"If Oracle is NOT going to keep developing OpenSolaris as an open source project ... a fork might be the only solution for people who care," wrote a developer on the mailing list.
Overall, the board members urged a more cautious approach, however.
Establishing regular contact with the Oracle would be a first step, Schilling said. OGB has no official contact within Oracle, and only one of the board members, Teresa Giacomini, works for Oracle, and not in a role related to Solaris.
"We don't even know whom to talk with," admitted Schilling.
Board member Simon Phipps noted that "the time to fork hasn't arrived yet" and seconded another poster's point that it wouldn't be a good idea to fork the code base given that Oracle still does much of the development work, and provides the supporting community Web sites.
Phipps also noted that the company may not have formulated its plan for OpenSource, which given the load on Oracle head Larry Ellison's agenda these days, is quite understandable.
In an email to IDG News Service, Phipps noted that Oracle has a different, more controlling, style of communicating with the open source world, compared to Sun's more open approach. This certainly can be seen in Oracle's approach with MySQL as well.
"Given Oracle's style, I have seen no concrete triggers for concern yet," Phipps wrote, in the email to IDG.
Oracle did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
