Hello: Perhaps OpenSolaris should consider adopting a once per year release cycle since twice per year is evidently unmanageable. At the very least I should think it would be a bit less embarrassing: 2009/05 slips to 2009.06, ostensibly to stagger download bandwidth from Solaris 10 update. Okay, I can grant you that one. Sadly. looks like the beginning of a new tradition as 2009.12 slipped to 2010.02, and now I am seeing sun.com addresses reference 2010.03, wh/basically means we may well need to add another 2-3 months onto that if we want to get a realistic estimate for planning purposes.
Speaking of planning, I note following popping up everywhere at sun.com: "Oracle is reviewing the Sun product roadmap and will provide guidance to customers in accordance with Oracle’s standard product communication policies. Any resulting features and timing of release of such features as determined by Oracle’s review of roadmaps, are at the sole discretion of Oracle. All product roadmap information, whether communicated by Sun Microsystems or by Oracle, does not represent a commitment to deliver any material, code, or functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decisions. It is intended for information purposes only, and may not be incorporated into any contract." Which doesn't seem like it should be at all relevant to an OpenSolaris discussion until you take into consideration that 1) opensolaris.org is now sporting Oracle branding and copyright notices, and 2) that we're also waiting on a long overdue release. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not. Before you write me off as a jerk, consider that I just spent the past couple years rolling things over to Solaris, evangalizing, etc. Now I've got a lot of those same people asking me some tough questions. And they're loosing patience waiting for answers to Important Questions Oracle continues to deftly sidestep. You know, those ones that inquiring minds like Rockwood pose in his open letter to Oracle. I suspect that this doesn't bode well for the open source side because if there was any good news the marketroids would be shouting it from the roof tops. But hey, let's take an optimistic stance and assume Oracle doesn't let OpenSolaris die on the vine - if/when we actually do get another release I would ask that it be coordinated with Gnome release and NOT ship with beta version of Firefox - whoever was responsible for that in 2009.06 ought to keel hauled on Ellison's yacht. If OpenSolaris wants to remain viable alternative to other free *nices, I believe regular releases are essential. For example, consider FreeBSD during the transition to 5.0. Delays after delays upon delays and many long time users finally gave up and switched to Linux. Previously FreeBSD was a contender but following this release engineering fiasco never really regained traction. On the other hand, look at OpenBSD, which continues to release twice per year, like clockwork, and tend to keep growing a small but loyal band of converts in the process. So pick a release engineering schedule that you can realistically meet and then stick to it. My $0.02. At this juncture I estimate better than 50:50 odds that I'll be moving off of Solaris unless Larry speaks up real soon now and delivers some good news. I really, really hope that he does because Solaris is awesome on the technical side. But I've been around long enough to know not to get my hopes up too high. Thanks to those who've helped me out in the past. -- Ken Gunderson <kgund...@teamcool.net> _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
