IBM Buying Sun?

[Ex-Cyber]

Note that IBM has been focusing more and more on software and services, and steadily divesting from hardware. I doubt that Sparc would survive in any form.

An increased focus on software and services is precisely why I think SPARC could survive. Sun already took the big step of open-sourcing variants of the UltraSPARC T1 and T2 processors and related design/verification tools. It seems like a natural follow-up to provide software and services for users of those designs. Whether that's a viable plan in the larger context of the market is another matter, of course.

[lordmozilla]

interesting idea. However I know from a reputable source at sun, that there is more and more support towards dropping opensolaris/solaris entirely and moving to linux.

However this is not exactly likely to happen right now considering sun's higher echelons but worth noting. If a merger happen ibm might just do it.

[highlandsun]

Note that IBM has been focusing more and more on software and services, and steadily divesting from hardware. I doubt that Sparc would survive in any form.

[jadrevenge]

AFAIK Sun is the major sponsor of OpenOffice.org. What would happen to its development if Sun gets bought out? I've been a little worried about what might happen since Sun's market has been crunched by Linux. Would this be good or bad for OOo?

Umm ... If IBM bought Sun OpenOffice would be in very safe hands ... have you google'd "IBM OpenOffice" ?

IBM are big in the OASIS group that specified the standards by which OpenOffice works; In some areas OpenOffice is seen as IBM's baby, and the press believe that IBM are using OpenOffice as a stick to beat Microsoft.

OpenOffice, MySQL and Java are the things that will definitely survive.

I kinda hope that Solaris will continue and that AIX apps will be ported to it because Solaris is more mature and has more development (especailly with ZFS), especially since OpenSolaris has a PowerPC variant now, but that may be my wishful thinking.

Problem with ZFS though is that IBM sell raid and storage solutions and ZFS does all that for free ... IBM might not like that hanging around ... Only thing in it's favour is that ZFS will hurt the competition too.

One thing not mentioned (we have an ex-sun employee in our office, and he still likes Sun, but not the atmosphere that currently surrounds the place Sun still have 3 Billion in cash reserves, so if IBM buy it for 6 Billion they're getting a very good deal.

[Wyatt]

I think if IBM buy SUN we will see bye bye to some important open sources

Such as? IBM's record with OSS isn't too shabby, really, and things that have been released don't just go away when the company folds; it's something that belongs to the community. I feel personally that this is, perhaps, the single most compelling reason to adopt open software and standards.

[zinovsky]

I think if IBM buy SUN we will see bye bye to some important open sources

[alazyworkaholic]

What about OpenOffice?

AFAIK Sun is the major sponsor of OpenOffice.org. What would happen to its development if Sun gets bought out? I've been a little worried about what might happen since Sun's market has been crunched by Linux. Would this be good or bad for OOo?

[DeepDayze]

IBM and Sun would be quite a powerhouse indeed. HP would also be sweating considering the powerful hardware a combined Sun/IBM could put out. Certainly Microsoft will feel a lot of heat as well. IBM definitely has a long and storied history of putting out some astounding hardware, and so did Sun.

IBM could definitely put out some really powerful servers that are within reach of small companies

[Saist]

I can imagine IBM positioning SPARC as the "open source" CPU option with a broader range of consulting/customization services for smaller customers while keeping PowerPC around for bigger customers... maybe wishful thinking, but it will be interesting to see what happens in any case.

That's a really interesting viewpoint to have...

Of course, where things could get really interesting is IBM shipping boxes equipped with Niagara, Cell, AND Opteron's in one motherboard package. Would be a dynamite integrated server for small office / home offices, capable of handling any task. Given that Opteron + Cell is a reality now, as RoadRunner proved, I don't think it's that much of a stretch to add another architecture into the mix.

Of course, the only operating system architecture of harnessing that power is... Linux / Unix. Can you imagine the sweat beads such a combination would be giving Microsoft?

Wishful thinking as well, but IBM's shown they aren't stupid, so if they did pick up Sun, I can see that integration occuring shortly afterwards.

[KDesk]

Wyatt, oh, yes, you are right! ZFS! DTrace! GPL! Would be very good! Who knows... So many things Sun has..