Tag Archives: Sun

Oracle to own MySQL

Posted by on April 21, 2009 No comments

Sun and Oracle today announced a definitive agreement for Oracle to acquire Sun for $9.50 per share in cash. The Sun Board of Directors has unanimously approved the transaction. It is anticipated to close this summer. This news comes as a shock after IBM recently failed to reach an agreement with Sun Microsystems.

What’s the future of MySQL now that the world’s largest commercial proprietary database vendor will soon be owning the world’s largest open source database project?

With the acquisition due to take place this summer, Oracle will own not just MySQL but also the Java Platform, Open Office, VirtualBox, Open Solaris … what will happen with these applications, specially OpenOffice?

Related blogs: ZDNet and Linux Magazine

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OpenOffice is sick

Posted by on January 14, 2009 No comments

According to this article “Measuring the true success of Openoffice.org” by Michael Meeks, the beloved OpenOffice is sick, sick because of  Sun.

“…the statistics show a picture of slow disengagement by Sun, combined with a spectacular lack of growth in the developer community. In a healthy project we would expect to see a large number of volunteer developers involved, in addition – we would expect to see a large number of peer companies contributing to the common code pool; we do not see this in OpenOffice.org. Indeed, quite the opposite we appear to have the lowest number of active developers on OO.o since records began: 24, this contrasts negatively with Linux’s recent low of 160+. Even spun in the most positive way, OO.o is at best stagnating from a development perspective.”  (extracted from the article “Measuring the true success of Openoffice.org” by Michael Meeks)

The tight hold Sun has on OpenOffice makes it difficult for developers to to just jump on board and contribute. Contributing code requires that developers commit thier code’s rights over to Sun making it the sole owner of OO’s code-base. Less control from Sun and more freedom and power for the developers and the Opensource community appears to be the only way forward for the OpenOffice project. 

Read in full: “Measuring the true success of Openoffice.org” by Michael Meeks
Read also:  What Meeks means by OpenOffice being sick at zdnet.com

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