After months of hinting about its intentions, Sun Microsystems Inc. today confirmed plans to release source code from its Solaris operating system under an open-source license.
Sun spokesman Russ Castronovo said an open-source Solaris is in the works, but he declined to reveal any significant details about the project, including what software license Sun would be using, whether all of the components of the operating system would be open-sourced and when, exactly, Sun intends to release an open-source Solaris.
"At this time it's in the development phase," said Castronovo. "We're in the 'thinking about it' stage, and looking at details. There are a million details to work out."
The debate over whether to open-source Solaris has been a contentious one, according to sources within Sun. As recently as yesterday, Sun CEO Scott McNealy was claiming that it would make little sense for Sun to freely release such a valuable asset.
Sun has already released a number of open-source software products to date, including the OpenOffice productivity suite, components of the GNOME desktop, and the Tomcat servlet container. But the company has, until now, declined to release its most important software assets -- Solaris and the Java platform -- under an open-source license.
While the central kernel of the Solaris operating system includes some interesting technology, an open-source Solaris will need to materialize within the next few months if it is to be of any interest to developers, said Eric Raymond, founder of the Open Source Initiative, a nonprofit corporation created to help companies develop open-source software licenses. "If they don't get this done within six months, it's not going to matter at all because Linux is advancing too fast," he said.
Sun has lost a significant portion of its business to Linux servers running on inexpensive Intel-based systems. Linux server shipments grew by 57% year over year in the first quarter of 2004, while sales of Unix servers declined by 3% during that time, according to industry research firm IDC.
The fact that Sun is now planning to open-source Solaris is somewhat ironic, Raymond said. "It is a matter of record that Linux was written because Solaris was too expensive and was closed source. If they had open-sourced it in 1990 or sooner, Linux would never have happened."