what’s your problem with it? Its going to be providing 2 and 4-way Opteron systems and the sheer throughput and stability and scalability of their higher systems is still unmatched by linux x86 systems. Maybe one day they will be matched, and then I am sure I would see Sun switch to Linux. But I don’t see why it should switch entirely for religious reaons, anymore than IBM is switching entirely from AIX. In other words, Sun, which has provided the OSS community with vast help to Gnome, and provided openoffice, and God knows, tons of stuff, is met with nothing but endless ingratitude for the terrible crime of not religiously adopting Linux across the board. Give us a break.
So we have a managed Gnome and the ability to write Java solutions have have them run on new hardware without major porting difficulties. I wonder what the JDS developer edition will be like. Anyway, I don’t see any reason at all to use Microsoft products. Now we just need SUSE to catch up to SUN and businesses will have a choice. I don’t know if businesses can ask for anything else, because these guys are supplying them with good services and they are competitive.
I think I’d rather write my solutions in Java and have it integrate with GNOME rather than use GTK.
The nice part of having Linux as the operating system layer is that it encourages competition because new business interest can enter the market.
ahhh…there it is; thanxs Eugenia!!
For your information GNU/Linux is not tied to x86, and Altix is an Itanium system. All you saying that Intel is a “johnny come lately” forget that Itanium was codeveloped with HP who has EXTENSIVE expreience with 64-bit processors. You can believe all the FUD spouted about IA64 if you want, but it is a rock solid processor and the Altix comes at half the price of a comparable system from Sun. It is much more scalable with 512 processors than a SunFire 15000 is at only 108, and you forget that at 108 you aren’t going to have room for I/O boards, now are you! Also the Altix with its NUMA architecture has much better throughput than anything Sun has to offer.
I’m not anti-Sun but their decisions to cling to their antequated Solaris/Sparc architecture rather tha moving on to Linux/IA64 like SGI did will only hurt them in the long run. Sun is doing great things with Linux on the desktop, but unless they finally give up on their irrational clinging to Solaris and embrace Linux on the server too, people will stop buying Sparc and start buying SGI. The whole world is moving to Linux and no proprietary OS can keep up because so much more development is going into Linux. SGI has proven with Altix that Linux doesn’t have scalability issues and can scale to 512 processors. So quit with your anti-Linux FUD, wake up and embrace the truth!
A religious movement, basically free UNIX. Problem, it’s not free. Why move to SuSE or RedHat for server equipment? “Certified” versions of the software cost more than Solaris. What exactly is the point, other than a bunch of kiddies wanting Linux to win a ficticious war against the man “cause it’s coool!.” I understand Linux is a good Operating System, but what exactly is bad about Solaris? (NOTE: The OS, not the software above it)
Isn’t that embellishing reality… just slightly?
J
Sun please give us looking glass!
How could I give examples if Sun’s overly restrictive license doesn’t even let them happen?
Yes they do, you just,
A: Can’t use the Java source code to base it off (with out a lience from Sun )so you have to create a clean-room implementation, like say Classpath, GCC, Mac… Just like Mono and dotGNU has had to do. You have (atlest) two GPL’ed JVMs out and about, both, like Mono and dotGNU in diffrent levels of completeness, doomed to a life a almost-but-not-quite-[Java|.Net]
B: Not call it Java
You are right – I have personally went with Mono. Sun has left me with no other choice, since I want to use a modern programming language.
Even Red Hat and Ximian have been forced to patch OpenOffice.org so they can build it without Java – sad story.
I want 3D desktop now…
I sense that many get the impression that “Java Desktop System” is a Desktop System made with Java. We know that this is not the case (since we clicked “read more”…). I personally fail to see the significance of having Java added to Gnome, especially since Ximian is doing quite a good job with two products, Ximian Desktop (which isn’t moronically named) and Mono.
The post about GPL earlier made a lot of sense and I would dare to predict that Ximian will add more and more Mono based stuff to their desktop. Heck, if nothing goes wrong I should be able to develop .NET software on Longhorn, and happily run it in a future version of Ximian Desktop, integrating perfectly.
so what you are saying you cant make proprietry or gpl applications using java ???
or do you have to get a license from sun for any application u make suing java ??
Snake
Out of the 38 comments, there isn’t even ONE comment worth replying to. Nick, you have been told over thousand times, JDS is not java based. For people who say, “ooooooooo, GNU/LINUX + X86 ROOLZ!”, grow a brain and check the sums. It is cheape to deploy an x86 server with Solaris. As for the morons crowing about Solaris on the desktop. Read and repeat, Solaris sucks on the desktop. Don’t argue with the facts. SUN has NEVER said Solaris would be good for the corporate market and SUN left the UNIX workstation market over 10 years ago and only keeps the workstations there for development and a few niche customers, their main focus is servers. Read and repeat.
Solaris on servers; both x86 and SPARC, Linux on the desktop. Again, read and repeat and stop posting such stupid comments. Just when I thought that some users here can’t get lower than the “IN SOVIET RUSSIA” troll on slashdot, we have people here to take the title via just one post.
For goodness sake, read the article, read the background information THEN comment.
A religious movement, basically free UNIX. Problem, it’s not free. Why move to SuSE or RedHat for server equipment? “Certified” versions of the software cost more than Solaris.
WRONG WRONG WRONG. Multiprocessor Solaris licenses are ludicrously expensive!
http://store.sun.com/catalog/doc/BrowsePage.jhtml?cid=82431&parentI…
As you can see, a 128 processor license costs $400,000, and that’s only the upgrade cost! That’s ridiculous. Imagine how much a license for something like the 512-processor Altix system would be!
Altix systems are less than half of a comparable system from Sun. I imagine this is due in large part to SGI not charging ridiculous licensing fees.
Why do all you people continue to insist that I’m touting GNU/Linux on x86 for datacenter use? Duh, that’s what the Altix is for. And Sun hardware and software is in NO WAY better than Linux/Altix. Just name one thing Solaris can do that Linux can’t
Okay, I know that java is no longer a buzz word, but stop bad mouthing it. When I’m writing an app, it’s usually in java, using the AWT for the GUI and JNI to do the C interfacing (if I want to mess with system calls and such).
Just name one thing Solaris can do that Linux can’t
Well, I think the scheduling in Solaris is at least half a decade ahead of Linux. Linux has just now implemented an O(1) scheduler in the 2.6 kernel, whereas Solaris has had one for years. Furthermore, you can swap out schedulers and move processes between them on-the-fly, and run multiple schedulers simultaneously, and you can do this on any recent Solaris system… it isn’t a function offered by applying an esoteric and poorly tested kernel patch. Furthermore, Solaris offers a Fair Share Scheduler in which absolute partitions on system resources can be created, and processes can be moved between these partitions on-the-fly.
the right for an OSS product developer to distribute it with their system for free. then Java could be built into Gnome and KDE and Mozilla.
but I think it would also be nice for a clean room implimentation of it to get completed (come on companies where are you) so then rather than live in this javaless hell we can have a java system that is totaly useable and integrated.
@Snake
Take a look at how many Java projects are on Sourceforge, I think it ranks #3 (slightly below C & C++). So yes, of course you can create and distribute Java-based open source appz.
I think the question earlier was about open sourcing Java itself, a different issue.
http://sourceforge.net/softwaremap/trove_list.php?form_cat=160
the right for an OSS product developer to distribute it with their system for free.
I’m fairly sure you can distribute a unmodified version of Java freely.
Most OSS projects don’t distribute Java on the bases that it is not “Open”, not that they are not allowed to.
—
There is hoops (and cash) you need to jump thou. inorder to distribute modified versions of java, or to call a Clean Room implementation of Java “Java”. I think they are now being relaxed (thanks to Tomcat).
—
nice for a clean room implimentation of it to get completed
I think Apples is
But, Yeap.
Perhaps the coolest damn thing ever. Sun should open-source it! (hah, but no, it would be really cool if they did!) Really neat.
Just watched the looking glass demo. I can’t believe it! Mind-bending is the word. It makes OS X look about a decade old. When they release this with their Java Desktop System I will buy the OS the same day.
BEAUTIFUL.
@Joe
thnx m8 for the reply, thats fine for opensouce what about proprietry ??
Snake
yeah i have to agree “IF” they oss it it would do amazing thing for linux on the desktop
hehe any ideas when theyplan to implement this or beta it atleast ?
Snake
The only problem I see with making commercial apps is that java is waay to easy to decompile. just by searching google you can find a java decompiler in minutes.. and its not like it decompiles to assembly either.. it decompiles back to java, which is what makes it worse than decompilers for most other languages.
I also see posts that imply java is not capable of much. My question to you is this: have you ever actually tryed to program a real app in java? It can do everything c# can do.. I really dont see why people are going so crazy over c#, as its just microsofts ripoff of java which they created because of a dispute with sun.
If you want to use gnome 2 use Linux on a x86 machine, for free (no single license issues). They made a new theme for Gnome, no big deal. Is this theme bussiness oriented ? I would say it is. I wish good look to sun, they are an honest company IMHO.
IBM also published a web slides presentation that also studied the segments of corporate desktop users (for Linux desktop) on the corporate side. Problem is IBM doesn’t have the courage to starttheir own Linux distribution while SUN is in a bad finacial and processor (tech level) moment has nothing to lose.
Sun will be releasing the new theme December, stay tunned
# I guess you pay $100 year to have an updated
# staroffice suite, which is worth it if you raelly don’t
# like win32 Word.
Most OSS projects don’t distribute Java on the bases that it is not “Open”, not that they are not allowed to.
A lot of projects would love to distribute java but you can’t. The license only allows you to distribute it if
* You distribute it with your java program (to make sure the user can run it)
* You distribute it with a printed book or magazine
I say get gcj up on par with tiger (java 1.5) and then we can forget all about C++ and hard disk trashing virtual machines that takes ages to start up.
Color me impressed. I wonder what software exactly is behind that… but it would appear to be some sort of nested X server that uses GLX as the backend. If only we could see those sort of changes integrated into XFree86 itself…
No, it is just a Java app running atop of X or even Gnome, it does not utilize any 3D X server.. Unfortunately..
Great article on UltraSparc IV at Ars Technica.
Check it out:
http://arstechnica.com/cpu/003/mpf-2003/mpf-2003-1.html
“All Sun system and system board products include a license to use the Solaris Operating System, SPARC Platform Edition. Customers purchasing new and remanufactured hardware from Sun are authorized to run the latest version of the Solaris operating environment on those systems, or any previous version of Solaris software that is still available.”
Same page you linked. The licenses are only for upgrade to Solaris 9 if you didn’t buy a system from Sun.
$400,000 /128 = $3125 / cpu one time.
At $179 -$18000 the average price per cpu per year for Redhat would be $9089. There by making Red hat more expensive than solaris.
Care to post a link with the price of a 128 cpu Altix with Linux on it so we can compare the price of the SF 15K.
Care to talk about what is antiquated about Solaris/SPARC. linux is trying to catch up with what solaris had yesterday O(1) scheduler, NUMA support, 64-bit support, enterprise class debugging and profiling tools ( linux is nowhere close here).
I can go into excruciating technical detail, if you are willing. But something tells me you are talking out of your nether regions. This OSnews so lets get technical about solaris and linux kernels and SPARC, I am ready.
You should read http://oss.sgi.com/projects/numa/. Linux doesn’t scale out of the box with out SGI doing massive work on the kernel and IBM contributing too. Note that these comapnies have a lot of enterprise experience not the main linux kernel hackers. Linus and gang are great developers but they don’t have the budget for the hardware.
The Altix is a box build out of many C-bricks each brick with 4 cpus each. You can always connect 5 SF 15k’s and get a 500+cpu box with a highbandwidth interconnect and single image of Solaris. The UltraSPARC III is designed to scale upto 1024 cpus. NUMA doesn’t give you massive throughput as you seem to think. NUMA is bad for throughput because the latencies for remote memory accesses are usually very large compared to local accesses.
Oh and itanium2 madison costs a minimum of $4000 per cpu and max of $10,000. For 512 itanium 2 cpus the minimum cost is $204800 just for the cpus. The altix costs a lot more than the SF 15k.
“Out of the 38 comments, there isn’t even ONE comment worth replying to.”
Well then go back to Slashdot and take your attitude with you.
Just name one thing Solaris can do that Linux can’t
I’d like to see you hot swap a processor in a muliprocessor machine with Linux. It can be done with Solaris. It detects the faulty processor and doesn’t send any jobs to it anymore. Swap in a new one and it will start using it again. Zero downtime.
Or try installing or admining Linux through a serial terminal server. Sure, there may be expensive addon hardware that lets you do this, but x86 machines generally can’t, and Linux doesn’t have support anyways. Console is still console on Linux.
And to all you folks cheering Linux? “I don’t like Linux.” Why? All you folks cheering it mindlessly and attacking anyone who *dares* to critise Linux. Really, people are entitled to their opinions. These are operating systems we are talking about here. Don’t confuse operating systems with religious cults.
More than StarOffice, this could be the killer Linux app for Sun. I know I would be interested to get the JDS just for that, if it’s as cool as it looks.
just by searching google you can find a java decompiler in minutes
You can get tools to make this much harder.
.. I really dont see why people are going so crazy over c#
As a Java guy, I do. Luckly a lot of C# features are coming soon.
Alas the big .net feature I quite like (cashe of “HotSpot”ed sections) is not
A lot of projects would love to distribute java but you can’t
The Multi-GB linux distros can’t stick even a “WeMustHaveThisHelloWorldForLegalReasons” java app? Or ask Sun, I really don’t think they’d be that much of an bugger?
that takes ages to start up.
Shared VMs, MMmmm. Soon I hope…
I say get gcj up on par with tiger (java 1.5)
This would make me very very happy (gcj also includes a JVM, so two birds one stone)…
No, it is just a Java app running atop of X or even Gnome, it does not utilize any 3D X server
What about the native X apps running on it(Real, etc), and being spun? either they are fake (possable) or it is an X server, writen in Java?
Or I’m confused about what you are saying
Don’t confuse operating systems with religious cults.
No, thats what Emacs is for!
Who cares about the OS, as long it Emacs 21.x compiles 🙂
No, it is just a Java app running atop of X or even Gnome, it does not utilize any 3D X server
What about the native X apps running on it(real, etc), and being spun? either they are fake (possable) or it is an X server, writen in Java?
Or I’m confused about what you are saying
Ignore whoever said this. They are a moron. It’s obviously acting as an X server, and using OpenGL as a back end on top of a normal XFree86 server. X applications are connecting to it. I doubt it’s written in Java at all. It is doing a lot of work drawing X windows into texture memory, and Java would be way too slow to do that efficiently. I am guessing very efficient C or C++ to write something like this.
You may want to do your research, and also check who exactly you are calling a moron.
Maybe what you should do is look up Symetrical Multiprocessing and Massively Parallel Processing before you start spouting FUD! There is a huge difference in how they are designed and what they do. And even if Oracle is porting its database to Altrix, it is more than likely very specialized.
I work with Sun and IBM hardware on a daily basis (and I am not an employee of either). Most sane companies are not simply going to dump their Sun and IBM hardware costing millions of dollars for a bunch of unproven Intel and AMD boxes running Linux. The key here is stability, not cost, and to get that stability you have to pay for it.
Linux is not the universal answer to a bunch of problems:
1. It does not meet the requirements for the U. S. Government for auditing (Common Criteria EAL3). So adoption by the Government is going to be limited to “non critical” uses like DNS servers. And the Government buys a lot of computer hardware and software.
2. Linux does not have certain features that Solaris and AIX have such as IP Network Multipathing (Solaris), EtherChannel (AIX), Projects (Solaris), Logical Partitions (AIX).
3. I hear a lot of people making noise about Linux, but what I see is people complaining about RedHat and SuSe “selling out” and wanting their “free as in beer” OS. I personally feel the acid test of Linux is here and it has noting to do with the OS, it has to do with its user base. How many people are going to “jump ship” when they actually have to pay for Linux to get support? And considering what RedHat is charging for RHAS, Solaris (x86 or Sparc) comes in cheaper and is EAL4 compliant.
4. And for that matter why should Sun or IBM dump their primary OS for Linux? Because you say they should, or some other Linux zealot say they should. Think again because they won’t, not if their customers have anything to say about it.
Linux can do some things well, I have not used one OS that does everything well (and at last count I have used 14). The “choice” I hear Linux people talking about must be only for Linux, and if anyone thinks of another OS, then they are talking FUD! And regarless of how great Itanium is, there doesn’t seem to be a bunch of machines running them and furthermore, not a lot of long term reliability and usability reports from Itanium boxes. As far as the “scalability” you keep talking about, again SMP and MPP are different. And I am also willing to bet that SGI has enhanced Linux with proprietary code to handle this (just as IBM has enhanced Linux to run on a zSeries mainframe).
I am looking at things from the persective of someone who works in the industry. And I am not convinced Linux is the answer, and it is going to take much more than Linux zealot nonsense to convince me otherwise.
Linux is not a commercial product and that makes it more stable and powerful than any of the operating systems out there. There are more businesses who base their product line on Linux today, including SUN (Java desktop System), IBM, and Novell, etc. These companies are convinced that their product has a place in the enterprise.
The Gnome that Sun has built is obviously a product that is integrated with Solaris and Java. They have commercialized that software layer and have depolyed it on Linux. Sun realizes that they do not control Linux, so they have chosen wisely to base their product line ontop of the operating system layer.
None of these companies control Linux, it is an open source platform, and what some people want to see is business finding opportunites derived from basing a product line on the Linux platform. When those companies sell a product, it is not Linux, but it is a strategy that specializes Linux for industry.
These other operating systems (Windows, Solaris, AIX, OSX, etc) are burdensome and weak, because they weaken the companies strategy of deploying a specialized product and they are burdensome because they are not flexible, they are isolated because they are closed and not easy to deploy. The operating system layer is now like a hardware layer, and it is much more productive if it is open like Linux, and the concentration is on developing solutions and service.
“These companies are convinced that their [Linux-based] product has a place in the enterprise.”
Yep, but may not at a critical task of the enterprise.
I’d be very interested in a direct comparison of Java Desktop System with its real competitors such as the Linux Terminal Server Project http://www.ltsp.org/ or K12Linux-LTSP http://www.k12ltsp.org/ .
Compared with K12LTSP, JDS appears to have
– paid-for support
– the Star Office extra templates and Adabas databse
– some different icons
– no support for Windows Terminal Server (K12LTSP has rdesktop)
– slightly more recent versions of some applications
What else is there to justify the $100/year/desktop fees?
The thing that Sun can do for linux on the desktop, is get major developpers port some applications that will make corporations think again.
For the moment, there is no project management software (like MS Project) available for Linux, No application of the level of Visio, No acrobat writer (yes you can do a number of things in OO.org) no licensed DVD player available to all linux users, No easy to use web design tool. So maybe Java Desktop will be fine for Call centers but were I work, that wouldn’t do. They will also have to repair the mess they’ve done with Java GUI development and its reputation, make it really easy and offer a VB/VBA to Java utility that’s really powerful and usable by the guys coding in VB. They are not all professionals.
Also, why not contract Codeweavers to provide support for VB run times in the meantime ? And get Borland to provide conversion utilities for VB to kylix ?
And they have to promote Linux as an open field, because nobody will want to leave Microsoft arms for Sun’s arms if they feel they are completely tied to Sun. Linux has less than 1% presence on the desktop. IF the target is really MS, and its 97%, they shouldn’t dismiss the other companies already present. They should acknowledge Suse(Novell), Xandros, Mandrake, Libranet, Lindows and show that they are not alone on that field and that whatever works with those distros will work with JDS.
Failing that, corporates will no more move to them than they have moved to Apple, that has got a lot more credentials on the desktop than Sun. The problem is that no corporate wants to be dependent of one provider for everything. With MS it’s bad enough but with Apple, you can’t even choose your hardware.
What SUN is doing wrong right now is that instead of leveraging the Linux buzz, they want to go it alone. Go and check the interview of the Sun desktop honcho. He says JDS is the first alternative to MS in 15 years ! But desktop linux distros have been around for a least 3/4 years !
IBM has really understood what Linux and open source is. I doubt SUN has.
now adays no one wants to buy an expensive sun server when they can just buy cheap x86 systems running GNU/Linux
Thats an incorrect statement. Robert pointed out the exact reasons why Linux is a minor player in large corporations and will continue to be as long as the “big iron” suppliers(HP,IBM,SUN) are around.
First good comment and as a linux user for untold years it makes a nice summation of the missing pieces for many corporate users.
For the moment, there is no project management software (like MS Project) available for Linux
I have used Mr. Project in linux more than a few times. It does not have a few features of Project but then again its interface is clearer and its easier to work in.
Mr. Project is a wonderful project management package lacking two important things.
1) A ways to import MS Project files. (reverse engineering help please, Sun folks pleeease)
2) A way to access network project files in a collaborative mode the way that MS Project does.
No application of the level of Visio
Dia needs some serious tender love and care. I know this and Kivio or whatever for the KDE crowd I have heard is much better. Dia needs help and it needs an import tool as well. I hear that no one has been able to figure out the Visio formatting stuff.
No acrobat writer (yes you can do a number of things in OO.org)
I believe there is a way in OO to save the file as a Acrobat document.
I know that the Ximian Gnome print dialog has a print to pdf option as well. Maybe Sun could work that into their usability features or something.
Still, I thought that Adobe use to support a *Nix version of acorbat and it would be nice if they did again. Not denying this at all.
no licensed DVD player available to all linux users
This does suck. I mean it. I really do.
On RH9 using apt4rpm it is dead easy to get this with a apt-get -f install mplayer but I know exactly what you mean.
It would be nice to have a DVD player that worked really well and was available out-of-the-box.
I have oft-wondered if someone like sun could offer a binary plugin to xine or mplayer or gstreamer and ship it with those products without it violating the GPL or causing a minor OSS freak revolt on them.
No easy to use web design tool.
Maybe I do not do enough web design but I have used both bluefish and screem. Screem has a lot of nice features and works very well. bluefish is nice for quick development.
For the WYSWIG folks the OO people have sweb or Mozilla includes a simple editor as well. No these not enterprise level tools but they work very well for the person that needs to hack out a quick site.
make it really easy and offer a VB/VBA to Java utility that’s really powerful and usable by the guys coding in VB.
That is an interesting idea. Doubt it will happen but it is an interesting idea.
It is rare that I read in these pages a good thoughtfull post on the limitations of linux without the thing turning into a bit of nonsense that amounts to “linux sucks — windoze rulez” so the post was very refreshing.
Linux is not the universal answer to a bunch of problems:
1. It does not meet the requirements for the U. S. Government for auditing (Common Criteria EAL3). So adoption by the Government is going to be limited to “non critical” uses like DNS servers. And the Government buys a lot of computer hardware and software.
Except for NASA, of course:
http://www.sgi.com/features/2003/nov/nasa/index.html
Regarding EAL3:
“IBM spokesman Clint Roswell said IBM expects to receive EAL3 certification for SuSE Linux by the end of 2003, with EAL4 to come later.”
From this article:
http://www.zdnetindia.com/techzone/resources/security/stories/87020…
How many people are going to “jump ship” when they actually have to pay for Linux to get support?
Paid support for Linux has been around for a while, and not many people have “jumped ship.” On the contrary, Linux market penetration continues to grow.
4. And for that matter why should Sun or IBM dump their primary OS for Linux? Because you say they should, or some other Linux zealot say they should.
While IBM isn’t dropping AIX, it’s clearly focussing on Linux, making large customers such as Schwab and American Express switch from UNIX to Linux.
It’s true that Linux doesn’t measure up to Solaris and AIX in some aspects. However, it’s clear that IBM and others plan on bringing Linux there in the near future. Clearly, the focus now is on improving Linux so that it surpasses proprietary Unices (Sun being the exception).
“The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has awarded Fairfax, Va.-based PEC Solutions Inc. (Nasdaq: NM: PECS) a $9 million contract to provide technology support to the government.
Specifically, PEC Solutions will help the federal courts migrate its national information technology infrastructure to a Linux/Intel platform.”
http://sanantonio.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories/2003/11/17/dai…
Sun appears to understand open source just as well, if not better than IBM. Right now Sun is becomming the leader.
I would question the motives of IBM and Sun with regards to their perceived support of Linux. In my opinion both of those companies are investing just enough to ride the Linux train until such time that it runs out of steam or market growth flattens out.
Neither one of those companies could possibly want Linux to become king of the enterprise, they would lose to much money if people were to stop buying their big iron.
Sun appears to understand open source just as well, if not better than IBM. Right now Sun is becomming the leader.
Just to add, they’re doing something about getting Linux on the desktop. Now, for all the IBM fanboys, where is that Linux Desktop Software that IBM has been promising or is it like all their other indevers, one big ball of crap, just like Lou Ghestners diabolical management of Nabisco.
How many companies have IBM acquired and failed to absorb into their company, heck, from the outside, it looks alot like Computer Associates. Lots of software of very average quality.
SUN on the other hand work WITH the community, contributing to projects that MATTER like Evolution, XFree86, GNOME, OpenOffice.org and Netbeans.
The fact remains that the $1billion that IBM apparently donated was NEVER donated. They call $1billion as in “$1billion in IP”. In otherwords, nothing pratical. If they were to do something practical, it should be to buy out Corel, pump $600million into the company and port their whole range over to Linux. THAT would be VERY useful. Creating yet ANOTHER threading or filesystem implementation isn’t going to help anyone except those who like to get their creative juices flowing in excitement over added complexity.
“Neither one of those companies could possibly want Linux to become king of the enterprise, they would lose to much money if people were to stop buying their big iron.”
Wow! the next big thing to “Free Software” is “Free Hardware”! Hooray!!
can this plug into the network running on Windows NT , seamlessly ??
And is it true that it is priced 100$ per year. Is it not a perpetual licence ? B’coz if it is so in the longrun it will be even more exhorbitant than what Microsoft charges.
the real worry is that the cost of ownwrship will be high with the cost compounding every year.
3rd party version about.