Operating System

Table of Contents

Resources for Solaris 10 10/09

• The Solaris Info Center on BigAdmin provides info on new features in the Solaris 10 10/09 release, including ZFS flash archive, ZFS cache devices for storage pools, ZFS user and group quotas, parallel patching for containers, and turbo charging svr4 packaging
• Solaris 10 10/09 OS: What's New Guide
• Can the Solaris 10 10/09 OS run on your x86 system? Find out with Installation Check Tool.

Resources for Solaris 10 5/09

• Workaround for Installing Solaris 10 5/09 OS on the IBM HS22 Type 7870 Blade Server by Jonathan O'Brien and Lee Damico
• Solaris 10 5/09 OS: What's New Guide (pdf)
• Can the Solaris 10 5/09 OS run on your x86 system? Find out with Installation Check Tool.
• BigAdmin Solaris Zones hub: The Solaris 10 5/09 release adds support for using ZFS clones when cloning a zone.

Resources for Solaris 10 10/08

• FAQ: What's new in Solaris 10 10/08?
• Video: What's new in Solaris 10 10/08
• ZFS and Solaris 10 10/08 FAQ
• Video or podcast from Storage Group: ZFS Boot in Solaris 10 10/08 OS

Other Solaris Resources

Books, FAQs, How-To, and Misc. Resources

• Configuring the DHCP Server for the Solaris OS or OpenSolaris OS
• White paper: How to Work with ZFS Snapshots (login or registration required)
• Retail Books About the Solaris 10 OS on the Solaris Information Center
• Sun BluePrints papers:
  • The Solaris Operating System - Optimized for the AMD Opteron Processor
  • Using the Solaris Operating System to Optimize the Xeon Processor 5500 Series CPUs
• Solaris 10 System Administration Essentials (Amazon pre-order)
• Solaris Security Essentials (Amazon pre-order)
• Solaris Feature FAQs
• Using on-the-fly decompression for UFS filesystems by bnsmb
• How to Find Large Files and Directories in the Solaris OS
• How to Check for Deleted Files Held Open in UFS File Systems
• How to Access a Solaris Partition From Windows or Linux
• How to Create and Burn a DVD or CD with Solaris 9 Sparc by Ross Moffatt
• Creating a Solaris 10 x86 OS Bootable DVD or CD by Ross Moffatt

• BootDiskLayout
• Adding xVM DomU support to a Solaris Live CD Distribution

• Talking about RAM disks in the Solaris OS
• Using a SVM submirror on a ramdisk to increase read performance

• Changing the value of kernel static strings
• How to change the output of the uname command in the Solaris OS
• Workaround for the different behaviour of the which command in Solaris and in Linux
• Understanding the Differences Between prstat and vmstat Output in the Solaris OS
• Using "lsof" in the Real World

• Installing Solaris 10 on MacBook 13" White Core 2 Duo
• Installing Solaris 10 5/08 OS on IBM x3850 M2 Server by Lee Damico
• Installing Solaris 10 5/08 OS on the IBM LS42 Blade Server by Lee Damico

• Workaround for Solaris 10 Errors Related to NICs

• Moving Solaris Containers on Sun Fire T2000 Server to Sun SPARC Enterprise M4000 Server
• Upgrade resources

• 6668806: Xorg Server Fails to Start on IBM x3850 M2 Server

Tips From the Solaris Tip of the Week Blog

• Solaris Tip of the Week blog home page
• Use mdb to View Process Stack
• Unique private subnets for your local zones
• IPNAT load balancer
• Create your own svr4 and ips packages
• Link Aggregation and Logical Interfaces
• Debug native code with disassembler
• Use RBAC to grant fine-grained security privilege to non-privileged user
• Which zone is the resource hog?
• Global zone as firewall
• findit.sh
• File-based ZFS for development and test environments
• Dhcp Jumpstart
• Zones
• Service Management Facility (SMF)
• Two forms of apache redirect
• Managing self-signed certificates
• ZFS mount cleanup
• Zone cloning
• Use stunnel in client mode to debug SSL connections

Solaris Shells and Scripts

• A Script Template and Useful Techniques for ksh Scripts - Update March 2009
• Conditional function definitions in ksh
• A script to start and stop ramdisks in the Solaris OS

OpenSolaris Resources (see also Open Source page on wiki)

• BigAdmin's Sys Admin Resources for the OpenSolaris OS
• OpenSolaris 2009.06 Support for 1000+ SPARC and x86 Systems (see HCL)
• What's New in OpenSolaris 2009.06
• Sun BluePrints article: Deploying Web 2.0 Applications on Sun Servers and the OpenSolaris Operating System
• Managing Boot Environments With OpenSolaris Package Manager
• Fluendo Makes New Codecs Available for OpenSolaris
• Test Farm and SSH on an iPhone
• SPARC Support in OpenSolaris Development Package Repository build 106
• Webcast: Installing OpenSolaris in VirtualBox
• Overview of the Distribution Constructor
• OpenSolaris 2008.11: Accessible Live CD Instructions
• OpenSolaris 2008.11 Installation FAQ
• Running Trusted Extensions in OpenSolaris 2008.11
• Understanding Role Based Access Control (RBAC) on OpenSolaris

• OpenSolaris System Administration Guide
• What's New in OpenSolaris 2008.11
• Release Notes for the OpenSolaris 2008.11 Release

• Linux.com Review: OpenSolaris 2008.05 is robust and ready
• Blog: Advantages of Solaris and OpenSolaris over Linux
• Blog: Top 5 unsuccessful searches on OpenSolaris 2008.05
• Blog: Triple Boot, Part 1: Planning, which describes creating a triple-boot system with Windows Vista, OpenSolaris 2008.05, and Ubuntu 8.04

Milax Resources

• Converting the MilaX Live CD for SPARC to a WANBOOT image by bnsmb
• Using the MilaX Live CD for failsafe booting by bnsmb
• Adding a Live CD Distribution to an existing Solaris installation by bnsmb
• MilaX 0.3.1 SPARC LiveCD available
• MilaX 0.3.2 SPARC LiveCD Available

Solaris 8 Support

Vintage Support Resource Center

• Solaris 8 Vintage Support resource center on BigAdmin

Q&A--Can I Get Support After Installing the Solaris 8 OS on a New Sun System?

Question:
Sun no longer ship systems with the Solaris 8 Operating System. What is the policy regarding customers who lease a new system (for example, a Sun Fire V490 server with 1.35GHz UltraSPARC-IV CPUs) and install the Solaris 8 OS on it? Can customers get a support contract on that? Or does Sun offer renewals only for existing Solaris 8 licenses?

Answer:
Most likely, the customer simply buys a new Solaris 8 license and then puts the system on contract (if the customer wants to do that; it is not required).

The only thing that recently changed, is that a customer can't put the Solaris 8 OS on a new system for free anymore. Now, they need to pay for a license, unless the system is already on contract and they are upgrading (for example, from a release earlier than the Solaris 8 OS). If they are downgrading, they need to buy a new license. See Solaris 8 Transition Information for more information.

In addition to perpetual licenses, one-year Solaris 8 retirement subscriptions are also available, as explained in the Solaris 8 Transition FAQs.

Customers can still purchase support contracts for new systems they purchase, if they get the perpetual Solaris 8 license. If they get the Solaris 8 retirement subscription, then support is included with the RTU/license.

Here are additional Sun resources:

• Sun training courses
• Register your Sun gear
• Services
• SunSolve Online
• Sun forums
• Documentation
• BigAdmin web site
• Worldwide Developer Events
• Current Events