Just a quick follow up on the BluePrints news item. Please accept Jonathan’s invitation to contact him and make him aware of your disapproval. Swift and overwhelming reaction from the customer base is what we need to save our beloved BluePrints, especially with all the docs we’ll need when Solaris10 releases later in the year.

It looks like Sun has laid off most of its “BluePrints” team:

“It looks like the Sun BluePrint program has succumbed to the budget cuts. Many of the authors have been working under the organization Reference Architecture Engineering and have been RIFed. AFAIK, all publications resources assigned to the project have been reallocated. I’m not even sure if someone will turn out the lights. Looking for news jobs are:

Tom Bialaski (LDAP)
David Deeths (JumpStart, disk management)
Don Devitt (PC integration, performance)
Mark Garner (datacenter practices, networking)
John Howard (JumpStart, disk management)
Deepak Kakadia (networking)
Ted Persky (databases)
Enrique Vargas (Sun Cluster, datacenter practices)”

I don’t normally get into personal opinion here (as this is a news site, not an opinion site) but wow, what a spectacular way to kill a project that your customers love, and shoot yourself in the foot at the same time!

Sun has announced NetBeans 4.0 at JavaOne 2004.

Learn the five ways in which to deploy J2EE applications or modules to Application Server PE 8, from command-line interface
to Administration Console to automatic deployment. This article also explains how dynamic reloading functions in Application Server PE 8.

Read about it here: http://developers.sun.com/prodtech/appserver/reference/techart/deployment.html

Developers and porters alike will want to participate in the Sun Studio 9 Early Access program. This release is avalible for Solaris SPARC and X86 as well as X86 Linux.

Sun’s JavaOne 2004 conference is in full swing, with a ton of new product updates and news:
– J2SE 1.5, codenamed “Project Tiger” released
– Java Studio Creator visual development environment released
– Project Looking Glass and Java3D to be released on java.net
– Development program promotions including a free Opteron workstation with software subscription and free Java Studio Creator for Mac OS X

Here’s an excellent example that demonstrates how to enable Single Sign-On by integrating an application server with
Access Manager 6.1. Detailed are installation, deployment, and verification procedures, as well as troubleshooting tips.

Check it out here: http://developers.sun.com/prodtech/identserver/reference/techart/oracle9ias.html

According to this InfoWorld article, Sun’s “Metropolis” Opteron-based workstation will go on sale next week. Sun is also offering free hardware with developer program subscriptions:

“If you’re a developer and you sign up for our development tools and our subscriptions, we’ll actually include one of our workstations free with the promotion,” said John Fowler, executive vice president of Sun’s Network Systems Group.

The workstation, known as the w1100z, is manufactured by an unidentified third party.

Sun is soliciting input for the next generation of J2EE application servers and would like to get your opinion. Fill out this short survey
and tell us what you really think so we can build products that meet your needs. This survey is not restricted to current Sun customers,
we value all opinions!

Voice your opinion here: http://see.sun.com/Apps/DCS/mcp?q=ST1WG0DTFqfbqAW

Fujitsu has released a new SPARC64-based processor this week. The new SPARC64 V will ship before September for use in UNIX-based servers, especially 8-way, 16-way and 32-way configurations. The SPARC64 V incorporates 3 MB on-chip second-level cache, is built using 90-nanometer (nm) process technology, and can be mixed and matched with previous generations of SPARC64 processors within a system. The company said it plans to use the new 1.89 GHz chip in its PRIMEPOWER 650, 850, 900 and 1500 server models.

Fujitsu and Sun will merge Fujitsu’s SPARC64 and Sun’s UltraSPARC product lines by mid-2006 in a program dubbed the Advanced Product Line (APL). Both chips are based on Sun’s SPARC V9 instruction set architecture. The new data center systems family will include Sun’s Sun Fire hardware and Fujitsu’s PRIMEPOWER products.

Sun Blogs have had an unforseen benifit, developers are now actively able to communicate in a casual manner with end users and non-Sun developers. One of the best examples yet is MRJ’s soliciting for Solaris/X86 driver requests! Just add a comment to the blog entry and tell him which driver has been keeping you from running Solaris/X86 and he’ll take it into consideration. This is beyond cool.

What best to do while implementing SSO within enterprises and in a federated environment? Read these recommendations from
Sun’s Market Development Engineering Identity Adoption Team, including tips on how to implement Liberty standards to extend SSO outside enterprises.

http://developers.sun.com/prodtech/identserver/reference/techart/bp_sso.html

What if:
* You could grow your storage in manageable, affordable increments?
* When you experienced a startling growth spurt, you could adjust your storage levels immediately?
* You could branch out to new markets without worrying about unexpected drops or gains in data volume?
* You never had to worry about another upgrade, patch or alert?

Storage-on-demand with simple, predictable pricing is available today.
Find out more: http://www.sun.com/2004-0615/spotlight

OSNews reported another article about Solaris10. I report it here only because it’s so chopped full of errors that it’s obvious the author only learned of Solaris10 minutes before writting the article. It’s only saving grace is that so far this is the only place I’ve seen Solaris10’s “Dynamic File System” actually refered to as the “Zettabyte File System” instead of just ZFS. Make sure your not drinking anything when you read it. [Update: After some discussion in Bryan Cantrill’s Blog by myself and Bryan, Chris (the author) has “fixed” the article. It is now correct. A big thanx to Chris for doing this.]

David Edmonson has installed a Sun Enterprise 450 server as his In-Car Enterprise-Class Entertainment System, aka MP3 player.