Open source is a requirement but not the only one. There are countless examples of companies building integrated solutions based off of open source projects that, when they went bankrupt, there was nobody to pick up the available pieces and continue moving the stack forward. Just pointing out that open source is not this magical escape hatch that some people think (at least not in corporate environments).

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yencabulator 3 days ago | parent [-]

Especially so for Oxide's decidedly non-Linux setup. They are in a niche software ecosystem with practically no one else. Apparently mostly because they're practically all ex-Solaris staff.

https://www.illumos.org/docs/about/who/

(Listing all projects using ZFS or DTrace as "who uses Illumos" is cheating.)

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ryao 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

I remember many Linux fans saying that monocultures were bad until Linux became so popular that Linux was the one benefiting from a monoculture. Despite that, the rationale against monocultures still applies.

That said, Illumos is influential as an organ donor to many others. There are a number of awesome technologies in it.

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yencabulator 3 days ago | parent [-]

Oh I would love to have some healthy competition to Linux, but I am not rooting for Solaris to do that, I'd rather have one of the Rust-based microkernel actually git gud. Time to shake the foundations of the age-old security and isolation models, not resuscitate a dusty old thing built on piles of C and shell on top of a large monolithic kernel and pretend everything's fine.

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bcantrill 3 days ago | parent [-]

Well, good news: we have one of those too![0]

[0] https://oxide.computer/blog/hubris-and-humility

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yencabulator 3 days ago | parent [-]

Oh I am well aware. But I am hoping to run dynamic workloads, including virtual Linux machines, on a PC. It's a bit of a different world.

Latest one still in my to-read pile: https://lwn.net/Articles/1022920/

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freeopinion 3 days ago | parent [-]

You want to run dynamic workloads on a PC? As in a desktop PC? That is clearly a completely different market than Oxide serves.

Or do you mean PC as in rackmounted servers? If that's what you meant, PC is a very poor word for it. That's kind of the point Oxide made from the beginning. Why are you running server workloads on a PC with a funny shape? Why do you need 84 power supplies (2/shelf) in your rack? Why do you need any keyboard or graphics controllers? Why don't you design for purpose a rack-sized server?

Or did you mean exactly what you wrote: "a PC"? You only need one server, not a whole rack's worth? Again, that is not the market Oxide is targeting.

Or you need to be able to run "dynamic workloads" that could require 40-4000 CPUs? You need hypervisors and orchestration, etc.? And you don't want them to be Solaris, or to run on Solaris? And you know all about Hubris and you don't want that either? But you think it would be nice if they weren't Linux? Maybe if they were modern microkernels written in something like Rust? But not the Hubris microkernel written in Rust?

I'm going to have to take you at your word. Your needs are "a bit of a different world" than Oxide fits.

But it's pretty cool that you still got some friendly personal attention from two big-name Oxide employees who seem willing to try to help you if they can. If you ever do find yourself in a world that aligns with theirs it appears that they are willing to try to accommodate you.

	▲	yencabulator 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		We're talking about healthy competition for Linux, Rusty microkernels, and I'm saying Hubris is not what I'm looking for because of the stated reasons. Hubris workloads are defined at build time and it does not target x86. When I say PC I mean the large ecosystem of compatible performant hardware that exist out there, as opposed to e.g. RISC-V at this stage.

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sunshowers 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> Apparently mostly because they're practically all ex-Solaris staff.

I absolutely do not have a Solaris/illumos background! The first time I ever sshed into an illumos machine was my first day on the job.

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jiveturkey 3 days ago | parent [-]

The exception proves the rule. You can't deny the deep Solaris heritage.

	▲	sunshowers 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		I wouldn't deny that, no.