While I don't have a clue about what userbase OpenIndiana has and how
widespread it is, there are some things I see that don't look good for OI.
First of all I find it to be poorly marketed. The website is updated
almost never and it looks like nothing is happening, there are no
roadmaps, the documentation on the site is improving but still has some
considerable lacks. A website that looks poorly maintained with empty
menus doesn't look good at all. The website should put a much greater
effort at marketing itself and show what OI/Illumos can really do. We're
talking about statements such as "ZFS is leading technology ..." and
rich illustrations so that even less versed people will understand it.
The design of a website also communicate the quality of the product. It
may sound a little vainglorious to some people but that's how it works
in real life.
Secondly I find it incredibly hard to start developing things on the
operating system. If I for example want to get started with contributing
by porting a Linux graphics driver to OI/Illumos, where do I begin? How
do I get the compilers to work with me without errors and how do I
troubleshoot them? Or in short ..... where is the *documentation* for
it? I think there should be an open door that lets new people in and
makes it easier to get started developing for OI/Illumos. Right now it
looks like a closed community with a very high barrier of entry for
those outside that are willing to develop for OI/Illumos. If this
problem gets fixed then maybe userland applications that are necessary
for a desktop OS will eventually find their way into the OS for those
people who want to use it as a desktop OS.
I'm fully aware of the power of the command line and it is the command
line that really makes me like Unix based OSes (including Linux). But
making OI look well-polished with a fancy and easy to administer
web-admin GUI that would encourage the average-Joe to use it as a
home-NAS / virtual server is not a bad thing. That way OI would reach a
higher penetration with a larger user-base and most importantly; it will
get _free advertising_. To some extent the old adage "A good product
markets itself" has some truth in it. But it must not only be good, it
has to /look/ good so that even a less versed person will understand how
good it is.
Another weak point of the OS is hardware support. While I understand
that it might be a tremendously daunting undertaking to maintain
hardware support for everything there is out there, on can strategically
focus on key hardware components. My personal pet peeve with OI is the
poor support for my AMD/ATI GPU, otherwise I think I think it is a good
thing that there is a focus on HBA and NIC hardware, i.e. hardware that
is essential for it to function as a file/webserver as was stated in a
prior post. But the most important thing is that it is well documented
so that a user who wants to start using OI will know *beforehand* what
hardware to use.
On 2012-09-01 12:06, Open Indiana wrote:
Although Openindiana is opensource it doesn't mean it doesn't need any
steering or control.
My main concern is who will take up the flag and carry it?
The people who think OpenIndiana is a dead end have IMHO no idea what it is.
They apparently expect an OS with a GUI that lets them control anything and
they forget that on all OS's one has to leave the GUI at one point as soon
as there is a need that goes deeper than starting a writer-application.
Even Windows2008 still has a scripting and commandline facility.
Someone or some people have to take control on a roadmap and set a course.
Where do we want to go and what will we build?
If hosting ever starts to be a problem I will jump in.
But... with the recession on its way all over the world, people have to work
harder and have not as much spare time as they used to have. When someone
needs to choose between his work or an OpenSource hobby the choose is easy.
-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Friesenhahn [mailto:bfrie...@simple.dallas.tx.us]
Sent: vrijdag 31 augustus 2012 21:00
To: Discussion list for OpenIndiana
Subject: Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] "OpenIndiana lead Alasdair Lumsden
resigns"
People come and go, that's just a fact of life. The important thing
for OpenIndiana now is to get over it, select a new project lead and
rock on. We are all just as saddened as you are to see Alasdair leave,
but I would hope OpenIndiana was never just a single-person job.
The main risk at the moment is that OpenIndiana is hosted on Alasdair's
servers and openindiana.org is owned by EveryCity Ltd (i.e.
Alasdair's company). The servers and domain are still running but there is
no telling about the future.
Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
bfrie...@simple.dallas.tx.us, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer, http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/
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