Brian Gupta writes:
> When I talk to Sun and say I want to run OpenSolaris I am handed a nice copy
> of either SXDE and/or SXCE. I am sure this is almost a universal truth.
Possibly. If you ask for just "an operating system," you'll get
Solaris, so is Solaris just "an operating system?"
One of the problems here is in striking a balance between educating
users ("sorry, there's no such thing as 'running' OpenSolaris, but you
can install an OpenSolaris-based distribution, and I happen to have
one of those; would you like a copy?") and just being pedantic.
I don't think that the events that occur when you ask for something
that doesn't technically exist are necessarily defining terms.
> Currently it is the closest thing to a referential OpenSolaris distro. (At
> the New York UG meetings, I have made a point to also represent the other
> distros. I will bring a stack of xyz opensolaris distro and give asmall
> preso on it... So far I have covered Belenix and Nexenta.
I've always been a bit uncomfortable with Express (under its various
confusing names) being the reference distribution. The problem is
that it necessarily makes the other distributions "less equal." If
we're going to have a sound community, I don't think we should have
any of the animals on the farm being more equal than the others.
--
James Carlson, Solaris Networking <james.d.carlson at sun.com>
Sun Microsystems / 1 Network Drive 71.232W Vox +1 781 442 2084
MS UBUR02-212 / Burlington MA 01803-2757 42.496N Fax +1 781 442 1677
