Setting Up Your Development Environment on OpenSolaris

The OpenSolaris OS is a flexible and scalable operating system for developing applications that target multiple platforms. The OpenSolaris OS enables you to build applications and solutions in a variety of programming languages including C/C++, Java, PHP, and Ruby.

The OpenSolaris OS is a minimal distribution that fits on one Live CD. You might find that some of the tools you want in your development environment are not included in the initial installation. The additional tools you want probably are quite easily available from the OpenSolaris release package repository.

This document shows you how you can set up your OpenSolaris environment with the tools required to develop applications on the OpenSolaris OS.

The tools that you want in your development environment are available from the following sources:

OpenSolaris OS LiveCD and .iso file. Some tools are included in the initial installation. See the list and some examples at Bundled Tools.
IPS (Image Packaging System) repositories. You can easily download and install packages from IPS repositories using Package Manager, a graphical user interface for IPS, or by using the command-line pkg commands. The default release repository contains packages that are well tested. This is the best way to install packages that you know work with the OpenSolaris OS. To access other repositories, see How To Add IPS Repositories.
Product sites. If a tool is not available from an IPS repository, you can download the software directly from the product site. If the tool is available in the IPS release repository, get the tool from the repository and not from any another site. The tool in the IPS repository might be specially configured for the OpenSolaris OS.
Source. If an IPS or SVR4 package is not available for your preferred application, and you are able to obtain the source for the application, then you can build the application using the build tools available for the OpenSolaris OS. See the OpenSolaris project site for more information.

OpenSolaris Application Development Packages lists some of the popular packages that come with the initial OpenSolaris installation or that are available from the release repository.

Using Package Manager to Find Packages to Install

The OpenSolaris Package Manager utility provides easy ways to view packages that you might want to add to your development environment.

Select System > Administration > Package Manager from the desktop menu bar on your OpenSolaris system.

Categories List

Select the repository you want to search from the Repository menu.
Click the category menu on the left side of the Package Manager window, and select the Development category.
Select a sub-category such as C++, Java, or Source Code Management.
Select All Packages from the Show menu.

A check mark in the Status column of the package list means that package is already installed on your system. A green star means an update is available for that package.

To install or update a package if the package is not already installed or if an update is available for the package:

Select the checkbox to the left of the package name.
Select the Install/Update button or the Package > Install/Update menu option at the top of the Package Manager window.

You can select more than one package to install or update before you select Install/Update. To list all packages that you have selected:

Select the repository you want to search from the Repository menu.
Select Selected Packages from the Show menu.

To list all the packages in a specified repository that have updates available, select Updates from the Show menu.

Search Selected Repository

Select the repository you want to search from the Repository menu.
Type the string you want to find in the Search field.
Press the Enter key.
Both the package name and package description are searched and matching packages are displayed.

Search All Repositories

To search all repositories that you have added to your Repositories list:

Click the magnifying glass icon to the left of the Search field and select the All Repositories option from the menu.
Type the string you want to find in the Search field.
Press the Enter key.
Only the package descriptions are searched. Matching packages are displayed along with the name of the repository the package belongs to.

Setting Up Your Development Environment on OpenSolaris