# OpenIndiana



## gpatrick (Jun 11, 2012)

Since I've used Solaris since 2003, I installed OpenSolaris when it was released and it was my primary home system.  When Oracle killed the project I came back to FreeBSD and also started using OpenBSD.

Since Vimage Jails are still too experimental I decided to have a look at OpenIndiana.  Since OpenSMTPD is what I use for mail, I decided I'd try to build it on OI.  The installation of OI went well, and the update went well too.

Next I installed Sun Studio 12.1 from the repository and then proceeded to download automake, autoconf, libtool, and m4.  It took a while to find the correct versions of each, but bootstrap finally succeded!  Next I was on to configure which failed because I didn't have Berkeley DB headers.  So I installed the db-4 package from sunfreeware.com.  Next it needed libintl, libiconv, and libevent. It also needed libgcc.  The next problem was it couldn't find the headers even though I had them in the path, so did a soft link to /usr/include and that problem was solved.

Back to configure which started to run but then failed because it couldn't find the event header config files.  Those were soft linked to /usr/include like the Berkeley DB headers, but each time it failed.

It was late so I decided to stop for the night and powered off the laptop.  Today I decided I'd try again with the libevent headers but to my surprise, even though OpenIndiana booted up to a console login, the keyboard wasn't responsive.  I've rebooted into FreeBSD and OpenBSD on different drives and they work, just OI is whacked.

But this isn't the first issue I've had with OI.  The day before last, I installed OI and started my software installs and rebooted.  When it came back up my /opt/sunstudio12.1 and /usr/local/bin directories were completely gone.

It is hard to say why I have had so many problems because OpenSolaris was rock-solid.  But after two wasted days on OpenIndiana I don't believe I will try it again.  Too inconsistent and unstable.  But I like the Zones and Crossbow implementations, and the beadm environment.  

Maybe someday it will be more stable.  I've read they don't have many resources, but neither does the OpenBSD project and they release consistently.  OI has said they were going to release a stable version in Q4 2011 and still nothing.  There has been indication it is also due to collaboration with Nexenta and merging resources.  I received an email thread from the oi-dev list and someone had problems for a long time and referenced a problem that existed for months that went unheeded.  Finally a developer responded he was getting back to work on the "little project" and gave an answer.  One shouldn't have to wait months for an answer.

I honestly don't know if the OpenIndiana distribution will survive.

Has anyone else had experiences with OI?


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## vermaden (Jun 12, 2012)

gpatrick said:
			
		

> It is hard to say why I have had so many problems because OpenSolaris was rock-solid.  But after two wasted days on OpenIndiana I don't believe I will try it again.  Too inconsistent and unstable.  But I like the Zones and Crossbow implementations, and the beadm environment.



At least *beadm *is already on FreeBSD land 
http://forums.freebsd.org/showthread.php?t=31662



			
				gpatrick said:
			
		

> Has anyone else had experiences with OI?


I used OpenSolaris in the past for a short period of time, recently tried OpenIndiana and it's a quite good system, I like the _Time Slider_ feature in Nautilus (IMHO it should be ported to FreeBSD) but there are almost no packages for OpenSolaris/OpenIndiana, pkgsrc is a big PITA to set up (on OpenIndiana of course). I was never able to set it up on OpenIndiana/OpenSolaris to be honest, official repositories and even blastwave and others have very little to offer, it's just a very nice OS without needed packages.


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## fluca1978 (Jun 12, 2012)

gpatrick said:
			
		

> Maybe someday it will be more stable.  I've read they don't have many resources, but neither does the OpenBSD project and they release consistently.  OI has said they were going to release a stable version in Q4 2011 and still nothing.  There has been indication it is also due to collaboration with Nexenta and merging resources.  I received an email thread from the oi-dev list and someone had problems for a long time and referenced a problem that existed for months that went unheeded.  Finally a developer responded he was getting back to work on the "little project" and gave an answer.  One shouldn't have to wait months for an answer.
> 
> I honestly don't know if the OpenIndiana distribution will survive.
> 
> Has anyone else had experiences with OI?



OpenSolaris clearly suffered by the Oracle policy, and so was OpenIndiana and Illumos, due to the fact the developers and boards of directory asked Oracle for a dialogue that never came and wasted months. I used OpenSolaris on my laptop and it was pretty good, even if the hardware support was not very complete (it supported the wifi card but not the ethernet on a clean install). When OpenIndiana was launched I tried the build 148, that was essentially the same as OpenSolaris, but I was so frustated of being unable to compile KDE and related libraries that I throw it away (on OpenSolaris I was able to do). I would have used Open{Solaris|Indiana} for my home computers if the project was a little more stable. And I'm not accusing them to be not productive, probably the code coming from Sun/Oracle is not so easy to migrate as open or maybe developers are too busy with regard to those of other systems. I also tried Nexenta storage, that was pretty much complicated to use if compared to FreeNas.


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## Remington (Aug 3, 2012)

fluca1978 said:
			
		

> OpenSolaris clearly suffered by the Oracle policy, and so was OpenIndiana and Illumos, due to the fact the developers and boards of directory asked Oracle for a dialogue that never came and wasted months. I used OpenSolaris on my laptop and it was pretty good, even if the hardware support was not very complete (it supported the wifi card but not the ethernet on a clean install). When OpenIndiana was launched I tried the build 148, that was essentially the same as OpenSolaris, but I was so frustated of being unable to compile KDE and related libraries that I throw it away (on OpenSolaris I was able to do). I would have used Open{Solaris|Indiana} for my home computers if the project was a little more stable. And I'm not accusing them to be not productive, probably the code coming from Sun/Oracle is not so easy to migrate as open or maybe developers are too busy with regard to those of other systems. I also tried Nexenta storage, that was pretty much complicated to use if compared to FreeNas.



OpenIndiana is still very much alive and the current version is 151a5 (alpha 5) which was recently released.  Solaris was never designed to be a desktop operating system and that's why you'll have some difficulties compiling KDE/Gnome as well with any GUI applications due to limited video drivers support.  It is the same thing with FreeBSD.  Solaris/OpenIndiana/FreeBSD are designed to work as a server.  I've used FreeBSD and Solaris before.  Now I'm currently using OpenIndiana as my web and file server.  It's very stable, secure and robust.

I never liked Linux due to many different distros and ZFS is not built into Linux Kernel due to license issues.  ZFS on Solaris/OpenIndiana is quite fast due to benchmark tests I've read and I've done tests myself.  FreeBSD is still very good but I prefer OpenIndiana since ZFS is more mature and stable.  Many former Sun/Oracle developers who worked on Solaris are still working on OpenIndiana including ZFS creator Bill Moore.

OpenIndiana is here to stay and it will thrive without Oracle.  I'm sure Oracle is second guessing their mistake for shutting down OpenSolaris project as more people switch over to OpenIndiana from Solaris.


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## FIlIPy65 (Aug 4, 2012)

Sorry the question,
but why try OpenIndiana instead FreeBSD to be a desktop?

Cheers.


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## vermaden (Aug 6, 2012)

Remington said:
			
		

> OpenIndiana is still very much alive and the current version is 151a5 (alpha 5) which was recently released.  Solaris was never designed to be a desktop operating system and that's why you'll have some difficulties compiling KDE/Gnome as well with any GUI applications due to limited video drivers support.  It is the same thing with FreeBSD.  Solaris/OpenIndiana/FreeBSD are designed to work as a server.  I've used FreeBSD and Solaris before.  Now I'm currently using OpenIndiana as my web and file server.  It's very stable, secure and robust.



_"It is the same thing with FreeBSD."_

Definitely not.

On FreeBSD You have ready-to-install 23000 ports, also available as packages.

You have rich 'compiler infrastructure' with gcc 4.2 and clang 3.1 in base and lots more in the Ports/packages.

OpenIndiana/Solaris/Illumos is nowhere near to this, they have some basic GNOME packages and GIMP maybe int their pkg(1) repository, but if You want to have at least HALF of what FreeBSD has, try putting pkgsrc on Illumos without issues or good luck with hunting for various pkg repositories that will contain a package that You seek and that it will work on your version.


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