On Fri, Oct 30, 2020 at 2:30 PM Garrett D'Amore via Python-Dev <python-dev@python.org> wrote:

I’m not on this list. But I have offered to help - if there are tasks that need to be done to help this I can help put the weight of a commercial entity behind it whether that involves assigning our developers to work on this, helping pay for external developers to do so, or assisting with access to machine resources.

For the record there are multiple illumos distributions and most are both free and run reasonably well in virtual machines. Claiming that developers don’t have access as a reason to discontinue the port is a bit disingenuous. Anyone can get access if they want and if they can figure out how to login and use Linux then this should be pretty close to trivial for them.

Thanks! It usually isn't just about access. This email thread and related tweets appear to have served their purpose: To drum up volunteers+resources from the otherwise potentially impacted communities. The valuable thing is developer time.

Access: I took it upon myself to spin up some Solaris-derivative VMs for Python dev things in the (now distant) past. It wasn't a positive experience, I won't do it again. Bonus on top of that: Oracle, the owner of Solaris, is still actively attempting to destroy the entire software industry. Working on anything attempting to directly benefit them is a major ethical violation for me. Others make their own choices.

I won't even spin up major BSD VMs anymore for a similar reason. It isn't a good positive use of my time, even despite having an enjoyable past with those OSes and knowing several past and present Free/Net/OpenBSD core devs.

I look forward to new *Solaris buildbot(s) joining the fleet,

-gps