Re: Anyone else worried about the future of Sun?
From: Juhan Leemet (juhan_at_logicognosis.com)
Date: 07/10/04
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Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2004 00:45:11 -0200
On Fri, 09 Jul 2004 15:56:57 +0000, Rich Teer wrote:
> On Fri, 9 Jul 2004, Keg wrote:
> This smells of a troll...
Yep, kinda funky.
>> For starters I have been a Sun guy as far back as the old 100-lb Sparc
>> IPX systems and I still believe they make the best hardware on the
>
> Umm, IPXs were little lunch box sized boxes, certainly didn't
> weigh 100 lbs.
I concur. The OP must be talking about things like the 15+ year old
Sun-3/260 pedestal that I have in my storage locker? Still runs, last time
I looked. Might put it in the basement next winter, for extra heating. Got
a cute little IPX handling my tape backup libraries. Does the job.
>> Example 1: We were told that some of the mid-range equipment we bought
>> 3 years ago would "Meet our database needs for 5 years or more". Now
>> our 3-year support contracts have expired and support for some of our
>> machines nearly tripled and they are now telling us the equipment is
>
> Yeah. All vendors will probably try that one.
I guess I've always been a "bad boy" in doing a mix/match between my own
spares and vendor service. In PDP-15 days, I used to have the problem
diagnosed and pointed to the transistor that the DEC technician (on
service call, 4 hour guraranteed response) had to replace. Eventually my
boss realized we didn't need that service, and we hired our own tech (and
rented him out across campus). It has gotten harder these days with
complex mobos and interfaces on (starting with VAXen and) Suns, but still,
you can buy a mix of gear with as much redundancy and/or HA as you
want/need. You can even consider "soft failure" (reduced performance)
modes. I'm getting really irritated with the idea of "one stop shopping",
"pass the buck", "write the cheque to M$" kind of approach I see from
PHBs. Where exactly is the service we as IS/IT (er, appropriate typo?) are
providing? Everyone should have responsibility and commensurate authority.
>> The Linux Issue:
>>
>> I think Sun is dropping the ball badly. The only thing holding Linux...
>
> There are other issues holding LInux back in the Enterprise space. Just
> ask the large retailer here in Canada who had to ditch his Linux email
> solution because it was too unreliable.
I still haven't heard PC/Linux SMP scaling as well as Sun/Solaris? Yeah,
they put together the Mongolian hordes of PCs in Beowulf "clusters", but
that only works for some (very simple?) parallelizeable problems.
Marketdroids tend to "design" systems and networks by "slapping together
boxes" (pictures?) without a full/true understanding of what it takes to
make them really do the job. With an "all you gotta do is..."
>> As an IT Director, I have no choice but to start moving towards Linux.
>> Why?
>> 1) Support is orders of magnitude cheaper. 2) Replacement parts are
>> usually a 10 minute drive away. 3) Replacement parts are cheap enough
>> to keep on hand. (hell keep entire spare systems on standby)
>
> Please explain how the availability of commodity PC parts is anything to
> do with Linux. What is preventing you from running Solaris x86 on that
> same x86 hardware?
I would also point out that it is virtually impossible to buy spares for
PCs that are older than a year or two. The result is that you have to
"upgrade", which sometimes means new O/S release, new drivers, etc., i.e.
"churn" and more hidden costs. Have you accounted for those? Even after
EOL by Sun, it is still possible to buy "standard" Sun parts to keep 10+
year Sun machines running, and they run very well (tho more slowly).
>> 5) x86 based hardware is much easier and faster to troubleshoot and
>> repair. (and thus employed skillsets are cheaper and easier to find)
>
> Nonesense. IME x86 is notoriously HARD to diagnose. Unless your idea
> of diagnosis is "just replace the box".
The hardware variation on the "just reboot? just reinstall?"
>> You can't ignore that the "real-world" TCO is much much lower with
>> Linux.
>
> I don't think it is.
Wishing doesn't make it so. I suspect a lot of shops are "hiding" their
costs in areas which are harder to investigate, such as reliability? Is
this the Enron of computer systems design, management and accounting?
I had a client who insisted on using cheap staff (Windows admins sent on a
3 day *nix course?) who couldn't/wouldn't setup NIS, so NFS wouldn't work,
so PVCS couldn't work right, so users ran around ftp'ing files (when they
remembered?) to their source code control repository. I've ranted about
that before. No one can tell me that they saved money when _every_ person
on the floor had to worry more, had to do an extra 1/2 hour (per day?)
work, missed deadlines, (contract performance penalties?), etc. How was
that cheaper? Yet it was the "conventional wisdom" of the day. Real TCO?!?
The Royal Bank of Canada had some kind of fiasco here about a month ago.
Their computer systems were trashed/compromised in some way. They put out
TV news bulletins explaining why they would not be able to issue payroll
cheques for their client companies on a certain Friday. Funny, I thought a
company was "formally bankrupt" if it couldn't meet payroll? I never heard
any kind of explanation, or resolution, except much bluster and hushing
noises. Wanna bet some PC stuff was involved in there somewhere/somehow?
Some screw up, wha'? Did you hear any more about that, Rich?
>> I justed replaced some very heavily hit E450 NFS servers with dual 1.7
>> Ghz Xeon systems, 2GB RAM, and Adaptec SCSI cards for local system disk
>> mirroring. I needed no additional support for this config and these
>> systems can be maintained by any college intern. If I need a new CPU or
>> something I send one of my IT guys down the street to Comp-USA or
>> wherever.
Yeah, this year. Next year your guys won't be able to find those CPUs
anywhere, except maybe as "pulls" from surplus shops?
> Agreed. What's preventing you from running Solaris x86 - a mature,
> enterprise ready OS NOW - on it?
Has Sun overcome its ambivalence about Solaris x86? They do flip-flop.
Not knocking Linux or new grads/interns. They all have their place. I'm
running Linux here, too. Tinker lots on it. My main servers and important
workstations are Sun/Solaris boxes. That combo works best for me. I put
reliable and stable systems where I have important data. My PC could catch
fire for all I care (well, there's the $). My old Suns keep on truckin'!
>> Please Sun, get more proactive in the Linux space, it is the future,
>
> Linux is NOT the future - apart from the drooling Linux hordes. In fact,
> if anything, I predict that more and more IT managers will become
> disenfrachised with Linux once they realize that it doesn't live up to
> its hype.
This is also something that I have never understood. The "monomania" that
seems to catch the public fancy: it has to be all Windows, it cannot be
all Unix, gonna be all Linux, mainframes are dead... all a pile of crap.
Apollo and Sun guys got it right 20 years ago: "the network _IS_ the
computer!" Heterogeneous networking has always, and will always be there.
The more we avoid dealing with it, the more effort/money will be wasted.
Grumble: M$ going out of their way to pervert standards doesn't help!
>> From a persoanl career standpoint I have to start focusing my energies
>> on Linux so that I can keep myself employed in the next 5-10 years...
>
> Yeah, sure. SUn has "been on the brink" of years now...
No business can afford to be complacent. M$ should watch their ass, too.
Any news of either demise is premature (apologies to Mark Twain). There's
a place for Linux, but it's over hyped (and no clear responsibility?). I
would be seriously worried if I thought Linux was taking care of the money
in my bank accounts. I was actually reasonably content that OS/2 ran ATMs.
BTW, dunno about you guys, but I don't see many *nix (even Linux) jobs
going around here, aside from Windows admins "with some *nix exposure".
GRR!
>> Just ranting I guess, I really like Sun's equipment but it is becoming
>> more and more difficult to put Sun gear into the Data Center,
>> especially with IT budgets today. To me, tripling support costs to
>> force customers into newer gear is un-ethical and I will take no part
>> in it.
Yeah, we've all got some rants in us. Nice to have each other's shoulders...
BTW, who is forcing those decisions? Do you run the datacenter? Do you
have a budget? Then it's your decision, isn't it? Are you doing risk
analysis correctly? Are you really getting a handle on your TCO? Or is
someone else working your buttons and/or handles?
I had a job like that once. I was supposedly the "manager of computer
stuff" in a division of a large consulting engineering company. The
computer staff were assigned to projects (with project managers), so I
couldn't tell them anything. The "computer budget" was spent by the GM of
the division, overruling my researched recommendations. I guess I was
there so they could "pin the tail on the donkey"? It never works out,
though. After 2 years of trying to turn my part around, I quit. Within a
few months the entire company was heading into bankruptcy: not because I
left, but (I'm convinced!) because they were not making decisions in a
rational manner. The GM was fired (in disgrace). The VP was let go (not in
disgrace, but not exactly moving up in the world either). The company was
decimated. Pigeons come home to roost eventually. Don't work for a jerk.
> Ah, so you disapprove of Red Hat's Enterprise Linux move, then?
Yeah, I'm not sure what to think of that. They have to make money somehow.
SuSE (my current favorite distro) seems to be going in the same direction.
If the software is "free", you have to "pull through" sales of something
else. It used to be "consulting", but I guess there's not enough money
there? I suspect computer consulting markets are pretty soft/weird.
...couldn't help rising to the bait...(now I'll sink back into the depths...)
p.s. Linux has crashed more often and has taken data with it. Solaris has
failed (H/W transient) less often and my data was safe (also backed up).
-- Juhan Leemet Logicognosis, Inc.
- Next message: Juhan Leemet: "Re: all that stuff in /var/sadm"
- Previous message: Juhan Leemet: "Re: NFS problems with Linux mounting a file"
- In reply to: Rich Teer: "Re: Anyone else worried about the future of Sun?"
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