Sun supper offer appeals to Torvalds
In the latest word in a peculiarly public interchange, Linux leader Linus Torvalds appears inclined to take up Sun Microsystems Chief Executive Jonathan Schwartz on his offer for dinner.
Last weekend, Torvalds expressed some "cynical" thoughts about Sun's intentions regarding its open-source Solaris operating system, which in turn led Schwartz to invite Torvalds to dinner to demonstrate Sun's intention of being a team player in the open-source realm, not a parasite.
In an interview Wednesday, Torvalds indicated he was interested in the dinner date, even given the condition Schwartz attached.
"I'm a fervent (believer and founding member) of the Free Food Foundation, and while Sun as usual has a few gotchas ('bring wine') in their licensing, it does sound like a good offer," he said.
But Sun has some work to do establishing its bona fides in Torvalds' eyes. In particular, he was clearly unhappy with how long it took Sun to make Java into an open-source project. The server and software company moved through multiple licensing regimes before finally releasing the core Java code under the General Public License (GPL), the same license that governs the Linux kernel.
"Quite frankly, if it wasn't for Java, I'd probably not be nearly as cynical," Torvalds said. "I've absolutely detested the Java licensing situation from the get-go, and a short time of being mostly open-sourced just hasn't yet had time to flush away all the bad taste of years of just stupid license shenanigans."
But Schwartz has had luck wining and dining potential adversaries in the past. As soon as Schwartz took over as CEO in 2006, his first call was to Intel CEO Paul Otellini. At that point, Sun sold x86 servers solely with Advanced Micro Devices' Opteron processors. But the two met over dinner and wine.
"It was a bottle of Barolo at Delfina," Schwartz said earlier, referring to the San Francisco restaurant. Now, just over a year later, Sun now sells Intel-based x86 servers.
Stephen Shankland writes about a wide range of technology and products, but has a particular focus on browsers and digital photography. He joined CNET News in 1998 and since then also has covered Google, Yahoo, servers, supercomputing, Linux and open-source software, and science. E-mail Stephen, or follow him on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/stshank. 
*for sins in this life and past lives and whether known to us or not and also regret all the negative consequences of our sins.
Anyhow, I think it's important to realize that, indeed, God is an open source of a good many things. However, it may also be nice to have your thought on the topic at hand in a more direct sense, if you have any.
Anyway, I think it'd be fascinating to see some kind of merger here... I have to say that I kind of view open solaris and bsd as kind of, well, wastes of effort- you know, on the entire "divide and conquer" principle. I guess I'd like to see one perfect OS that everyone can use, and until we're to that point, I'd kind of prefer most people to work on enhancing that particular platform. Alas, it is not left to me to determine where other people's efforts go, and I suppose it is of some value that bsd is under the license it is.
Still, I can't say I see the point of having two mutually exclusive OS'es under the same license. Perhaps we could see a unified kernel API? What if over the next few years we see multi-kernel distros? Like, boot from install disk using the linux kernel, select your DE, your kernel, etc.
I'd have to say I'd probably go with KDE, Linux, and Beryl as the default window manager... but it would be an interesting option. I guess what I mean to say is that I would like binary compatibility between the Open Solaris and Linux kernels. I just don't know how hard that would be to achieve, or really, if it has already been done or what...
I have to say that Sun is one of the few companies that really pleases me with their licenses in general, so, props to them. Perhaps if they had dinners with Torvalds more often we could see some interesting developments.
Michael
www.code4life.com
- Don't forget the Open Sauce
- by t8 June 17, 2007 4:04 AM PDT
- Don't forget Open Sauce. Closed Sauce bottles not allowed. Besides how can you really taste it when the bottle is closed.
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