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OpenIndiana is a free and open source Unix operating system derived from OpenSolaris and based on illumos.
Curmudgeonly software reviewer Dedoimedo AKA Igor Ljubuncic reports:
Conclusion
I find the test today somewhat sad. Sure, I did accomplish what I needed, but it gave me no joy, and no hope that this operating system can even even remotely compare against any Linux. Even CentOS is lightyears ahead. In the server environment, it may have its uses, but it completely misses the mark on the desktop.
Package management, applications, it all just feels raw, alien, unfriendly. What do you do if there are problems with drivers, or hardware? Where do you find the latest apps, and this isn't just an act of mercy by a volunteer? What about compatibility on actual hardware. The fact I was not willing to commit my test laptop also tells something.
You can master and tame OpenIndiana, to a level. But it is mostly a futile exercise in obstinacy. All of the stuff we've done above are more or less a given in Linux, and have been so since about 2007. It's like driving an old car and trying to match its abilities to new, modern technology. Unless you're into antiques, it's not really worth it.
The worst part, I guess, isn't the specifics. That can be sorted. It's the absolute lack of progress since 2011, in the desktop space. Underneath it may be wonders, but if you cannot use the system, then it's worthless. Lots of the stuff from the previous version have been removed [or] made less accessible, but we get nothing new in return. So it is nerdier and harder than before, and that's a grim sign of a future that has no place on the desktop. This seems to be true with other operating systems in this family, too. Just not worth the effort. Stick with Linux. Grade wise, 4/10.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 19 2017, @12:42PM (4 children)
"Doesn't want to use the command line?"
When I "reviewed" Solaris, years ago, I felt much like this reviewer does today. I didn't understand much about *nix OS's, and despite the fact I knew my way around DOS, *nix was quite different. I was lost for a long time. It's hard to say at what point in my own learning curve it was, when I tried to use Solaris. I was beginning to get comfortable with some of the Linux cli, but I wasn't "there" yet.
I know that I had a GUI desktop, but after all this time, I can't even remember which desktop it was. I do remember that it was clunky, and disappointing. Suse Linux Gnome had prepared me to expect great things from a *nix desktop. Whichever Solaris I was diddling with was so very far behind the curve, I would have been embarassed to demo it for anyone.
I'm in the camp that says Solaris was a pretty good server, but not the best. And, it sucked as a desktop.
I may download the new OpenIndiana, just to see how it looks. But, I'm not rushing to do it this morning.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Monday June 19 2017, @01:43PM (3 children)
If it was Solaris as opposed to OpenSolaris, it was likely Sun's crappy "OpenWindows" [wikipedia.org] which was hated (and rightly so) long before Linus Torvalds was in college, or the marginally better, but still crappy, CDE [wikipedia.org].
But things have changed, especially with Illumos/OpenIndiana.
OI actually defaults to Mate [wikipedia.org] (based on Gnome2), which is decent enough. It can also run the aforementioned CDE and, I believe, OpenWindows (if you're that masochistic). But it also supports Enlightenment [wikipedia.org], Openbox [wikipedia.org] and other windows managers as well.
I've also heard tell that some folks have gotten xfce running on OI too.
Bash is also available, in addition to the default csh.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by turgid on Monday June 19 2017, @06:39PM (2 children)
The first Unix I used back in about 1993 was Solaris. I remember one of the machines on the network was enormous. It had 128MB of RAM. I ran some home made FORTRAN on it. I used to love the OpenLook Window Manager and in 1995 when I installed Slackware at home for the first time, I used olvwm [wikipedia.org]. My 100MHz Pentium was slightly faster than some of the Sun 4u boxes I'd used at university.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kaszz on Monday June 19 2017, @11:58PM (1 child)
People seems to completely have lost sight of computer resources these days. That a CPU clock at 33 MHz, DRAM 32 MB, harddisc 100 MB, x86 arch with VGA is sufficient to boot and run X11 window seems unfathomable for people these days. I'll guess even Netscape v1 would run on top of that, perhaps even Netscape v2 (the first decent one). To insult even more a computer platform with a CPU clock at 7 MHz, DRAM 512 kB, storage 880 kB, m68k arch with bitmap and acceleration handled a window based GUI.
With this knowledge it become much easier to judge how much computer resources you need for say a embedded system with a graphical user interface. Which means that if the user interface only need to be some kind of really dumb graphical terminal you know with quite a certainty you can get it done with say a ARM at 8 MHz, SRAM 512 kB, Flash 512 kB, storage with flash 1 GB and DMA trick to drive the display. Which means it can be squeezed down to ONE chip which saves circuit board routing, EMI and complexity by a magnitude. The all graphics can be sent as vector commands down some serial line like Ethernet etc.
So when modern computer have "minimum" specifications of a CPU at 4 GHZ with 4 cores, DRAM 4 GB, storage 200 GB or more using 64-bit x86 and closed to hell graphics. You KNOW something is up big time.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday June 21 2017, @05:15PM
I forgot to mention GEOS, that does window interfacing using a 8-bit CPU at 1 MHz, bitmap graphics, 64 kB of RAM and 160 kB of storage. How sucky does that indicate the Microsoft code is..