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Solaris Might Become LSB-compliant

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the isn't-it-ironic dept.

lvv writes "Register: according to Sun's Jonathan Schwartz, Solaris - one of the most proprietary Unixes, might become LSB compliant OpenSolaris. Also some info about future of Solaris desktop (Gnome)."

11 of 177 comments (clear)

  1. wait a minite by JamesCronus · · Score: 5, Funny

    hang on, solaris, becomeing linux compliant???? eh???????? i thought solaris, being UNIX was posix complient, and so didnt need to be LSB compliant. hang on wont this turn solaris into a linux clone, but linux is a unix clone................ i'm gonna go and lie down, i think i'm dreaming

    --
    dybia felly dwi a hampster (i think therefore i am a hampster)
    1. Re:wait a minite by Empty+Threats · · Score: 5, Informative

      POSIX compliant and POSIX conformant are not at all the same thing.

      Windows is something like 85% compliant but not conformant; OpenVMS is 100% compliant but not conformant.

      I believe compliance is a matter of having the right API's in place, while conformance specifies just how things should work inside the OS.

  2. One of the most proprietary? by Clue4All · · Score: 5, Informative

    Solaris - one of the most proprietary Unixes

    I'm going to take issue with this statement. Solaris isn't open source by any means, but it's a free download on SPARC and until recently Intel platforms, and you can download the source after agreeing to Sun's license. You can make changes to the source, recompile anything you damn well please, and contribute changes back to Sun (I have done so myself), the only thing you can't do is redistribute it. It's not on par in the open nature of Linux or FreeBSD, but compare this to DEC/Compaq/HP Tru64 or HP-UX or AIX where you pay a huge sum of money for a binary CD. I'd hardly call that the most proprietary.

    --

    Is your browser retarded?
  3. O.K.! by Jeremiah+Cornelius · · Score: 5, Funny

    I think that this will finally earn them the right to increment a Major Version Number!

    --
    "Flyin' in just a sweet place,
    Never been known to fail..."
  4. In related news... by steveadept · · Score: 5, Funny

    In another fantastic display of pandering, Schwartz noted, "OpenSolaris will be based on UnitedLinux, because that's the direction everybody's going, isn't it? Isn't it?"

  5. LSB means you can use source RPMs by yerricde · · Score: 5, Informative

    i thought solaris, being UNIX was posix complient, and so didnt need to be LSB compliant.

    Any LSB conforming operating system can use source RPM packages that meet the LSB specs. This should expand the selection of free software that runs on the Solaris operating environment as well as make it easier to install.


    All your Linux Standard Base are belong to us.
    --
    Will I retire or break 10K?
  6. Sun and standards by germinatoras · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A lot of us like to accuse Sun of being no better than Microsoft at a lot of things. This may be true on some level, but this is definitely a step in the right direction. While their motivation may be purely profit-driven, at least they are taking the approach of "Linux is getting popular, so we should be more like it", rather than "We need to squeeze every last $0.01 out of our locked-in customers".

    Lately, Sun seems to be establishing a good track record for openness. They've created a fairly decent platform-independent programming language and development environment, and have made their Solaris environment look more like the other Unices out there. They are starting to come out with Linux products, or at least are talking about them. Even the source code to Solaris 7 used to be available for purchase on CD-ROM (although they may have backed away from that).

    I hope that this is more than just a bid to recapture lost market share, but a real committment to play fair and adhere to open, published, and somewhat popular standards.

  7. Big Endian or Litle Endian? by Snork+Asaurus · · Score: 5, Funny
    Solaris Might Become LSB-compliant

    Is Solaris already compliant with all the other bits?

    --
    Sigs are bad for your health.
  8. You can already by turgid · · Score: 5, Informative

    RPM is provided on the Solaris Companion CD so you can already use source RPMs with Solaris.

    --
    Stick Men
  9. Least significant bit by DahGhostfacedFiddlah · · Score: 5, Funny

    Until now, Solaris has been based on MSB (Most Significant Bit) technology, which made it incompatible with many PC devices. For instance, you couldn't network a Solaris and PC machine without going to the TCP/IP level, because what would leave the Solaris machine as

    11100000 00000111

    woule return as

    00000111 11100000

    As you can tell, this was a major PITA. I, for one, am glad that I'll be able to use all my favourite hardware on my Solaris machine now.

    --
    Last post!
  10. Re:And if they'd done that ten years ago... by magellan · · Score: 5, Informative

    "But with Spark's RISC instruction set and Sun's insistance on keeping both hardware and software closed, the cost/benefit balance was tipped."

    First, Sun's hardware is not closed. Sun does not own SPARC. SPARC International does (www.sparcinternational.com). You can license the SPARC instruction set from them.

    You can buy boards from Sun and build your own SPARC computers.

    You can buy complete SPARC computers with no Sun hardware at all from Fujitsu.

    You can obtain a license Solaris for single SPARC CPU systems for free (beer).

    Solaris 8 is also available for Intel-based computers. Solaris 9 added no features of use for Intel, so the lack of availability for Solaris 9 is irrelavant.