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By Leslie T. O'Neill February 13, 2007 - Any company creating a Web 2.0 venture operates under the startup's credo: Get to market fast, and get to market cheap. Sun is today announcing new Solaris 10 OS tools and technologies as well as an expanded Sun Startup Essentials Program that make it easier for developers and startups to create Web applications on the Solaris OS. The offerings provide easier and earlier access to systems and technologies that are optimized for performance and security at low or no cost.
“ Today's announcements -- Solaris Express, Developer Edition, the Solaris + AMP offer, and the expanded Sun Startup Essentials Program -- prove Sun's commitment to developers. They demonstrate that Sun is serious about helping startups leverage Sun's innovative technologies and proven solutions to shorten development time, reduce costs, and get to market faster. ”
— Tom Goguen, Sun's vice president of Solaris Software.
Solaris Express, Developer Edition is the first release of a free new distribution based on the OpenSolaris project, providing developers with an integrated environment optimized for developing Solaris, Java, and Web 2.0-based applications on commodity desktop and laptop hardware. Sun also helps simplify development and speed deployment of secure Web-based applications and services with easy access to an AMP -- Apache, MySQL, PHP/Perl/Python -- stack recently optimized for the Solaris 10 OS. And the Sun Startup Essentials Program includes new features to help startup companies conserve cash, accelerate their development cycle, and speed time to market. It's now easier -- and cheaper -- than ever to get a next-generation Web infrastructure off the ground running Solaris 10 OS, the strategic choice for developing emerging Web applications and services. Solaris Express, Developer Edition
When it comes to conserving cash, you can't beat free -- and with Solaris Express, Developer Edition, everything is free, from development to deployment on Solaris 10 OS. Unlike other open-source offerings, the open Solaris OS is a highly secure platform supported by the broadest set of x64/x86 platforms on the market. Plus, it's buoyed by a vibrant community of the world's best, most creative developers and free access to support through the Sun Developer Network, BigAdmin, and the OpenSolaris community. Commercial support from Sun Services is also available for an additional cost. The new Solaris Express, Developer Edition will be updated three to four times a year with the latest tools and technologies for Solaris, Java, and Web 2.0 developers. This easy-to-install, complete development environment includes several integrated components that get Solaris up and running easily, reduce development time, and save money:
In conjunction with this release, Sun is also announcing Sun Developer Expert Assistance for Solaris Express, Developer Edition. These developer services include code-level support, answers to programming questions, technical assistance, and tips on best practices. More affordable than competitors' service plans, Sun charges just $49 to answer one question or $249 to field as many questions as a developer can ask in one year. The Solaris + AMP (SAMP) Offer
When a company's customers begin to contribute content to next-generation Web applications, the growth of those applications can explode overnight. To manage that kind of unforeseeable increase in system resources and requirements, it's necessary to have an operating system and a Web infrastructure that can scale on demand. Solaris and AMP deliver that superior Web applications infrastructure as well as simplified access to a freely downloadable, optimized AMP stack and to Solaris 10 OS. "By simply moving Web applications developed with the very common AMP stack --Apache/MySQL/PHP, Perl, or Python scripting languages -- over to Solaris, you can improve performance, improve security, and improve scalability by taking advantage of unique Solaris features, such as DTrace and Solaris Containers," explains John "JB" Brock, Sun's technical marketing manager, Emerging Internet Technologies. With DTrace, the dynamic tracing tool built into the Solaris OS, developers can tune their SAMP applications. This increased observability is unique to Sun's Solaris + AMP offering. And existing features, like Solaris Containers, which provide root access to the containers versus the OS, and Least Privilege, which limits access to the lowest required privilege, provide greater security than commecial Linux distributions. Sun is also issuing a challenge to developers called "AMPlify Your Web Tier." This program encourages existing AMP on Linux customers to move their LAMP-based applications from Linux to Solaris, blog about the experience, then report back to Sun in an entry to qualify to win a Sun server. Developers can access SAMP through http://www.sun.com/solaris/amp. To try SAMP on Sun's award-winning servers, the SAMP offer provides options via Sun's Try and Buy program, the Sun Store, or, if you're a qualified startup company, the Sun Startup Essentials Program. Note: Support for Cool Stack software is not covered by Sun support agreements associated with the Solaris OS or Sun Fire servers. Developer support for the optimized AMP stack is expected in March, with production support by summer 2007. The Expanded Sun Startup Essentials Program
To be successful in the highly competitive, fast moving Web 2.0 realm, a startup company needs more than killer development software -- it also need the screamingly fast, massively scalable, ecologically responsible hardware that only Sun can deliver. Launched in November 2006, the Sun Startup Essentials program already offers U.S.-based companies deep discounts -- as much as 60 percent off of list price -- on certain systems products offering breakthough price/performance. These include the Sun Fire T1000 and T2000 servers with CoolThreads technology and Sun's x64 servers, such as the Sun Fire X4100-M2 server. Today, the Sun Startup Essentials program adds three money- and time-saving enhancements to help startups deploy Web applications and services to the Sun platform quickly and easily - and at prices a startup can afford. Web startup companies tend to have extremely high storage requirements, which can grow very quickly. To address that need, qualified startups can now receive equally impressive discounts -- in some cases, as much as 70 percent off -- on Sun SAN (storage area network), NAS (network attached storage), and direct attached storage equipment, as well as the revolutionary Sun Fire X4500 server. Also new is a free advice offering called Startups Ask Sun, which provides users with email support when it comes to architectural, design, and development issues for startups building new services. "A lot of these companies have expertise in their specific area where they are building an application, but they may have all kinds of technical questions. They could be about specific products or technologies, something as simple as 'Which server should I buy?' or as complicated as 'How do I architect my solution today so that tomorrow my architecture and infrastructure will scale to the growth of my company,'" explains Sanjay Sharma, director of the Sun Startup Essentials Program. Third, qualified startup customers can access software downloads of popular open source and Sun software stacks, including the new SAMP, and integrated infrastructure software from Sun, including the Java Enterprise System -- all software that's free for the asking from Sun. The goal of this program is to give startups simple, affordable access to the hardware and software essential to succeed. To that end, qualified customers purchase their discounted equipment online directly from Sun. "Sun is better positioned than any other big company to tap into a new wave of Internet entrepreneurship. All of this software is available free for both development and deployment, and that together with our best-in-class hardware that we have for these kinds of applications makes Sun a natural partner for startups," says Juan Carlos Soto, Sun's vice president of Market Development. For building and rolling out Web-based applications and services, you need look no further than Sun. With the award-winning Solaris 10 OS, industry-leading hardware, and proven services expertise, Sun provides a complete solution to quickly and cost effectively deploy new network services securely and reliably. For more information, go to http://www.sun.com/web. Technology writer Leslie T. O'Neill covers Sun technology and was the Test Center Managing Editor and Special Projects Editor at InfoWorld magazine. |
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Oracle is reviewing the Sun product roadmap and will provide guidance to customers in accordance with Oracle's standard product communication policies. Any resulting features and timing of release of such features as determined by Oracle's review of roadmaps, are at the sole discretion of Oracle. All product roadmap information, whether communicated by Sun Microsystems or by Oracle, does not represent a commitment to deliver any material, code, or functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decisions. It is intended for information purposes only, and may not be incorporated into any contract.
