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Economist article on Sun's Linux Strategy

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the stuff-to-read dept.

DavidNWelton writes "The Economist has a well-written article about Sun's Jonathan Schwartz and his Linux strategy. It also mentions Microsoft, and the SCO lawsuit."

9 of 133 comments (clear)

  1. Two points.... by salimma · · Score: 4, Insightful
    • Solaris for Intel - that news is a few months old. Nothing to see here - though appearing in a business-oriented publication might indicate Sun's seriousness on the matter
    • SCO lawsuit - left unsaid is the possibility that Solaris itself would be targeted next, should SCO win or settle its IBM lawsuit. It's not only Sun's Linux strategy that is in question (Though both cases are equally questionable)

    --
    Michel
    Fedora Project Contribut
  2. This was a well-written article? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Huh? Did I miss something?

    Since when did meandering blather, gibberish, and recycled blurbs make for good writing?

    The only "news" in the article is the author's fantasy of a hypothetical Sun buy-out by Oracle or Cisco [neither of whom is doing all that great themselves].

  3. wrong by jbellis · · Score: 4, Insightful

    the reason SCO can target IBM is b/c IBM was its partner in a "next generation unix" project called AIX 5L or, earlier, Project Monterrey. So IBM, unlike Sun, has engineers who work on Linux AND engineers who had access to SCO ip.

  4. Do we need another company doing the same thing? by jezzgoodwin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A friend of mine recently bought a server from Dell. The main thing he was looking at was the hardware side of things as he wanted to install the OS from the ground up. Dell offered the best hardware and support for the price and also they do price matching so he got quite a few things cheaper than expected.

    Surely Sun can't exactly sell the hardware for any cheaper than it can already be bought for, so what's the advantage of choosing them over a company like Dell?

    Unless of course they bring the power of Solaris to x86 and do it nicely? It's just the same thing from someone else.

  5. Linux a Puppy? by attobyte · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Linux is not a puppy. I ran Redhat 6.2 for my firewall until just like a month ago. Linux doesn't have to be upgraded and tendered to. Maybe for exploits but Solaris has those too.

    Atto

    --
    I didn't use the preview button, so get over it!!!!

    Mike

  6. ....as some geeks would like by md17 · · Score: 4, Insightful


    Whatever Sun's fate, Mr Schwartz is probably right that the software industry will not be taken over by free programs, as some geeks would like. The main attraction of open source, as he says, is the fact that it is "great for innovation", not its questionable claim to be free.

    Does the author of this article actually understand anything about software or economics? It seems to me that any consumer in the world should want "free programs" as opposed to those you have to pay for. Even if we assumed that all that silly FUD about Linux having a higher TCO than Windows or Solaris, were true; wouldn't consumers still desire that Linux (and the rest of open soruce) progresses to a point of of lower TCO? And shouldn't that be a lot more viable for open source than a software product which locks you into a big company that just wants more of your money, not less? Anyways, open source is winning and will win more because it can innovate faster and for less. It is not just "great for innovation", it costs less, and costs (TCO) keep going down.

  7. Free as in? by madsatod · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The Economist article said:
    The main attraction of open source, as he says, is the fact that it is "great for innovation", not its questionable claim to be free."
    Anyone else annoyed with the writers confusion on free software/gratis software throughout the article. Well guess it's viewpoint of the Economist. No wonder they interpret free as "free (as in beer)".

  8. Furthermore... by mindstrm · · Score: 3, Insightful

    IT's not about "Free shit".

    Will proprietary software with real value still have commercial value? HEll yes, always.

    Will proprietary software that does the same thing as free software have value? No, why should it?

    Why should we be paying anyone money for something people are willing to do for free. Simple as that.

    Look at.. Vmware. Good product. Solid. Makes money. Then we have FreeMware. Not so good. Not even close, really. VMWare definately has *value*, and lots of it.

    Now, if VMWare sits on their product and does nothing but fix bugs, that situation won't last. Eventually, freemware, or someone else, might catch up, or surpass it. But all VMWare has to do is keep innovating and developing, and they can keep selling their great product.

    The same goes for everything.... we all don't like windows because, hell, the only reasons we really use it are because we are forced to by software compatability... we don't see it as anyhing that adds real value.. only artificial value.

    Free software will continue to set a baseline standard for software, which you have to beat significantly in order to actually sell software. That's where things are going. ANd that's a GOOD way for things to be. Nobody is saying focused, commercial programming efforts can't pay off bigtime.. they absolutely can.. butnot if you are going to make snakeoil.

  9. Re:"Questionable Claim" by snarkh · · Score: 3, Insightful



    If you told the author of this article you were giving him a free car, with a free warranty for parts and a substantial discount on labor, apparently his response would be "Oh yeah? What about gas?". Sheesh.


    It might seem different if you have to hire a chauffeur, though.