✍ Last Day At Sun

Posted on March 8, 2010 by Simon Phipps

Key West Sunset

Today is my last day of employment at Sun (well, it became Oracle on March 1st in the UK but you know what I mean). I am a few months short of my 10th anniversary there (I joined at JavaOne in 2000) and my 5th anniversary as Chief Open Source Officer. I hope you’ll forgive a little reminiscence.

Looking back, we’ve achieved some amazing things. We’ve:

  • Got some of the most important software in the computer industry released under Free licenses that guarantee software freedom for people who rely on them, regardless of who owns the copyrights. Unix, Java, key elements of Linux, the SPARC chip and much more have been liberated.
  • Guided and fed the quiet revolution that has restored competition to the productivity software market through Open Document Format.
  • Kick-started the corporate blogging revolution at Blogs.Sun.Com, so that at any time you could have checked there have been around 1200 Sun employees sharing their enthusiasms with maximum trust and minimum oversight. In the process we created policies that have enabled many other companies to start the same journey and gave employees ownership of their work.
  • Changed Sun’s attitude towards open source so that early, bitter critics have become people willing to defend – or even join – the company.
  • Participated in the wider community in useful ways, such as retiring old licensing, sponsoring the FSF and helping the GPL v3 come in to existence.
  • Worked with an amazing, once-in-a-career team that has gone on to play key roles elsewhere in the industry.

I didn’t do any of that alone, plenty of it wasn’t my idea, and without the groundwork of others before me it would have been impossible. There are far too many people to attempt to thank here – each “we” above represents a bunch of smart people of whom I was the least. You all know who you are, thank-you so much for the privilege of working with you.

Of course, no story with highlights like that can be without disappointments too. I’m sad that Apache did not get the TCK license they requested. I’m sad that we didn’t get the code for some of those projects permanently outside the sun firewall. I’m sad we never got to a place where co-developers become a priority for various product teams. And I’m sad that, despite the success of the open source software businesses, it still wasn’t enough to rescue Sun in the end. But overall, I am amazed and humbled to see what the open source team at Sun has achieved.

I’ve not decided what to do next (well, apart from sell photos and other shameless commercialism!), but I see so many friends finding exciting opportunities that I’m not especially concerned for now. I intend to keep blogging, so I doubt anything I do will be much of a secret.

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130 Responses

  1. LenZ, on March 8, 2010 at 16:15 said:

    Hi Simon! Very sorry to see you leaving. It was an honour and pleasure to work with you! I am sure our paths will cross again at some point in the future. The OSS world is a small one 🙂

    Take care and all the best!

  2. Michael Ernest, on March 8, 2010 at 16:31 said:

    Thank you for all your work and contributions. There was a day when the only way to get meaningful technical information on Sun products was by knowing someone who trusted you well enough to look over their shoulder, or pay for a corporate license. I have so much more information today I can use to deliver accurate, meaningful information to faithful Sun customers. It’s made a world of difference.

  3. Andrew Haley, on March 8, 2010 at 16:32 said:

    Hi there. I’m sad to see this, but not very surprised.

    Keep in touch, y’hear? I’ll be interested to see what you do next.

  4. Skrocki, on March 8, 2010 at 16:39 said:

    Wishing you all the best, Simon!

  5. zonker, on March 8, 2010 at 16:55 said:

    Best of luck to you whatever you wind up doing next. I hope you find a good home with interesting challenges and the resources to do good things.

  6. Adriana, on March 8, 2010 at 17:07 said:

    Congratulations, I think, and now onto better horizons and all that. And thanks for being such a tireless (and erudite) open source advocate. And I don’t see that changing! 🙂

  7. Mark Wielaard, on March 8, 2010 at 17:08 said:

    You made amazing things happen at Sun. Very sad to see you go. Hope you will keep being a catalyst in the community wherever you end up.

  8. Eduardo Pelegri-Llopart, on March 8, 2010 at 17:20 said:

    Have fun in your new life! And we really need to get together in the UK… even if that means me adding a stop at Heathrow.

    – eduard/o

  9. Mark Reinhold, on March 8, 2010 at 17:31 said:

    Thanks for all your wise advice over the years. I look forward to seeing what
    you wind up doing next!

  10. Stephen McGibbon, on March 8, 2010 at 17:32 said:

    Simon, I wish you all the very best in whatever you decide to do next. I am sure opportunity won’t be a stranger 🙂

    Best wishes

    Stephen

  11. Jim Grisanzio, on March 8, 2010 at 17:32 said:

    Best wishes, Simon. Thanks for the great times over the last decade!

  12. patrickfinch, on March 8, 2010 at 17:35 said:

    Simon, I am sure that very exciting things are around the corner for you. Not many people can string together a list of achievements like the list you put together at Sun and you can be very, very proud of them. I am proud and very grateful just to have been able to play a part in a few of them.

    Patrick

  13. Charles-H. Schulz, on March 8, 2010 at 17:43 said:

    Simon,
    Best of luck to you. We had our moments and our sour words together, but as the time flew by I also learned to know you better, and I came to appreciate your qualities and personality in a much better way.

    I hope we’ll continue to work together, in some way.

    Oh, and before I forget: Thank you for your work at Sun, and all the things you didn’t have to do, but that you still invested time and effort to do.

    Cheers,
    Charles.

  14. Stefano Maffulli, on March 8, 2010 at 17:49 said:

    Hi Simon,

    thanks for everything you and your team have done for free software. I hope we’ll have more chances to do things together in the future. Have fun with your photos 🙂

    stef

  15. Stephen Walli, on March 8, 2010 at 18:10 said:

    Simon: Very best wishes for whatever you choose next. A sad loss for Sun^H^H^HOracle. cheers, always

  16. Yeti, on March 8, 2010 at 18:11 said:

    This announcement had an air of depressing inevitability about it whenever Oracle took over. Sad to see it come to fruition, and fearful of what’s going to become of Sun’s remains.

  17. Mark, on March 8, 2010 at 18:15 said:

    Good luck in your next adventure Simon. Thanks for all the advocacy and for approving all my open source requests…

    — mark

  18. Gordon Haff, on March 8, 2010 at 18:22 said:

    Best of luck, Simon!

    — Gordon

  19. stevel, on March 8, 2010 at 18:26 said:

    looking forward to seeing the next place you land at Simon. you effected a ton of change at Sun. thanks for everything!

  20. Alvaro Lopez Ortega, on March 8, 2010 at 18:34 said:

    Best of luck Simon! I’m sure you will do great. 🙂

  21. Silveira Neto, on March 8, 2010 at 18:46 said:

    Simon, my best wishes. Sun archived great achievements with your help. I really hope Oracle continue the Sun spirit, but this seems each time more far. :~

  22. Alan Lord, on March 8, 2010 at 18:49 said:

    Good luck Simon. Never met you but have enjoyed your commentary greatly.

    Keep talking!

    Al

  23. Aslam, on March 8, 2010 at 18:50 said:

    Hi Simon,

    Wishing you well, in your new adventures.

    -Aslam

  24. Eduardo Lima, on March 8, 2010 at 18:53 said:

    Simon, It was great working with you at Sun. Hope we can keep the OpenSource spirit alive… with of without Sun’s support…

    Cheers mate, and all the best for you in the near future!

  25. Evijs Taube, on March 8, 2010 at 18:56 said:

    Thanks, Simon, for your very encouraging presentations driving the Opensource idea forward! I am sure that without you Sun would not get even that far.
    Good luck and see you!
    Evijs

  26. Jacki DeCoster, on March 8, 2010 at 18:59 said:

    Best of Luck Simon! Hopefully our paths will continue to cross in the future. I’ll be checking your blog for updates on your next adventure!

    – Jacki

  27. Bob Sutor, on March 8, 2010 at 18:59 said:

    Best of luck in what comes next, Simon!

  28. Dalibor Topic, on March 8, 2010 at 19:10 said:

    Thank you for your help getting the many millions of lines of free software code at Sun liberated, from OpenSPARC, OpenSolaris, PhoneME, OpenJDK, to Glassfish and beyond! I’m sure you’ll continue to have a great positive impact on societies you decide to dive in next.

  29. Bdale Garbee, on March 8, 2010 at 19:13 said:

    Good luck, and stay in touch!

  30. Thorleif Wiik, on March 8, 2010 at 19:13 said:

    Al the best, Simon !

  31. Dirk Wetter, on March 8, 2010 at 19:20 said:

    Very sorry to hear you’re leaving. Good luck for what comes next in your career. Hope our paths will cross again then. Take care!

  32. Andrew John Hughes, on March 8, 2010 at 19:49 said:

    Like Andrew Haley, I’m saddened but not surprised. To an extent, the movement of your blog was a sign of foreboding. Thanks for all you have done to support the FOSS movement within Sun and best wishes in the future. ! hope to hear good things from you in the not too distant future!

  33. Norman Walsh, on March 8, 2010 at 20:05 said:

    Thanks for your tireless efforts, Simon! And good luck in your next venture!

  34. lillian angel, on March 8, 2010 at 20:16 said:

    I am also sad to hear that you are leaving. Best of luck! Thank you for all your efforts and what you have done in the open source community. Truly, a lot of it could not have been done without you.

  35. Matthias Pfützner, on March 8, 2010 at 20:42 said:

    Simon,

    it’s sad to see you go, it’s been great to have you on-board! All the best for your future!

    We’ll be missing you!

    Matthias

  36. iain, on March 8, 2010 at 20:50 said:

    Thanks for the almost daily selection of interesting items, I’m glad you’ll continue, I’d certainly miss the Webmink if you no longer posted.

    Thanks for all the memories and best of luck whatever comes your way.

  37. moreplanetsolaris, on March 8, 2010 at 20:50 said:

    great, hopefully this means the end of “planet webmink” and we get “planet solaris” back again.

    • Simon Phipps, on March 9, 2010 at 12:48 said:

      The only way to achieve that is to have more of the bloggers on Planet Solaris blogging more frequently I’m afraid…

      • Milan Jurik, on March 10, 2010 at 12:36 said:

        I hope your blog will stay as part of planet.opensolaris.org because your blog is very inspirative and you had and have (and will have, hopefully) significant impact in OpenSolaris world. Thank you for all your work (and blog).

  38. joncollins, on March 8, 2010 at 20:52 said:

    Best of luck!

  39. Glynn Foster, on March 8, 2010 at 21:02 said:

    Very sad to see you go Simon, but wish you all the best for whatever you plan to do next. It was an incredible pleasure to work with you, and looking forward to our paths crossing in future. Hard to wake up again to a company with one less person that I have a huge respect for. Take care!

  40. Mark, on March 8, 2010 at 21:39 said:

    Come work at Canonical!

  41. Rick Ross, on March 9, 2010 at 00:33 said:

    May the best days still be ahead of you, Simon. You have a huge vision, and your efforts at Sun will continue to produce fruit for years to come. If you continue to have things to say, I will continue to be happy to listen.

    Cheers,
    Rick

  42. Rich Teer, on March 9, 2010 at 00:41 said:

    Sorry to see you go, but as they say, all good things must come to an end… Best of luck for the future, and it was a pleasure working with you on the CAB and OGB during our tenures together.

  43. Alfred Peng, on March 9, 2010 at 01:14 said:

    Good luck to your next adventure!

  44. Rob Weir, on March 9, 2010 at 01:23 said:

    Good luck, Simon. I’m glad to hear that you will continue with your blog. I’m sure we will hear your voice in the debate for years to come.

  45. Danese Cooper, on March 9, 2010 at 01:50 said:

    Simon, I’m so glad to see you choose NOT to be a reptile. Looking forward to even greater things from you from outside (where the Sun continues to shine, most days).

  46. Rafael, on March 9, 2010 at 02:24 said:

    Sad to see you go, Simon. Thanks for all your work, it was a privilege being in the same company as you. Best wishes!

  47. The Post-Oracle Sun Exodus « Jeremy's Blog, on March 9, 2010 at 02:54 said:

    […] …then, Simon Phipps: […]

  48. Atul Chitnis, on March 9, 2010 at 03:03 said:

    Congratulations from Team FOSS.IN on releasing Sun’s final FOSS product! 🙂

    It was an honour to have been associated with the process since 2005, and we look forward to the next mountain you climb.

  49. Nitin Bharti, on March 9, 2010 at 04:16 said:

    Simon,

    I wish you all the best in your next endeavor — I’m sure it will be just as impactful as your amazing career with Sun. I enjoyed meeting you at TSSJS Barcelona in ’07. I hope our paths cross again!

    Cheers,
    Nitin

  50. David Gee, on March 9, 2010 at 04:17 said:

    So as someone who had the honour to work with you right from the start on java back in 1996 and then into sun – i’m sure you’ll find your next adventure as exciting as the last one.

    as my father would say, life is not a rehersal.

  51. Louis Suarez-Potts, on March 9, 2010 at 04:26 said:

    Simon,
    It’s been a pleasure working with you! I’m also quite sure that there will be many future occasions for more collaboration….
    ciao,
    louis

  52. Ludovic Poitou, on March 9, 2010 at 07:23 said:

    Simon,
    Thank you for your contributions. Best of luck in what comes next !
    Ludo

  53. Mike Cowlishaw, on March 9, 2010 at 08:17 said:

    Welcome to the free world! 🙂
    Mike

  54. Roberto Galoppini, on March 9, 2010 at 08:26 said:

    Hi Simon,

    once again thank you for all you did to try to make Sun more open to external contributions. Best whishes, and see you soon.

  55. Gilles Gravier, on March 9, 2010 at 08:32 said:

    It’s been a fantastic experience working with you as my manager at Sun, and during all these years as a colleague as well!

    Best wishes for what will certainly be an even brighter career outside of Sun!

  56. Glyn Normington, on March 9, 2010 at 09:19 said:

    All the best for the future.

  57. Constantin Gonzalez, on March 9, 2010 at 09:21 said:

    Hi Simon,

    thanks for all the good stuff you did at Sun, especially for educating us about open source. I still remember your keynote from OSDevCon 2009 in Dresden!

    Looking forward to seeing what you’ll be up to next!

    Cheers,
    Constantin

  58. Andrew Haley, on March 9, 2010 at 09:35 said:

    I am today wearing my “In a World without Fences … Who needs Gates?” T-shirt in your honour!

  59. Gilles Gravier, on March 9, 2010 at 10:32 said:

    I wore my “In a world without fences…” shirt out long ago. But I still remember VERY FONDLY the PR mess it created when it was distributed at J1 while MS was running an event just around the corner. 🙂

  60. Peter Reiser, on March 9, 2010 at 10:38 said:

    Hi Simon – all the best ! cu you on the net
    Peter

  61. Ryan Singer, on March 9, 2010 at 11:18 said:

    Good Luck, Simon. I am very interested in where you end up next.

    I’m looking forward to our next opportunity to work together.

    —
    Ryan

  62. Kurt Westh Nielsen, on March 9, 2010 at 12:10 said:

    Hi Simon
    Best of luck with your future endeavors. And thank you for several interesting conversations for more than a decade.
    /kurt westh nielsen

  63. Vyacheslav Sedov, on March 9, 2010 at 12:35 said:

    last day at sun but not last at earth 🙂

  64. Peter Lange, on March 9, 2010 at 13:16 said:

    Simon, best of luck out there. Thank you so much for your tireless support of the Open Source cause to “my” region of Central & Northern Europe. It was great working with you and hopefully we will cross tracks again.
    Peter

  65. Simon Phipps deixa a Sun (Oracle) « Training Tecnologia, on March 9, 2010 at 13:46 said:

    […] anúncio da decisão em seu blog traz também um histórico da passagem de Simon Phipps pela Sun, nos seus quase dez anos de […]

  66. anjan bacchu, on March 9, 2010 at 14:10 said:

    hi simon,

    Good Luck!!

    Looking back….
    Congrats on open sourcing java!! That ensured that Java continues its path to be a lot to a lot of people including me — (I’ve been doing java over 10 years now!)

    BR,
    ~A

  67. Caroline Maynard, on March 9, 2010 at 14:13 said:

    Best wishes, Simon. This funemployment thing is suiting me quite nicely so far.

  68. Jonathan Eunice, on March 9, 2010 at 15:06 said:

    You fought the Good Fight for open source at Sun.

    Wherever you end up, Simon, you will make more interesting, more transparent, better.

  69. Henrik Ingo, on March 9, 2010 at 15:20 said:

    Hi Simon

    Just wishing you good luck, I hope you take your time to look around and I’m sure you will find the place where you can continue to do a lot of good for open source.

  70. terrencebarr, on March 9, 2010 at 15:39 said:

    Thanks Simon for all your help and support. Good luck for your next undertaking!

  71. Rich Sands, on March 9, 2010 at 15:43 said:

    Simon, it was a great privilege to work with you. I learned damn near everything I know about open source and community from you – mostly by example. We did some awesome stuff, didn’t we? I am certain that wherever you contribute your talent and passion, you will continue to change the world of software. And I am greatly looking forward to working with you in the future, as I know we will!

  72. Steve McIntyre, on March 9, 2010 at 15:47 said:

    Sun^WOracle will be much lessened without you. Good luck in the future!

  73. Uwe, on March 9, 2010 at 15:48 said:

    Simon, all the best to you! I adore what you have been able to achieve for the FOSS-community; and I pitied you when we discussed the state of Free Software at SUN.
    There was a chance, and they blew it.
    I wish that in future you have a chance to contribute to a project that is more open to ‘free’.

  74. Ray Gans, on March 9, 2010 at 16:15 said:

    You leave with an admirable legacy that you should be proud of Simon. It was a privilege for me to work with you and I hope our paths cross often in the future.

  75. Al Hopper, on March 9, 2010 at 16:53 said:

    Simon – congratulations on your promotion 🙂 I certainly enjoyed working with you on the Community Advisory Board and the OpenSolaris Governing Board and learned a great deal from you. Thanks for all the help with Genunix.Org and I’m sure you’ve helped many folks promote open source without ever seeking any credit for your efforts. I wish you every success in your future endeavors and I hope we get to cross paths again – soon.

  76. Bruno Souza, on March 9, 2010 at 16:56 said:

    Simon,

    Thank you for the work, the friendship, the mentoring. You are leaving, but your work is already blooming in many places, and will continue to for a long time to come. You enabled many dreams to come true, and I’m sure you’ll keep doing even more.

    It was an honor to work with you on small pieces of such large legacy. I hope we’ll work together in a near, exciting future.

    Bruno.

  77. Jomar Silva, on March 9, 2010 at 18:20 said:

    Simon,

    Thank you very much for everything that you did to make the Open World a better one.

    I hope that you still working with us…

    Cheers from Brazil,

    Jomar

  78. Chief Open Source Officer de Sun deja la compañía | RSS Tecnología, on March 9, 2010 at 20:13 said:

    […] su blog personal, Simon Phipps – Chief Open Source Officer de Sun – anunció su retiro de Sun tras la adquisición de Oracle.  Simon estaba a punto de cumplir 10 años en Sun, de los cuales […]

  79. Pat Patterson, on March 9, 2010 at 20:30 said:

    All the best for the future, Simon. I didn’t get to work with you as much as I’d have liked, but it was always a pleasure.

    Cheers,

    Pat

  80. Joost Andrae, on March 9, 2010 at 20:51 said:

    It’s really sad to hear that you’ve left Sun. It’s been a pleasure for me to meet you and to work together at almost all OOo conferences, some trade shows and at your visits in Hamburg. I wish you all the best and I hope we’ll meet again.

  81. Zinoune, on March 9, 2010 at 20:55 said:

    I left sun few days ago, was really sad to leave a great company that did so much for the open source. Goodluck Simon 🙂

  82. Andrew Yeomans, on March 9, 2010 at 21:08 said:

    Sorry to see you move on, but I’m sure you will find a great opening soon – in both senses.

  83. Mario Torre, on March 9, 2010 at 22:19 said:

    This news is indeed very sad. Thanks for the hard work Simon, and for all those incredible things.

  84. Erwin Tenhumberg, on March 9, 2010 at 22:56 said:

    Simon, all the best and good luck for your future!

    I really enjoyed working for you during my 8 years at Sun! I’m still benefiting from the skills and contacts that I was able to build up while working for you. It probably was my best time at Sun, and considering where I am and what I do today, you definitely had a huge positive impact on my carreer.

    My favorite memory from my time in your team was our private weekend team trip to Yosemite right after JavaOne. We were a great team!

    I definitely hope our paths will cross again!

  85. Ed Burnette, on March 9, 2010 at 23:39 said:

    So long and thanks for all the (glass)fish!

  86. Pablo Barrera, on March 10, 2010 at 00:00 said:

    All the best to you Simon, new worlds to discover now!, your legacy will never be forgotten!

    namaste
    P.

  87. Sun’s open source chief leaves following Oracle merger | Technology startup news GeekoPedia, on March 10, 2010 at 00:17 said:

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  88. Chief Open Source Officer de Sun deja la compañía | Pluma Papel, on March 10, 2010 at 00:25 said:

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  89. Jean Elliott, on March 10, 2010 at 02:02 said:

    Simon,

    Thanks very much for being your provocative self at Sun. It was a pleasure (and a helluva time!) working with you and I’m sure our paths will cross again.

    All the best and please do keep in touch,
    Jean

  90. onur, on March 10, 2010 at 03:07 said:

    All the best to you Simon and thanks all you did for open source..

    Sincerely….

  91. BigBert, on March 10, 2010 at 03:43 said:

    Thanks for all your hard work, mate. Much appreciated.

  92. OpenMedia, on March 10, 2010 at 04:21 said:

    Best of luck. I really appreciated the keynote you gave at LCA in Hobart the other year and all the work you have done for the community. Best of luck.

  93. Sivakumar S, on March 10, 2010 at 05:06 said:

    Simon,

    Sorry to see you go.

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  95. Binky, on March 10, 2010 at 06:45 said:

    Sigh…We new this was coming as the Sun Open Source people have disappeared over the last 2 years. Oracle has lost a great asset though I suspect they may not know it yet. I’m hoping our paths cross in the future.

  96. redstar, on March 10, 2010 at 07:18 said:

    What will your legacy be, Simon?

    I don’t mean to sound critical, but whilst you seem to know your stuff and are very erudite, I (and many others getting on with selling things) never understood how you made the company money in the short to medium term and how your activities helped anyone in the field who was actually generating revenue.

  97. Viktor Horvath, on March 10, 2010 at 12:01 said:

    I had the pleasure to listen to a talk of you in Paris. Your blog essays are excellent food for thought to pass on to (non-techie) friends. Thank you for all of that, and all the best for the future!

  98. Responsável por Open Source deixa a Sun @ Gabriel Antunes, on March 10, 2010 at 12:04 said:

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  99. ✍ OpenSolaris Governing Board « Wild Webmink, on March 10, 2010 at 12:08 said:

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  100. Ramkumar, on March 10, 2010 at 12:41 said:

    Simon,
    Have a nice future

  101. Sunsettlement Boulevard « eDue, on March 10, 2010 at 13:03 said:

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  103. Sean Gallagher, on March 10, 2010 at 14:49 said:

    Simon, I know you’ll shake the earth with whatever you do. Best, and good luck with the post-Sunset.

  104. Geertjan, on March 10, 2010 at 15:55 said:

    Thanks and good luck!

  105. Sid Boyce, on March 10, 2010 at 16:08 said:

    Good luck in your future endeavours, I am sure this is not the last we hear of or from you – you have been a brick.

  106. Sun’s Simon Phipps bids Oracle adieu - Eye on Oracle, on March 10, 2010 at 16:38 said:

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  107. Alolita Sharma, on March 10, 2010 at 17:31 said:

    Simon, Look forward to many more contributions from you in the open source world and some fantastic blogging. And welcome as an incoming board member of the Open Source Initiative! Hope to collaborate on many good projects together 🙂

  108. Links 10/3/2010: Fedora 13 Alpha, Freescale+Linux | Boycott Novell, on March 10, 2010 at 18:24 said:

    […] ✍ Last Day At Sun Today is my last day of employment at Sun (well, it became Oracle on March 1st in the UK but you know what I mean). I am a few months short of my 10th anniversary there (I joined at JavaOne in 2000) and my 5th anniversary as Chief Open Source Officer. I hope you’ll forgive a little reminiscence. […]

  109. Fernando Cassia, on March 10, 2010 at 18:41 said:

    If there was one company that has fought all the good battles against the Evil Empire of Redmondia, it was Sun Microsystems.

    Openoffice.org, Virtualbox, JDS, Netbeans, the Java VM, all GPL

    Thanks to Sun, and surely thanks to people like you.

    Thanks for all the fish.

    I just hope Ellison sees what made Sun software successful, and continues with a similar attitude towards OSS.

    FC

  110. Komputery » Blog Archive » Simon Phipps odchodzi z Suna, on March 10, 2010 at 22:15 said:

    […] Phipps, kierownik działu Open Source w Sunie, poinformował na swoim blogu o odejściu z Suna, a raczej już z […]

  111. Brian Nitz, on March 10, 2010 at 22:28 said:

    Simon, I always enjoyed reading or listening to your perspective on things and you really did make a huge difference in Sun’s ability to work efficiently with opensource communities. With all that went wrong with Sun during the past decade, the fact that Sun embraced and worked with these communities, contributed documents A11Y, LookingGlass, ZFS, Java, Dtrace, QA, all told more code than all other companies put together (at least according to what I read out of an EU FOSS economics report several years back). Best of luck in whatever you decide to do!

  112. Matt Ingenthron, on March 10, 2010 at 23:37 said:

    Best of luck going forward Simon.

    I know in my time at Sun I joined conversations in Open Source communities and through blogs that I probably never would have been able to otherwise. Heck, in the early days, I was in a grey area with respect to the rules by just talking to local user groups!

    Thanks for helping to break down those barriers thus allowing all of us to engage in public discourse.

  113. Top Posts — WordPress.com, on March 11, 2010 at 00:15 said:

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  114. Simon Phipps odchodzi z Suna | Komputery, on March 11, 2010 at 01:27 said:

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  116. patrickfinch, on March 11, 2010 at 09:01 said:

    @redstar

    You are right to identify open source as a long-term bet at Sun, and of course it was especially aimed at maintaining and increasing the relevance of Sun’s offerings in the market.

    But to your specific question, there were many customers of Sun’s who demanded to see that Sun was serious about open source (maybe not yours?), and also who needed to understand what the commercial proposition becomes when discussing software products with open source code. I am struggling to think anyone could have been much more credible in this effort than Simon.

  117. Matt Zimmerman, on March 11, 2010 at 10:32 said:

    Best of luck, Simon, and thanks for your work!

  118. Fabiane Nardon, on March 11, 2010 at 19:42 said:

    Simon,

    It was an honor to work with you. Your legacy to the java community won’t be forgotten.

    Looking forward to seeing what your new endeavours will be. I’m sure they will be as inspiring as the work you did at Sun.

    Best wishes,

    Fabiane

  119. Dave Johnson, on March 11, 2010 at 22:53 said:

    Good luck in your new endeavors Simon and thanks for all the help and good advice you gave me in my career at Sun and in open source. – Dave

  120. El jefe de Open Source de Sun abandona Oracle « Software Libres, Mangas y animes ….. son Los lazos que nos unen a los que visitan esta bitacora, on March 11, 2010 at 23:01 said:

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  121. Tarik, on March 12, 2010 at 15:50 said:

    Good Luck 🙂

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