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Sun Steps Back from Linux JDS

Posted by timothy on from the crowded-house dept.

chill writes "ZD Net UK is reporting that Sun is pulling back from their JDS desktop Linux initiative. The big question is what happened to those half-million to million-plus units that were supposed to ship in China in 2004? One hint may be that in April, Novell announced a deal with CSSC to 'cooperate to provide technology, services and marketing to optimise and promote Linux to the Chinese market.' Sun's JDS was based on SUSE Linux, now owned by Novell."

5 of 202 comments (clear)

  1. This was inevitable by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Sun only supports linux because it is forced too. Sun developing for linux is ultimately counterproductive to its own long term future.

    1. Re:This was inevitable by tomhudson · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Sun developing for linux is ultimately counterproductive to its own long term future.
      Not necessarily - and actually probably quite the opposite. The whole idea was to get *away* from being *just a hardware vendor*, and sell all sorts of support services.

      Someone should whack them with a cluestick - everyone knows there are severe penalties for early withdrawal (from a new market).

    2. Re:This was inevitable by AKAImBatman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sun developing for linux is ultimately counterproductive to its own long term future.

      That's not entirely true. Sun's strategy has always been to sell hardware and complete solutions. It really doesn't matter to them if they're selling Linux or Solaris. In fact, long before JDS they provided an option to preload RedHat on many of their systems. Why anyone would chose RedHat over Solaris for a server system is beyond me, but a lot of customers were demanding it.

      All the JDS is lacking is a true follow through. This half-assed release-it-and-then-drop-it strategy is guaranteed failure.

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  2. Might be inevitable, but is it wise? by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sun only supports linux because it is forced too. Sun developing for linux is ultimately counterproductive to its own long term future.

    From a business viewpoint, you're probably right, if they want to keep selling what they're selling.

    On the other hand, sometimes you have to transform the firm - just ask Groves about Intel changing from making memory to making CPUs.

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  3. I don't think Sun's leaving open source desktops. by Rahga · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If there's one thing that's a reported definite in Sun, it is that they've decided on GNOME for their desktop environment on Solaris sometime in the near future.... I think JDS was a nice experiment at rebranding of both Suse and GNOME software, but never really a serious product with R&D devoted to improving software upstream from it. To make matters more complex, Suse joining the Novell fold has made a mess of the Suse and Ximian desktop offerings. Novell up top seems to be aiming for a losely defined linux services platform in the mold of IBM, not a strongly defined Linux desktop and distribution product. No reason they should go for the later either, since that market is decently covered by other products from other companies.

    So, Sun had JDS which is derived from a distrtibution (Suse) that is not nice to GNOME (wtg, germans), and are giving up on it. No biggie, IMHO.