"The Sun Ray firmware is not necessarily required, although without it the devices could be rendered incompatible with future changes."
I've been trying to get the firmware from Oracle for a few months now - I keep getting "Someone in sales will reach out to you" emails but nobody ever does. I'd be very surprised if there is any future for Sun Ray thin clients. On Tue, Oct 29, 2013 at 12:23 PM, Andy Giles <sun...@ang.homedns.org> wrote: > The Sun Ray firmware is not necessarily required, although without > it the devices could be rendered incompatible with future changes. > There is at least one other implementation of a client for ALP that > runs on Linux, it's mothballed within General Dynamics. Bringing > that out into the open might help, but you would have to talk to GD. > > The sadest thing is that ALP is in my experience by far the best > protocol for lower quality networks and it looks like it will disappear > along with Sun Ray. > > Andy > > > On 10/29/13 03:46 PM, Kent Peacock wrote: >> >> This is right on. If there ever is any release of source, it would likely >> not support any ability to generate and load firmware onto Sun Rays that >> Oracle produced. As Alan notes, there are pieces of proprietary, binary-only >> code included in the Sun Ray firmware. These include microcode for the >> graphics chips and one of the smart card controllers. I also can't see any >> possibility that the firmware signing keys would ever be publicly released. >> >> Kent >> >> >> On 10/29/2013 8:14 AM, Alan Coopersmith wrote: >>> >>> [As previously mentioned, I come from the Solaris side of the house, so >>> can't >>> speak for the Sun Ray/VDI org, can just provide a little insight on >>> what it >>> takes to release closed source as open source in the past from >>> experiences >>> at Sun.] >>> >>> On 10/29/13 04:45 AM, Kalle Anka wrote: >>>> >>>> 1) OpenOffice was released to the open source community by Oracle >>>> because they >>>> did not make money from it. So, how big are the chances that Oracle >>>> freely >>>> release SRSS to the community? Very slim? What are your thoughts on >>>> this? >>> >>> >>> OpenOffice was already open source, for a decade before that - Oracle >>> just >>> transferred maintainership of an already open code base to a new home, a >>> very >>> low cost operation, and one which IBM assisted with. >>> >>> Open sourcing a currently closed source code base is a far more expensive >>> operation as you have to trawl the source code & history to find any >>> parts >>> covered by third party licenses or NDA's (such as drivers for third >>> party chips >>> included in the hardware), excise them, and find a way for the community >>> to >>> build it without them. Corporate management also prefers you do a scrub >>> to >>> remove any comments or docs in the code that may make the company look >>> bad or >>> receive complaints from other companies - not speaking German, I don't >>> know >>> what the comments in the original StarOffice code said, but I know many >>> were >>> changed before Sun released the source as OpenOffice. In the >>> OpenSolaris >>> case, we were never able to fully open source the OS, after a decade of >>> trying >>> to clear all the legal entanglements, and there are still bits the open >>> source >>> community cannot fix bugs in, rebuild, or port to new platforms. And >>> when >>> you have required crypto keys, as Solaris & Sun Ray both did, then you >>> have >>> to figure out a strategy for them. For OpenSolaris, we assumed the >>> company >>> would still be involved and able to handle the signing for the community >>> - >>> for a Sun Ray code dump over the wall, someone would have to figure out >>> who >>> and how to transfer the keys to without jeopardizing the security of the >>> customers paying for support for the next four years. >>> >>> For a viable open source maintainership of Sun Ray, you'd also need >>> Oracle to >>> release the specifications of the ALP protocol and any other >>> documentation that >>> is required for it - and doc writers & editors don't work for free >>> either, so >>> that's another cost. >>> >>> Sun always said that it wouldn't just throw code over the wall, but >>> would try >>> to build a community - that's because the expense involved in preparing >>> code >>> to throw over the wall was too great if there was no return on >>> investment, and >>> building a community to grow the user base and possibly contribute code >>> back >>> was the result that made the investment worthwhile. >>> >>> I don't know how much any of that will cost for Sun Ray or how willing >>> the >>> management over there is to do this, but don't assume this is anything >>> like >>> what happened to OpenOffice. >>> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> SunRay-Users mailing list >> SunRay-Users@filibeto.org >> http://www.filibeto.org/mailman/listinfo/sunray-users >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > SunRay-Users mailing list > SunRay-Users@filibeto.org > http://www.filibeto.org/mailman/listinfo/sunray-users _______________________________________________ SunRay-Users mailing list SunRay-Users@filibeto.org http://www.filibeto.org/mailman/listinfo/sunray-users
