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OpenIndiana

Posted by Scott_Ruecker on · 11 comments
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OpenIndiana is a continuation of the OpenSolaris operating system. It was conceived during the period of uncertainty following the Oracle takeover of Sun Microsystems, after several months passed with no binary updates made available to the public. The formation proved timely, as Oracle discontinued OpenSolaris soon after in favour of Solaris 11 Express, a binary distribution with a more closed development model to debut later this year.

OpenIndiana is a continuation of the OpenSolaris operating system. It was conceived during the period of uncertainty following the Oracle takeover of Sun Microsystems, after several months passed with no binary updates made available to the public. The formation proved timely, as Oracle discontinued OpenSolaris soon after in favour of Solaris 11 Express, a binary distribution with a more closed development model to debut later this year.

OpenIndiana is part of the Illumos Foundation, and provides a true open source community alternative to Solaris 11 and Solaris 11 Express, with an open development model and full community participation. Announcement Details

We will be holding a press conference in London (UK) at the JISC offices at 6:30pm UK Time (BST, GMT+1) to formally announce the project and provide full details, including information on gaining access to download our first development release. In addition, we will be broadcasting live on the internet - please see http://openindiana.org/announcement for details of attending in person or on the web.

We believe this announcement will deliver the distribution the community has long sought after. - Project OpenIndiana

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Comments (11)

Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
And here I thought people would rejoice at this news..I have only tried out Solaris once before but I liked it and I know that there are many who visit LXer that have had or do use it..

I just thought someone would have expressed their happiness about this announcement by now..

I think it very cool that it is getting forked and will continue to be worked on.
gus3 ·
Quoting:it is getting forked
Your words, not mine. Heh.

Honestly, after Oracle hung the OpenSolaris out to dry, and then pulled their stunt against Google, I find it difficult to muster any enthusiasm for the former Sun Microsystems products. Call it FUD if you want, but I think it's justified in the face of such open hostility.
caitlyn ·
Is IlluminOS another fork? How many will we have and how will they diverge?

Also, Oracle is continuing Solaris development as a proprietary OS. To me the main reason to run openSolaris was to replicate a work environment at home without the need for expensive Sun hardware. Why would openIndiana, which doesn't have nearly the hardware support of Linux or BSD, and which is more resource hungry than those as well, be a choice I would want to make after it goes it's own way?
Steven_Rosenber ·
I could never get OpenSolaris to boot on anything. I did manage to get MilaX to run, which was strange because it's based on the same kernel.

I wonder what the licensing situation will be for IlluminOS ...
hkwint ·
Scott:

For those who liked OpenSolaris, I'm happy. But I think *Solaris users have been a fading minority already anyway. Used for the same reason as why people use Windows: They're familiar with it, their applications run on it and it works. I mean, if you were to choose new hardware and an operating system today, why would you choose Solaris? That's what Oracle thought when they started their "Unbreakable Linux" and BRTFS projects, I guess.

Apart from that, Indiana sounds like a continuation, not a fork. From what I learned, if you have a fork (like XFree86), first you have one, then you have two (XF86/Xorg). However, what happens here, sounds more like: First you had OpenSolaris, now OpenSolaris is dead, and now there's OpenIndiana instead. Of course, it's better than nothing, but it would have probably been better had OpenSolaris not died.

Anyway, if it will become the CentOS of Oracle Solaris, I think it has its place and merits.
tuxchick ·
Rejoice! Rejoice! We have no choice!

:D
kenholmz ·
".I have only tried out Solaris once before but I liked it" Scott, I tried Solaris more than once. I liked it, and yes, I did inhaled.

I'm not sure about these OS mutations. It may lead to extinction or it may strengthen the gene pool.

I respect the resolve of those forkers, it's like Masada or the Battle of Thermopylae. I wish them well.
caitlyn ·
@Hans: I think fork is more appropriate than continuation for one reason. openIndiana can't be like CentOS. Oracle Solaris is closed source and proprietary. When Solaris 11 comes along there is no way to implement the new features or changes other than reverse engineering, perhaps, and maybe not even that due to patents and copyrights. Red Hat, in contrast, releases their source code. All the CentOS and Scientific Linux folks do is strip out trademarks and branding. They are essentially compiling the Red Hat source code. To me the two, unfortunately, are worlds apart.
hkwint ·
@Caitlyn: Ah, you're right, I must have been sleeping... Somehow I thought Solaris would continue to be released under CDDL, but now OpenSolaris is dead, probably new "Oracle" code won't be released to the public.

Nonetheless, if the OpenSolaris branche dies, one "half of the fork" is gone I think.
tqk ·
Quoting:Red Hat, in contrast, releases their source code. All the CentOS and Scientific Linux folks do is strip out trademarks and branding. They are essentially compiling the Red Hat source code.


My favourite on my U30 was Splack; Slackware for Sparc.
caitlyn ·
U30? Nice machine!

I still kind of miss my SGI O2. MIPS processor, very fast in its day.

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