Oracle Adds OpenStack In Solaris 11.2

Oracle has updated Solaris, the Unix operating system it acquired with Sun Microsystems in 2009, adding support for the OpenStack cloud platform. This follows an update to its own SPARC hardware that (along with x86) runs Solaris, and comes at a time when HP and IBM are also updating their Unix servers.

Solaris 11.2 is only the second point release Oracle has made to the Unix version in the last three years since Solaris 11 shipped, but Oracle’s Mark Hurd told an event in New York that the platform remains strategic to the company as part of its “engineered systems” approach – which is essentially, buy hardware and software from one supplier (namely Oracle) and get better performance.

Solaris includes OpenStack

Solaris now includes a full distribution of the open-source OpenStack cloud system, which was developed by a consortium including Rackspace and NASA, and has been adopted by players including IBM, HP and Red Hat.

It also supports software defined networking (SDN), and Oracle is promising it can deploy clouds “within minutes rather than weeks”, and claiming that the unified tech improves productivity by 16 times, over a specific competitor (Red Hat).

Despite the ongoing decline in Unix servers, it’s still a competitive market. Oracle, along with its partner Fujitsu, updated its SPARC 64+servers earlier this month, and its big server rivals HP and IBM have also updated their Unix hardware. HP launched a new version of its HP-UX Unix version, promising that benefits from synergies with its more mass-market server products. Meanwhile, IBM has updated its Power Systems servers, saying that the new OpenPower Foundation will ensure a broader market for its Power RISC processors with possible support from Google in future.

One stop server shop?

John Fowler, executive vice president of systems at Oracle.pushed the engineered systems message, claiming that it is putting these standard components together better, and benefits from its own tech: “By engineering the OS, the virtualisation, SDN and OpenStack together, Oracle Solaris 11.2 provides a complete cloud solution,” he said. “It’s a complete platform for simple, efficient, secure, compliant and open enterprise cloud deployments that can help customers accelerate their businesses and capitalise on the potential of cloud computing while reducing cost.”

Some analysts also backed the idea. “Cloud computing is creating an entirely new set of expectations for enterprise-class infrastructure software,” said Al Gillen, VP for servers and system software at IDC. “Where once offering the piece parts
— the OS, virtualiSation and networking — was a sufficient starting point, having an integrated solution is becoming more of the expectation for enterprise customers looking to build a private cloud.”

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