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Sun Unveils More Linux Strategies
A number of people have submitted the press release from Sun Microsystems about their latest announcements in conjunction with Linux. Highlights from this one include the promised release of "New single- and multiprocessor systems, to be announced mid-year, will use the x86 architecture and be capable of running thousands of Linux applications natively." As well, they are expanding the Cobalt line of servers, but even more interestingly they are going to "freely offer" parts of Solaris - but no license specified that I saw. They are also releasing "ABICheck", which should check compatibility between Linux/Solaris. C|Net is carrying coverage now as well. And it looks like Lineo and SuSe are going to get competition in the embedded and telecom support area - I wonder if that's tied to the OSDL announcement. It's good to see that they are getting on the right track - now let's hope they stay the course.
It's a marketing strategy.
Solaris is known as "slowaris" because it is optimized for SMP systems. Single CPU boxes are cheap. Sun was getting rejected by potential customers because to get the full benefit of Solaris you have to buy a massive box. If they vend Linux then they can target both the cheapskates/small companies and the huge enterprise vendors.
Linux runs well on Sparc chips, BTW.
Mod this one down. Informative usually means its true. Java 1.4 RC1 has been released at http://java.sun.com/j2se/