Sun is becoming very interesting to watch. The company that was still struggling just a year ago seems to be making strides again. Chalk one up to Sun for saying that it will open source the clustering software for its operating system.

Two years ago, Sun announced that it would open source Solaris, its flagship operating system. That was a fine move in itself, but Sun said that it was just a start. It promised to open source all of its software eventually. It has been making steady progress, open sourcing its popular Java platform, for example.

High availability clustering is next on the list. Sun says it will post the code, called Open High Availability Cluster, to OpenSolaris.org. The code is the open source code base of high availability clustering software Solaris Clusters. Sun executives say the open source version eventually will be just as good as Sun’s commercial offering.

Read more about Sun’s plans here.

I’m interested to hear what you think about Sun’s move. Obviously, Sun is hoping that by open sourcing the software, it will attract customers for its hardware that it might not have reached otherwise. But it’s also providing the opportunity for companies to create highly available environments without having to invest a whole lot of money.

On another Sun note, check out Sun CEO and President Jonathan Schwartz’s blog on Sun’s re-entry into the HPC market. He makes some interesting points about clustering and how Sun is hoping to make it easier and more affordable for enterprises to make use of high performance computing power.

Are Sun’s moves enticing you? Let me know.