Bill Vass — Live & Uncensored

Advice for IT managers: Learning from Bill's experience running IT for Sun and his predictions for the future.

Q: From an IT perspective, how do you prove to your clients that you are serving their needs, and how do you show them what you are spending their money on? Does Sun have any products that help deal with this complex problem?

Bill Vass (A): We do regular internal customer Critical-To-Quality reviews and budget review meetings. We use PeopleSoft to track our IT hours spent and Oracle to manage our dollars spent.

Q: How do I convince my manager that a $2,000 Sun box is a better buy than a $400 Dell box? I already know why, but how does Sun market to a non-technical executive?

A: It's all about features and long-term ROI. However, from a price/ performance perspective we should be equal to or less than Dell.

Q: When will Sun post ease-of-use and ease-of-admin measurements for its software products the way it touts performance measurements? When will it provide ease-of-admin feature comparisons to the competition's products?

A: As an IT person at Sun, I'd love to see that happen. We have come a long way; we are standardizing interfaces, and we now have a common loader/ installer for all of the JES products. That has taken us a long way. What used to take a few months to get working together can now be done in a few hours. I think we are moving ahead of other companies in that space since we run lots of other vendors' products as well. I would be interested to know what an objective "ease-of-admin" measure would be.

Q: What do you think the sysadmin role will be in the future, and how will new technologies impact the server/ admin ratio?

A: In the future, the system administrator will focus on managing grids of computers in virtual data centers. The ratio of servers and desktops per administrator will go way up, but since the number of network services will be growing very fast, there will still be a lot of demand for sys admins... just in a different role.

Desktop and Application Alternatives
Options for migrating from MS applications, Sun Ray thin clients, and details on the Java Desktop System.

Q: I want to get my company off of MS Outlook. When will you have a client for your mail and calendar servers?

A: You can already switch to Mozilla for mail clients. You can really switch to any IMAP or other standard client to get off Outlook. You can also use Outlook Connect with the JES mail server to get off MS Exchange and still let Outlook users connect.

Q: Can you give me more information on Sun Ray thin client migration from Windows, and also what email server Sun uses (I know they don't use Exchange; what alternative do you recommend to run on Solaris?)

A: We run the Java Enterprise System (JES) mail server, which is part of the JES suite, which has portal, Web, IM, mail, calendar, identity, and much more. It scales to millions of users. You can have any client you want. Search sun.com on Sun Ray — there is a lot of info out there.

Q: I've heard of Sun working with cable providers such as Comcast to deliver Sun Ray sessions to their customers in the future. Can you guys comment on this? Is it something we'll see within two years?

A: We have a first pilot starting in October of this year with a broadband provider. We have been deploying Sun Rays at home in large volume to our employees now. The first pilots are to Sun employees so we can work out any technology issues before we open it up to the general public.

Q: What is next for Sun Rays? Do you ever see Sun Rays at the home computer end for ISP/ Service providers?

A: Yes, we are working with a bunch of the service providers now. We are also talking with wireless hot spot providers about putting wireless Sun Rays in hot spots for their customers to use when they are not lugging a laptop around.

Q: Will you continue with the Sun Java Desktop System development, or has your focus shifted back more toward Solaris?

A: We will continue with JDS. We already have 33,000 desktops running JDS at Sun. We have sold more than 200 million copies, so we're committed. Don't forget — JDS is a suite of desktop software (like JES on the server), not an OS, and it runs on both Linux and Solaris (x86 and SPARC).

Q: What is Sun's strategy for the Solaris desktop? What can we look forward to?

A: JDS is an all open-source desktop. It has about 200 components that let you run Windows applications. Everyone from Sun on this chat session is using JDS. Look forward to more features and applications, Java badge integration, environment sync with APOC and WebDev, and much more.

Open Source and Sun
Get to the bottom of open source issues.

Q: How do you plan to win over the anti-Sun crowd at SlashDot and LinuxToday? No matter what Sun does for open source, there are people bashing Sun for not dumping Solaris and going 100 percent Linux

A: That is a hard one. If you look at the numbers, we contribute more and run more open source than anyone else. Just look at the facts — we have 33,000 open-source desktops running at Sun. How many does IBM have? Like IBM, we have open sourced a large number of lines of code and products, but the similarity ends with open source Solaris. When will IBM open source DB2 or WebSphere? I am not sure how to get Sun the credit we should get for helping out Linux, GNOME, Mozilla, GIMP, NFS...

Q: What is the strategic value of not open-sourcing the JVM? This question seems especially relevant in light of open Solaris. Many believe that open-sourcing the VM will help it become a defacto standard.

A: We need to make sure that Java code as an open standard does not fork — once we open it up, we just need to make sure there is a way to stay true to the Java standard. The strategic value of Java code is that you can be sure it will run on any device or OS, whether it is open or closed source.

Q: What exactly is the dividing line between what other parties call an "open-source Java"? We know that the runtime is open source, but is the virtual machine not?

A: Java code is "open" through the Java community process. I think people like JBoss already have open-source JVMs.

Q: Can you please clarify what "all open-source desktop" means in relation to typically closed-source components, such as your JVM? Is this "all open-source desktop" all open source? I'm interested in gaining more insight into your strategy here; are you ultimately moving to all F/OSS, or do you see the future as "both source" (to quote Novell)?

A: We are and will continue to be as open source on our desktop as possible. However, I believe there will always be some parts we cannot open source because we don't own them. For example, we have some fonts on JDS and in StarOffice suite that we cannot provide in the open-source version because we don't own them. I think in the long run you will see Sun open source everything we can. At least as an IT person here at Sun you can be sure that I will always be pushing for that.

Q: Should young programmers and enthusiasts adhere to the open-source suite, forget about ASP/MYSQL/PERL, and wait for an entirely open-source world?

A: No, I believe open source is very important, but open standards is even more important. As long as you stick with open standards (open source or not), you have vendor portability.

Q: Sun is on the forefront of embracing open-source technologies for business use. With the Linux addition to your products, what additional strides will Sun take to further its venture into the LAMP technologies? What does this proactivity mean for Sun's competitors?

A: As you know, we are open sourcing Solaris OS and adding Linux extensions. This will help everyone in the open-source community. We will also be offering JES containers on open-source Solaris which adds portal, message, calendar, IM, and other servers to MySQL and PHP.