Heya guys!I''m thinking of getting Solaris cause i''ve heard a lot about it and i think it''s cool for developing.What do u think? "Tonight we strike,there is thunder in the sky,together we''ll fight,some of us will die,but they''ll always remember that we''ve made a stand and many will die by hand!" - ManOwaR GDSAUBY GameDev Society For UnBanning YodaTheCoda If you want to see yoda unbanned then put this in your sig

You must be kidding me right? Solaris in my opnion is one of the most crappy O/S''s there ever was. I have 40 boxes behind me all running Solaris 9 at the moment. The OS is a real pain to manage. You will also want to end up installing lots of GNU software to actually get anything done as Sun software tends to cost a lot. I''d recommend Linux (even if you have Sparc hardware) over Solaris. the only place where I can recommend Solaris is on a file server enviroment. For developing, nope.


Please understand all opnions are expressely my own.

I agree with HFX above.

Sun is a very for profit company. Expect to spend several 1000s of dollars to get the hardware (Solaris supports a fairly limited list) and software to do it the Sun way.

Otherwise, you'll end up installing alot of GNU tools and other software at which point you've re-invented linux but in an environment with less support because relatively few people have this type of configuration.

Don't go to Solaris for development unless you have a specific reason to do it (like a client requires it).

Edit: Like HFX I work with Solaris in my day job. Also Irix and AIX for that matter :-Z


[edited by - mauman on August 28, 2003 8:42:07 AM]

Solaris isn''t that bad. It''s pretty solid for enterprise customers, though Sparc isn''t the fastest, but on higher end machines is still a solid, stable, long-running platform. So for some projects, it might still be a good place to develop.

However, doubtful you''re targeting those platforms or Enterprise markets where Sun still has a foot hold. They''ve been getting eaten alive by Linux on cheaper x86 hardware for most of their traditional markets. Oracle is now going forward with RedHat for example.

x86 Solaris is sort of for training purposes and maybe for some management stations for the network, but you don''t really see too much x86 Solaris. Sparc higher end is still around and probably will be a for a while, the support contracts plus the massive hot-swap support is still good for those die-hard Sun customers.

I would also look at Linux or BSD. There aren''t too many differences between the platforms, so you should have no problem switching from one ot the other once you learn enough about each.

Sun has even toyed with Linux themselves, but its hard to figure out what they plan to do. They''ve changed their story so many times lately its funny. Sun isn''t doing too well currently, they would need to make some solid changes to restore their hardware/OS market, but I don''t think they will...they always seem to stubborn to change business tactics when its time.

Int.

Thanks everyone.From the written above i''ve decided to stink with Linux and Windows.Thanks again for the help!

"Tonight we strike,there is thunder in the sky,together we''ll fight,some of us will die,but they''ll always remember that we''ve made a stand and many will die by hand!" - ManOwaR

GDSAUBY GameDev Society For UnBanning YodaTheCoda
If you want to see yoda unbanned then put this in your sig

Solaris on Sun hardware is far more stable than Linux. You probably don''t have Sun hardware though, and you probably don''t require that kind of stability (for a development box). From a support standpoint, if you pay the $ you get awesome support. This applies to companies; most individuals aren''t going to shell out for support contracts .

Solaris does kick ass though. It can be a difficult to get things working on random x86 hardware, but if you stick with fairly main strem components (as 95% of users do) it is no harder than most Linux distro''s.

Solaris is a true Unix platform. I think that''s neat; whether you agree or disagree is your own *opinion*. I also have a predisposition towards the *BSDs (although whether they are true Unix systems or just Unix-like is a language/licensing debate).

quote: You must be kidding me right? Solaris in my opnion is one of the most crappy O/S''s there ever was.

At least you were honest enough to put opinion in there.

quote: I have 40 boxes behind me all running Solaris 9 at the moment. The OS is a real pain to manage.

Huh? Solaris is all about networking and network management. A properly setup Solaris network is NO harder to manage than any other network out there, if not easier. Solaris is set up differently than Linux in some respects, so if you cut your teeth on Linux then it may be somewhat confusing. If that is that case, it is easily remedied with google.

quote: You will also want to end up installing lots of GNU software to actually get anything done as Sun software tends to cost a lot.

Yeah, come to think of it, I''d recomend installing lots of GNU software if you install Linux too, as Linux software tends to be GNU. You do this either way.

quote: I''d recommend Linux (even if you have Sparc hardware) over Solaris.

I wouldn''t.

quote: the only place where I can recommend Solaris is on a file server enviroment.

I would recomend it for this environment as well as others.

quote: For developing, nope.

You can''t make an educated decision without trying out both and seeing how things work for your particular needs on your particular hardware. However, I would recommend Solaris over Linux.

Last time I checked, Solaris for Sparc had a free download and x86 was $20 to download.

Yeah. As far as I''m concerned, Solaris is a waste for anyone on x86, unless you just want to use it to learn it (not that it''s really terribly different from any other UNIX derivative). However, on Sparc platforms, it''s the way to go, since that is what it was designed for in the first place.

The Artist Formerly Known as CmndrM

http://chaos.webhop.org

Basically, if you have some box that is able to run Solaris(their drivers are a little sparse IMHO), I would only use it, if I only wanted to develop for UNIX or Java applications. Because I don''t need the insane uptime that a sun box allows for. For x86 Linux is still the best IMO, I prefer OS X if I have PPC based computers, and I would use Solaris if I had sparc boxes. It is all about what hardware you have, and your needs.

ACPI is a big problem with x86 Solaris, or at least it was with Solaris 8. Just search for "ACPI solaris" in google groups to see what I mean. IMO, unless a lot/all of your hardware is found on Sun''s compatibility list, don''t even bother.

pretty good movie though.