Sun and Linux

[Raju Mathur <raju@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

IMHO Linux needs neither Sun on the OSDL to survive.  Frankly as long
as Sun keeps putting up Solaris as a competitor to Linux it's
definitely going to get seriously burned.  When, oh when, will they
realise that Open Source is the way to go, and not dumb Community
Source Licenses like theirs, which only bring benefit to Sun and none
to the rest of the world?

Take the case of Java.  I go out of my way to prevent people from
developing apps in Java, since Sun owns Java and there's nothing to
prevent them from changing the license to a proprietary one tomorrow
(a possibility which the wording of the ``Community'' license makes
very strong).  If Sun does make Java proprietary tomorrow, the case
will be a bit like that of Unisys and GIF, but on a much larger scale,
since converting images is a simple job compared to re-writing code.

OpenSourcing Star Office was a good idea... now let them extend it to
the rest of their products.  Or was it that they have SO's successor
ready, so opensourcing the older technology isn't a problem, while
they still don't have successors to Java and Solaris in place?

As for OSDL, it's a fallout of the popularity of Linux; we're likely
to see many more of these before an year is out.

Regards,

-- Raju

>>>>> "Arun" == Arun Sharma <adsharma@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

    Arun> http://www.zdnet.com/sp/stories/news/0,4538,2622516,00.html
    Arun> Sun confirms that it won't likely join OSDL, but puts a
    Arun> dramatically different spin on the situation. "Bill Joy was
    Arun> the Linus [Torvalds] of his day, but we had the Unix wars
    Arun> and the commercialization of Unix and the community broke
    Arun> up," says Sun VP of marketing for Solaris Andy Ingram. "Now
    Arun> Linus has refocused the open-source community and tied it in
    Arun> with the Internet, which is a whole new way of gluing the
    Arun> community together. Our goal is to be a good citizen in this
    Arun> community; not only to see the benefits, but to contribute
    Arun> to it."

    Arun> 	-Arun