Murdock wrote in his blog "As an outsider, I’ve watched as Sun has successfully embraced x86, pioneered energy efficiency as an essential computing feature, open sourced its software portfolio to maximize the network effects, championed transparency in corporate communications, and so many other great things. Now, I’m going to be a part of it."

While remaining cagey about exactly what he will be doing at Sun, Murdock hinted that he will " be advocating that Solaris needs to close the usability gap with Linux to be competitive... [and] that Linux needs to play a clearer role in [Sun's] platform strategy.

Since Sun is a member of the Linux Foundation, Murdock will stay on as chairman of the foundation's Linux Standard Base project, which aims to ensure interoperability between applications and various Linux distros.

Murdock first developed Debian Linux - named after his wife and himself - nearly 15 years ago.