OpenSolaris Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions 4. - Where can I download the latest OpenSolaris install images? You can download the latest install images from here. Previous General releases are available here.
1. What is OpenSolaris? 5. What download should I use to install OpenSolaris? The OpenSolaris Operating System offers unique features If you are checking out OpenSolaris for the first time on designed to help you build and deploy high-performance x86/x64, we recommend you use the OpenSolaris LiveCD. application services, starting with the Image Packaging System This will allow you to boot your system directly off the CD to (IPS), continuing to the latest enhancements to the award- a live desktop environment and evaluate OpenSolaris before winning ZFS and featuring integrated virtualizaton options that installing onto your system. Other installation options are span OS, network and storage -- and that's just the beginning. available in the form of the Automated Install and Interactive OpenSolaris gives you next generation Oracle Solaris Text Install, both of which are supported on x86/x64 and technologies coupled with the best in open source software and SPARC. Automated Install offers a hands-off installation of a vibrant development community. clients by setting up an install service on a central system. Interactive Text Install offers an installation experience with a 2. What hardware platforms does OpenSolaris support? text only based interface. OpenSolaris supports 32-bit and 64-bit x86 systems and all SPARC based Sun4v platforms and Sun4u platforms with an 6. What kind of internationalization and localization is OBP (OpenBoot PROM) greater than version 4.17. We provided with OpenSolaris? recommend that you first check the OpenSolaris hardware Internationalization and localization will be provided similar to compatibility list (HCL) to see if that hardware is supported. existing Oracle support options. Support is only provided in You can check if there are drivers available using the Device English. Driver Utility which appears as a desktop icon on booting the Please note that due to space limitations with the OpenSolaris LiveCD, and available from Applications > System Tools LiveCD for x86/x64, only one local per language is included. menu after installation. Additional information on available Additional locales may be installed from network package drivers can be found at BigAdmin. repositories using the Package Manager.
3. Is there a memory and disk recommendation for using this 7. The download for the OpenSolaris install images are too product? slow in my location. What can I do? OpenSolaris requires 10 GB minimum disk space. It is known If there is a [download mirror] in your location, you may want to work with a minimum memory requirement of 512 MB, to use that. The OpenSolaris install images are fully re- though this may vary on some machines. Note that if you distributable so can be passed among family, friends and intend to use VirtualBox, you will typically require several colleagues. If you know of a local download mirror who may gigabytes of memory to host additional operating systems. be interested in hosting OpenSolaris install images, please let them know! OpenSolaris Frequently Asked Questions
8. How can I learn more about the OpenSolaris community? 13. What is ZFS? To learn more about OpenSolaris, the community, and what ZFS is the default file system on OpenSolaris. ZFS is a projects are being developed, visit http://www.opensolaris.org. combined file system and logical volume manager. ZFS includes ground breaking features for supporting high storage capacities, snapshots and copy-on-write clones, continuous Features integrity checking of data and automatic repair and software RAID. 9. What is Image Packaging System? Image Packaging System (IPS) is a new package management framework in OpenSolaris that enables a user to download and 14. Why is ZFS important on OpenSolaris? install additional software and updates from network package ZFS provides us a platform to do many things that we not repositories around the world. Rather than having to combine possible before, such as the ability to snapshot or clone your all software into several CDs or DVDs, a single CD image can data with the opportunity of instant rollback. Time Slider be provided allowing the user to install additional software that integrates this functionality into the file manager, enabling is critical to their needs from the network. The user will risk-free experimentation along with guaranteed integrity and automatically be notified should updates (bug fixes, security availability for your vital data. Additionally, any system alerts, or hardware support) become available. updates using IPS are provided to a clone of the file system allowing the user to quickly switch between boot environments should an update fail for any reason. 10. Where can I install software that isn't in the default install? Additional software is available on http://pkg.opensolaris.org and can be installed using the Package Manager or pkg(1) 15. What other exciting features are available on OpenSolaris? command line utility. Additional package repositories can be OpenSolaris has a wide range of exciting features for every added for 3rd party provided software packages. type of user. For the developer, OpenSolaris allows you to take your idea from experiment to global deployment on a single platform in 11. I can not find my favourite software in the default install, a familiar environment. DTrace, the dynamic tracing facility or on the network repository. What can I do? on OpenSolaris, gives users an accurate picture of what a You can try searching for it in other package repositories such system or application is doing at any given moment giving the as http://pkg.opensolaris.org/contrib. However, it may be likely opportunity to optimize or troubleshoot without any additional that your favourite software is not yet available on configuration. OpenSolaris. Project Crossbow provides complete network virtualization Contact the [SW Porters community] on opensolaris.org and and alongside Oracle Solaris Containers, enables you to suggest it should be packaged. Be careful however, you may develop, test and deploy complex virtualized workloads which be volunteered for the job! can be deployed on a huge selection of systems, from single CPU machines to clusters of large multiprocessor, multicore systems. 12. Can I install existing Solaris packages on OpenSolaris? Yes. pkgadd(1), and associated SVr4 packaging utilities, are provided for backwards compatibility. OpenSolaris Frequently Asked Questions
16. I'm using Linux, why should I consider OpenSolaris? OpenSolaris provides many key features such as ZFS, Dtrace, Crossbow and Oracle Solaris Containers that are not available in Linux that allow for easier deployment, administration and observability with the reassurance of a very stable, secure and scalable enterprise operating system. OpenSolaris provides a desktop environment similar to Linux with the inclusion of the GNOME desktop, Firefox web browser and Oracle Open Office productivity suite. Check out the [linux migration guide] for details of the differences between Linux and OpenSolaris.