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Linux Apps On Solaris
querencia writes "Sun has announced that Solaris 10 will comply with the Linux Standard Base specification, thus allowing Linux apps to run unchanged on Solaris. This isn't emulation -- they claim that it is 'kernel-integrated and supported as an operating system feature.' While I appreciate the benefits of the Solaris OS, I've considered them on the losing end of the battle until now. Will the power of Linux apps put Solaris back into the running?" Update: 08/04 15:50 GMT by J : At OSCON, Sun reaffirmed that Solaris 10 will be open-sourced. They said it would be one of the OSI licenses, not sure which yet; that this was approved at the highest levels of the company; and (with the expected "we're just guessing" language), it could happen as soon as year's end.
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boo!
NO
you mean like how wine put linux back in the running by allowing it to run windows apps? (or at least games...)
by the way, how well does doom 3 run under wine?
Having The Godfather making a reference to Cops
Just like with MS and OS/2 people will now make apps for Linux that oh yah work on Solaris not the other way around. As a developer it is a pretty easy choice to make and as we all know it is all about developers developers developers...
-Benjamin Meyer
Do you changes clothes while making the "chee-chee-cha-cha-choh" transformation sound?
You can think of this support for Linux apps on Solaris as the same way Wine works. It provides a layer of support by implementing the needed APIs without having to deal with a total emulation enviroment.
Free Unix? Free Windows. http://www.reactos.com
"We will now package glibc in Solaris."
Please. What is so groundbreaking about supporting Linux apps when all that's necessary is to stick a couple GNU libraries in the kit?
There's at least one Solaris application I'd like to run on Linux: Adobe FrameMaker.
The initial move of SUN towards an OpenSource OS, or even towards a linux based business model.
Will Solaris simply comply with the LSB in a similiar manner as they supplied SunOS BSD tools with Solaris, or will it also be capable of running Linux ELF binaries unchanged? What about Linux-specific things such as clone()? That's not something you can emulate so easily.
It seems a bit of desperate measure. There was a time when Solaris was the leading UNIX on any platform. Now Sun seem resigned to play second fiddle..
I guess it can't hurt. Apple is also rumored to be integrating Linux API to future versions of OS X to help bring developers to the Mac side.
AC comments get piped to
It seems that Solaris is having a real hard time getting trough no matter what. With the availability of so many BSDs and Linux distros Solaris is a lone wolf in the whole story. Also I don't think that people who are currently running Linux will be very eager to just jump up and switch since all of a sudden Solaris supports Linux binaries.
So what does Solaris have that Linux doesn't, except for the hefty price tag? It sure isn't multiprocessing anymore.
Doh!...
I meant solaris is dying...
It's just Solaris with glibc.
I can't wait for RMS to start demanding people call it GNU/Solaris.
Although it seems a doomed strategy, Sun could be allowing for an internal Linux development path which they could then back-port' to Solaris, allowing Solaris to expand its portfolio.
This would, IMO, backfire since a potential customer would see Linux as the more influential and therefore desirable IT tool.
what is with these articles? it seems like there's some kind of slashdot poster style guide somewhere, or the stupid editors take the bait
these kinds of articles seem to have some kind of lame question intended to provoke discussion, but in reality, is a thinly veiled linux promotion.
geez, can you folks make it seem a little more balanced?
oh, I just remembered: slashdot partisans = lame
This only works on Solaris x86 machines, which has always been the ugly Solaris step-child.
This seems to me to be a little desperate. Sun seems to be saying that Linux has won, at least in terms of software support.
One Solaris 8 system I use runs Apache 1.3.27. We can't upgrade due to the complexity of getting PHP to work - as it stands its got a few bugs.
Maybe this will help to get a better version of Apache up...
Open Source Software isn't just Linux and the GNU userland software. It covers a wide range of different software including software that runs on Linux. In the whole sea of OSS, Linux is just a one small part. This is good for OSS projects because they now have the potential for being run on a wider range of platforms without porting issues.
Solaris has always been a good operating system. You can tell the kernel devs know this as well because searching the mailing list you'll see that solaris is referenced more than any other commercial unix. There are comparisons of how the current kernel compares to the solaris kernel as well as trying to figure out how solaris does things.
Solaris 10 is going to have a lot of improvements to it as well. There are a lot of sun hardware out there and still a lot of sun hardware being sold so it helps OSS projects reach further with less work.
For the people that see open source software as only being about Linux, I don't think they'll respond as favorably.
Open Source Java DAO Generator
Will the power of Linux apps put Solaris back into the running?
No.
The long answer, Linux adaptation is slow because the FUD says that Linux is too hard, so IT managers avoid it. Linux is only now gaining ground as linux devotees have waged a constant war against that FUD. The FUD sources also say that Sun is too expensive and only caters to those who can afford their proprietary hardware. Sun has not yet begun to fight the PR campaign which it will take to overcome that. My thought is that by the time Sun gains that acceptance Linux will have near equal penetration into the corporate environment as MS.
See: here
I remember running it a couple of years ago, it was just another ugly motif applications to me ;-) But I was not a pro user.
I guess the demand for publishing under Linux stalled...
blaah !
You've never heard of CSW?
What is blastwave.org?
blastwave.org is a collective effort to create a set of binary packages of free software, that can be automatically installed to a Solaris computer (sparc or x86 based) over the network.
We (CSW) don't provide "Linux apps", but we natively compile and package software for Solaris.
Will the power of Linux apps put Solaris back into the running?
The power of free software compiled natively for my SPARC has returned Solaris to being my primary desktop. (Now if only I could afford a Blade 2500....)
Its pretty sad when a commercial OS ships a debugger with their system but no compiler.
I find myself wondering what Sun's strategy is. I mean, they go to battle with MS, enter a closed room, and come out best buds. Then they rail against FOSS in favor of open standards and threaten to do a hostile takeover on a leading Linux company. So then you think they've gotten a big check and become a patsy, right?
And throughout this blustering, they put forward the idea that through buying Novell they can somehow "own" the OS IBM is married to, which is kind of missing the point of Linux, but right in line with SCO's claims
Then they come out with news like this. As far as I can tell, their reasoning goes like this:
Has anyone checked for schizophrenia?
adam b.
They are trying to buy Novell, who own SuSE. They probably want YaST on Solaris! Yuck!
Solaris can be considered a real Linux ;^)
The thing I quite don't get a grip on here is how Sun can claim that Solaris is so much safer when it now can run Linux-applications. For years Sun have been preaching that applications they have are better and more secure. When they now comply with the LSB, wouldn't that make their OS just as "insecure" as Linux supposedly are in their views?
Their webpage says:
"You can safely run Solaris and Linux applications side by side in the same container, or you can configure separate containers that isolate Solaris and Linux applications from each other and from system faults. If an application fault occurs and the application needs to be restarted, other applications continue to run without interruption. ".
Okay, let's look at this. You can now run Solaris and Linux-applications side by side - This would mean a security breach in their previous views then? Or, you can choose to lock the Linux-applications away in their own container - This seem much more in line with previous statements from Sun.
"Unlike technology previously available for running Linux in other non-Linux environments, Project Janus functionality is kernel-integrated and supported as an operating system feature."
So, this LSB-compliance are kernel-integrated, and yet they claim Solaris is more secure than Linux? Can someone please help me out on this? I'll try to investigate myself, but I am not sure what I will find, as Solaris for now, still are, closed source.
"-Who said sit down?!"
-- S. Ballmer @ MSDC 2003.
Which apps would those be, exactly? Just about everything significant that's available for Linux is available as source, and most of those build with autoconf and GNU tools for portability, so installation on Solaris is just a 'configure; make; make install' away.
There are a handful of proprietary applications for Linux that might be relevant, but I'd guess most of these are back-office type things that probably already have Solaris versions. That just leaves things like the Flash plugin, and I simply can't see that sort of thing as being very important.
The scalloped tatters of the King in Yellow must cover
Yhtill forever. (R. W. Chambers, the King in Yellow
Believe it or not, SCO did this about 5 years ago. They pulled this functionality out of UnixWare when the lawsuits started flying.
If you want your applications to run anywhere, use something truly portable. Java? PHP? Perl? ANSI C? Yes...
Isn't this just a "Linux Personality Kit" for Solaris? Is Sun infringing on SCO's IP? I can hear attack dog Darl growling in the distance. And the voice of his master Bill Gates saying 'Down Boy! We already own them!'
It'll probably allow businesses to keep using their old Sun hardware a bit longer; they won't necessarily have to junk their Solaris boxes once they standardize on Linux for their core apps. However, I don't see it selling any new Sun product. "Oh boy, now I can pay thousands for Sun/Solaris HW/SW, so I can run the same apps I could have run on a $500 PC! Yay!!" :-)
Will the power of Linux apps put Solaris back into the running?
No.
What does Slashdot have with this fallacy about something saving Sun? Sun's hardware is expensive - why should I buy another piece of proprietary hardware? Sun's OS isn't GPL'd (insert your favorite license) - why should I buy yet another piece of proprietary Software? Some say Sun has Java - yet another piece of proprietary software. No Sun has to compete in the open market - sink or swim.
AC comments get piped to
Solaris traditionally runs on SPARC. Since almost all open source projects can be compiled on Solaris natively, I'd imagine being able to run Linux/SPARC binaries is at most a fringe interest to most people.. I seriously doubt it can run Linux/x86 binaries on SPARC, and even if it could it'd be emulated and thus way slow.
:-)
There is a Solaris/x86-port but it has always lagged behind SPARC version, and frankly if you're running on x86 hardware, why not use Linux directly. AFAIK, Solaris/x86 has even poorer hardware support than Linux/x86
Why not just start pushing a Sun Linux distro instead? I heard that was in the works, but I haven't heard anything about it in quite some time. I would use Sun Linux long before using x86 Solaris w/Linux compatibility.
Yeah, and how many people are switching to linux because they can run iTunes and Microsoft office in linux now?
The most prominent Linux apps are open source anyway.
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
The power of linux is not "the power of linux apps", and so linux apps running on Solaris will not really make that big a difference for Sun.
Don't become a regular here, you will become retarded. -- Yoda the Retard
I think this is only a good idea. Sun seems to be doing better in terms of their strategy. Sure, solaris as an OS may be dying, but at least it can die gracefully right?
I think this is possibly one of the smarted moves they could have ever made. The great part about this, is that now they can install wine on solaris and run solaris, linux and windows apps, and if they install the mono project, they will literally have all ends covered... Sounds like a win-win-win situation here. I know my boss for one will be thrilled
This is for proprietary software, right? If you have the source, it's not that hard to compile for Solaris. Most applications will compile out of the tarball just fine. The only reason I can think of to have this is to let people run proprietary apps that can't be recompiled.
Surely (clones of) most Linux software is already available through Fink?
I may be a little dense here, but what Linux binary-only packages or code that uses Linux-only system calls are available that you would want under Solaris?
(S(SKK)(SKK))(S(SKK)(SKK))
I venture to say...hello no. This move stinks of SCO as well. Maybe Sun will try to position itself as the only 'Legal' Linux compatable OS.
Of course, Sun is not talking about free software here ... it's easy enough to get any of that running on solaris.
They're talking about the software - proprietary - from vendors of theirs that are switching to linux because it's a cheaper (and better) platform for most apps. So, I really must ask, what is the point?
Solaris will - for the forseeable future - still be king on the mid to high end server end. They're talking here about workstation apps in the scientific and engineering realms which are moving wholesale to linux. So in essence Sun is saying here "you can run your linux apps on your legacy Sun workstations", and not much else. It's a nice gesture, but it is no earth shaker.
I had a presentation from SUN yesterday on Solaris 10.
Essentially Solaris 10 is going to be a huge change. SUN states they are aiming to be the best UNIX solution out there. With the amount of money they are spending/investing in developing Solaris 10 I believe they are making a very good attempt.
1. Linux apps will run on Solaris 10 on Intel/Sparc. Someone said this is just for X86.
2. DTrace a developer's sweetheart.
3. A new filesystem that will be much better than UFS
4. N1 Grid Containers. Making that purchase of the big iron more attractive. Equivalent to LPAR on mainframe.
5. Even better Multi-Processor efficiency. Linux is making good ground here but Solaris still is years ahead on many cpu's.
6. Of course, more efficient OS, better tcp/ip stack, security, etc. etc. The things you expect to improve with a new OS.
In my opinion, Solaris 10 if it meets what they
are marketing will prove itself. If not, watch
the SUN set.....
Sun is wandering all over the landscape. They portray themselves as a friend to Linux, yet align with Microsoft. They cannot stabelize their position as to whether the x86 architecture is friend or foe. They are sympathetic to SCO but support open source. My head spins.
Trying to figure out Sun's values is like trying to assess the how genuinely a murderer has embraced jailhouse religion.
Isn't WINE an emulator?
From the Slashdot summary:
This isn't emulation -- they claim that it is 'kernel-integrated and supported as an operating system feature'.
Solaris lost...
The business model involving incredibly expensive hardware and absurdly expensive support contracts is giving way to commodity hardware *and* commodity software. Running linux applications under Solaris only addresses one aspect of how Sun is being beaten, and it's probably the least important of them.
And I doubt that there will ever be an entire open-source OLTP system that Citi will be able to process all their credit card transactions, or anything of that ilk.
And all the open-source fanboys who run around touting their "new way of doing things" that "make propietary solutions obsolete" because they're not "mired in old ways of thinking" sound too damn much like dot-com stock salesmen from five years ago. Humanity has been around how many hundreds of thousands of years and now we have open source software that will cure the world of the many of its ills? Yeah, right. And I've got this huge was of cash tied up in some Nigerian bank account and I just need a little help from you....
1) You need to emulate the Linux syscall interface. That means catching int 0x80 and treating it like a lcall into the kernel. It also means that when the kernel is entered via that method, that it uses a re-organized syscall table (possibly with differeing numbers of arguments and linux compatible wrappers).
/proc (I hope) and perhaps some /dev symlinks (I would think hd*, fd*, ttyS*...)
2) You might need to provide linux type headers (dev_t, time_t, etc.)
3)
4) ld-linux
etc. No, it's not nearly as simple as that. But I'm impressed that glibc works on Solaris x86. I've heard of somebody being insane enough to port it sometime back, but I didn't think it'd be used for anything...
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Forget the other way around.
I hate to be a conspiracy theorist, but this seems a little interesting.
First the SCO/Microsoft connections, then the Microsoft/Sun settlement... Now this? It seems odd to me that they are running in this direction in light of all of the Linux hoopla that's going around. Just look at "City of Munich Freezes Its Linux Migration" posted a little bit ago here. It almost seems like they are trying to put themselves into the position of snatching up those who are wavering on the Linux/licensing front.
Drivers. The LSB specifies the kernel too, IIRC. Linux has a metric shitload more drivers than Solaris ever will.
(PS. I'm not arguing with you. I liked your post.)
I think the point of the linux compatibility layer is to run COTS linux binaries, not stuff you can ./configure; make; make install. Because I think that'd be sort of dumb... don't you? Why not run native...
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Now I won't have to fix up all the unportable gcc/linux code you freaks like to think is cross-platform. Hah!
Edith Keeler Must Die
I wonder if this is the *real* reason behind their sudden interest in buying up SUSE?
;)
I mean, did Sun recently discover that one of it's (SCO supplied) engineers misappropriated some SUSE code to make Solaris run that way?
[Now, I'm off to lift my le... Um, visit... at another place.]
Solaris costs $99 see:1 904-st ory01.html
http://www.midrangeserver.com/breaking/bn04
This is much less that you will pay for an enterprise ready version of Linux and all the other costs dumped on you by Red Hat.
BTW Red Hat and Suse are more or less the only two enterprise ready (scalable & secure) Linux distros.
Solaris 10 offers N1 Grid containers - similar to FreeBSD jails which is not offered by Linux.
A dual processor system running Solaris x86 outperforms the same system running Linux by around 60% on standardized benchmarks.
Search the web to find a link (can't remember the URL!)
1. make install
2. fix compiler errors
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
The negative, among most posters, makes me wonder if OS diversity is good as long as all OSes are Linux:')
Sun has lost ground because their OS/Hardware solution is comparatively expensive; not necessarily because Solaris is not a capable OS.
It just amuses me that Windows homogeneity is bad; but Linux everywhere is good.
-greg -> gakinsATInsomniaDASHConsultingDOTorg
so you can dump you free platform, buy an expensive one and run your free apps on them?
Thats smart thinking.
There isn't much like the scent of a fresh harddisk
This is why the "GNU" part of "GNU/Linux" should NOT be forgotten. People in the Microsoft mind-set immediately think that "Linux" is what they see when they look at a screenshot of X11 running KDE. The situation really sinks in when you realize that Linux is just the kernel, and they could be looking at *BSD, or even Darwin (Mac OS X's base), running X11 and KDE. Why not Solaris? Solaris is going one further though -- how about not having to recompile those apps that have been compiled to run on Linux? Very cool stuff indeed... especially if/when they open source Solaris! If they do it right (meaning - GPL compatible), then we'll see "GNU/Solaris", and Stallman will have a whole new name to complain about...
"To make a mistake is only human; to persist in a mistake is idiotic." Cicero
FreeBSDers seem to think that Linux ABI is a great feature. Although, it's probably not really "helping" them in a competitive sense. But the users like it.
NetBSD has the ability to run SunOS and SVR4 binaries. See the code for more details. Not sure if FrameMaker works or not, but it'd definitely be good to know!
You can't go round saying things like that! Repeat after me: "Slowaris is teh sux (5 Funny)". "Who cares about Slowaris when linux does everything and its free as in beer and you get the source (5 informative)".
Now say 10 Hail Linuses, and come back when you're brainwashed.
This is not a troll; I'm a Linux user and have been since 1995, and I run Debian (so you know I'm a true blue old-skool dork, not some MS shill). But really-- WHAT apps? All the Linux apps worth running, with probably under a dozen exceptions, are either:
...or...
..... VMWare?
... didn't think so.
;)
1) Already available for Solaris
2) Open-source and thus available for immediate porting
Come on. Think of the commercial closed-source stuff that's available for Linux, but not Solaris.
1) VMWare.
2) Uhh... VMWare.
3) Umm
4) Ohyeah. VMWare Server.
Oh, and *laugh*Accelerated-X*laugh*. Seriously. Who the heck uses that?
Oh, and maybe some random assorted browser plug-ins. Anything else? Anybody? Hello?
Seriously, why is this even worth Sun's time?! If I were a Sun shareholder (which I would never do, now that they have a "technology sharing" agreement with MS and are all buddy-buddy after accepting a settlement bribe from MS... well, I'd be frothing at the mouth even more than I am now.
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
I've used both Linux and Solaris for development for years. Was a sysadmin for both types of systems as well. And my dream operating system is something along the lines of GNU/Solaris.
Meaning it the same way that wackjob RMS means it: the GNU userspace utilities, with the Solaris kernel. I /really/ like some of the things that Solaris offers, but I vastly prefer the GNU command-line utils. Putting them together would make a nice, nice system.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
I had a presentation from SUN yesterday on Solaris 10.
Hi Anonymous Coward.
Essentially Solaris 10 is going to be a huge change.
Number 10 must be big change.
SUN states they are aiming to be the best UNIX solution out there.
That's nice. I can't wait.
With the amount of money they are spending/investing in developing Solaris 10 I believe they are making a very good attempt.
We all hope so.
Linux apps will run on Solaris 10 on Intel/Sparc.
As someone already mentioned - most Linux apps are distributed in sources. If you really need such app you can find 10 minutes to compile it, or you can find precompiled binaries somewhere. What's the benefit? Playing RTCW ET on Solaris?
A new filesystem that will be much better than UFS
Much better? Awesome! (how many percents better?)
Even better Multi-Processor efficiency.
Even better? That's good, or even better.
Of course, more efficient OS, better tcp/ip stack, security, etc. etc.
Even better security? And more efficient OS? Hurrah!
What a nice marketing crap.
A typical approach for Sun. Why use something that already exists when you can spend millions and reinvent it. In the end, Sun will have it's own version of Linux, except they will have written it from scratch and will call it Solaris. HP Invent, Sun ReInvent!
> IIRC the user survey showed Linux users expected it to be free
And this is one more reason why linux will never replace windows. No one would dare risk porting expensive commercial software to linux.
Free software is not just an expectation, it's a demand. Seems a lot of folk feel its an insult to the purity of linux - or even a personal insult - when someone actually asks them to pay money for software. (Then they usually lash out and claim their free version is better anyway.) Oh, they'll get all high and mighty about GPL vs LGPL vs MPL vs BSD, but really all most of them want is something for nothing.
Piracy killed commercial software on the Amiga, and I think the same would happen on Linux if things like Office, Photoshop and a lot of games were ever ported to it. (Enterprise software is different of course.) A lot of users would see it as their *duty* to pirate software and teach the evil corporations a lesson. I think this mentality is already evident in the mp3 community, where people hoard and share tens of gigs of files they will never ever listen to.
Linux has to shed the group mentality of a 15 year old. This is happening I think, but I doubt it will ever go away completely.
If sun could get thier compiler to work on linux software within Solaris that would be nice.. and if it was affordable then it would be even better. the compiler is one of the biggest stingers for Sun.
Then why do a lot of major institutions still run Solaris??? We have a Win2000 network but still use a Sun box because for one of our packages, it ONLY works on a Sun box....
Sun isnt dead... its a nitch product like Apple is. For those sys admins who dont know better there is always Windows... but for people who actually care about getting something done right, and having up time measured in months or years there are the other OS's out there...
Will sun ever blow by Microsoft, no, but will it still be used? Well there is a story here about emulating 20 - 30 year old computer systems so you can bet your ass people will use it for years to come.
Apparently Apple is doing this too and for both I give congrats.... they are making it so Linux is more a flavor with no restrictions than right now where for some things you have to go with one or the other... A bold move on everyones part considering every one of these companies wants you to use THEIR version..
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
A few people above have already commented on this, but this is exactly what SCO did when it was Caldera. Caldera/SCO decided that since Linux was so popular, they could run Linux software on UNIX. They thought this was a pretty neat idea, even though no one was asking for it.
The flaw in this business plan is that if you have a lot of Linux apps, a good possible choice of OS to run them on is (and this is just a suggestion) Linux. There is rarely a need for a declining UNIX system to emulate a popular UNIX-like system. Perhaps if Caldera had grasped that its UNIX purchase was pointless and concentrated on out-Linuxing RedHat and SuSe, they'd still be called Caldera and would be in the Linux support and services business today. And hey, maybe they'd be earning a profit.
This is not to suggest that Solaris is a useless OS. It isn't. But if compatibility with Linux is something a customer wants, Linux is going to be the best choice, nine times out of ten. So the only possible reasons for Sun to do this are:
Someone wondered if Linux would ever get certified as an UNIX.
Well, this is a true Unix getting certified as a Linux!
We are actually winning. Amazing.
In the x86 world things are quite different. Having been a desktop-oriented architecture for a long time, the main x86 chips (Opteron/Pentium IV) are pretty much the best these days at executing single-threaded stuff (see spec.org if you don't believe me). Multiprocessing was more of an "after-thought" than an initial requirement. Consequently, you can easily get 4-way SMPs for x86s, but not more than that (Sun AFAIK scales considerably better).
This reflects on x86 OSes as well. There's not that much need to do well on more than 8 execution contexts (4way SMP x2 - hyperthreading), and consequently having an operating system that scales better won't have that much of an impact on x86. Sure, in the "big iron" category things will be different, but not for the dominant architecture
The Raven
for those who love to claim solaris, and mainframes dead, you're smoking crack. It may become a nitch product, but it won't die. Certain problems are an order of magnitude easier to solve with vertical scalability. Horizontal scalability is not great for every problem. Grow up and learn how things really work and when they should be used.
http://wwws.sun.com/software/linux/compatibility/l xrun/
Run Linux Applications unmodified on Solaris
As a result of collaboration between Sun Microsystems and the lxrun open development effort, Linux applications run without modification on the Solaris Operating Environment on Intel platforms.
Solaris and lxrun provide a robust environment allowing a range of applications to be executed. These applications can range from browsers and office productivity tools to graphic-intensive applications and games. For example, these included Applix, GIMP, GNOME, Netscape Communicator, Myth II and WordPerfect.
http://developers.sun.com/solaris/articles/lxrun/
Lxrun is an emulator for executing Intel Linux a.out and ELF binaries on other types of UNIX® running on Intel x86. It was developed originally on and for SCO OpenServer and SCO UnixWare.
[ SCO was handing out free UNIXWARE at a Linux show five or so years ago, I don't remember which one in SF Bay area. Sales rep. was making point that Linux binaries work on their product. I haven't tried installing yet..]
Lxrun does system call remapping "on the fly." There isn't a significant difference between the execution environment required by Linux and SCO binaries. The primary difference is the way in which system calls are handled.
In Linux, an int $0x80 instruction is used, which jumps to the system-call-handling portion of the Linux kernel. On SCO systems, int $0x80 causes a SIGSEGV signal. Lxrun intercepts these signals and calls the SCO equivalent of the system call that the Linux program attempted.
There is also some mapping of ioctls, various flags, return values, and error codes. The result is that the Linux binary runs--with the help of lxrun--on the host platform with a small (usually negligible) performance penalty.
Because lxrun is effectively a system call emulator, it requires copies of the Linux dynamic loader (ld-linux.so.1) and whatever Linux shared libraries are required by the program being run.
Most programs that do not rely on Linux-specific idiosyncracies or deal directly with hardware should work under lxrun.
The official lxrun web page is http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~steven/lxrun/
Why would Sun do this?
Because they suddenly "get" open source? Maybe, but doubtful. Because they really want to be able to run linux apps on solaris? Again maybe.
Or maybe it's part of the deal they struck with MS. Bill & Steve are nothing if not ingenious, devious & ruthless - not to mention damn smart - when it comes to fighting the enemy.
Sun poses no threat to MS (anymore), but if they open source solaris it would splinter the open source *nix market. Very smart; MS haven't been able to use their previous tactics for eliminating competition (buy them/write a replacement & give it away/lock your VARs into draconian penalties) but this is as smart as it is devious. How do you fight something you can't buy or undercut? Turn it on itself.
Like I say, smart. Bilious, but smart.
And there are way too many patches going into an allegedly "stable" tree.
This your evaluation based on reading LKML, or secondhand?
Because, honestly, Slashdot did an article on this a bit back and it was prety negative about it, and I don't really agree with the article author's opinions there.
I personally don't see it as a problem. What most users (business and whatnot) consider "stable" is a kernel that's actually been tested with their userspace software, which means a kernel from a distro maker. Linus is supposedly adding smaller features now. With the introduction of the "RC" version numbering scheme, he's basically making a small development branch for each new stable release. I'd say that this is more about reducing the size of branches in kernels being fed to the distro manufacturers (which really isn't what you should be using anyway, if you're running a production machine) from year-long-plus beasts into two-month-long branches or so (the current "devel branch" is 2.6.8-rc3, which has been branched from 2.6.7 for about two months).
May we never see th
One word: Oracle. The database giant says, "Sun is our primary and recommended platform," and Sun enjoys a decade of dominance in the server market. Then Oracle says, "Linux is now our primary and recommended platform," and suddenly Sun is struggling to make ends meet. Coincidence? I think not.
Go to www.oracle.com and click on "technologies". What do you see? You see Linux (and, to be fair, Windows). What don't you see? You don't see Solaris. Hmmm....
Yup. On my BSD machines I only use linux binaries for a few applications - flash is the only thing that comes to mind. Actually, the first thing that came to mind when i read that was FreeBSD's linuxulator. I wonder if sun used any code from FreeBSD's solution or not. Not that there's anything wrong with that...just a curiosity.
Pfftt. Linux doesn't run on anything - it doesn't have legs. It's a kernel. Have you ever seen a popcorn kernel run? I, for one, have not.
{chortle, guffaw] "Old skool"? "true blue"? Riiiight.
You are a n00b. Dork, maybe... shill? Who cares? Oh yeah, you think you are in some sort of exclusive club.
As soon as there is an Open Source version of System V, that's the end of the line for SCO. The next Linux kernel release following the Open Sourcing of Solaris could -- entirely legally -- have been based on Open Source Solaris.
Mind, SCO's tail seems firmly between their legs right now -- IMHO they hope to disappear quietly into the night, and maybe nobody will come chasing after them to finish them off.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
http://www.sun.com/third-party/global/oracle/Sun_O racle_DS_final.pdf
1. Linux apps will run on Solaris 10 on Intel/Sparc. Someone said this is just for X86.
it is on the website of sun as well. it works only on Solaris x86!
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
although solaris x86 is not locked to specific hardware, I doubt SUN will provide your company support on non-SUN hardware. So you will be running Solaris x86 on SUN hardware which will be running linux apps, while I could just as well run native linux on x86 on probably cheaper hardware. Tell me exactly why should prefer running linux apps under Solaris instead? Certainly on x86 this makes no sense.
What this is, is just a way for SUN to say that Solaris x86 is a vailable platform, because it runs all these applications (which are linux apps). Now they no longer have to worry about pushing vendors to port apps to Solaris x86.
However I don't see this as a winner for SUN, apps will still not be written for Solaris x86 and how long will they be able to keep this game up? What if apps start using specific kernel calls which solaris does not have. I'd be surprised if a command like 'iptables' would work, while it is a very basic linux command.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
The power of more apps on the platform can certainly not hurt Sun. However why not run Linux apps on Linux instead. I've read Solaris is very stable and has some enterprise features that Linux may not support (maybe that's on the hardware side). However isn't Linux as stable as Solaris? If Solaris will become OSS, how about merging the best of the two. Does this help the potential copyright/patent problems that Linux may face -- e.g. the city of Munich researching possible infringements which is slowing down adoption of Linux?
I stand corrected....
Could it be that Sun is learning from Microsoft? This means that Solaris will run Linux stuff, but not that all Solaris code will run on Linux. I'd bet whatever OSI license they choose won't allow many Linux distributions to adopt much of their code. Seems like this is all a recipe for lots of problems unless everyone converts to Solaris. I'd bet that's there hope. Then their market for selling extensions above and beyond the open source version would be larger.
Hello Jacek....
I'm to lazy to register or don't write enough to justify registering... So I remain a coward, but I'm anonymous.... A big anonymous hug to you.
Solaris 10 is going to be a big change.
The last big change was from 2.6 to Solaris 7.
Solaris 8 wasn't that large, Solaris 9 was a bit
bigger with SVM, SSH, and some other useful stuff.
However Solaris 10 is quite a change.
Read up if you are interested at SUN.
Yes, making this the best UNIX is a goal of SUN. Will they be able to do it and will people agree and use it? Don't know, but I think they have seen that making their OS the best out there is very important. They should have listened to me years ago... Well, let's say Linux/competition is a good thing for SUN and Solaris.
Good point on the Linux apps being compile on Solaris. Perhaps a marketing scheme. At this time I would agree with you. I don't see much use for this other than perhaps you don't have the source code and can't recompile... We'll see.
New filesystem... yup... percentage better? dunno. Again, read up on it at SUN.... Thanks to Veritas VxFS/competition they upgraded their filesystem and it is an interesting read. Veritas was making a lot of money out of VxFS... Sun wants that piece of the pie to stay with them.
Multi-Processor support even better. Yup... they had to upgrade this component of the OS to support their Niagra line of Processors where they have more than one cpu per chip... So this part of the kernel/sub-kernel part got a lot of attention.
Security wise... yup... better... They are reversing the method of having the OS loading by default wide open. You are going to have to unscrew the security, if you will, if you want certain services.... Also is going to ship with a enterprise version of firewall. Again, read up.
tcp/ip stack more efficient. yup, they used the new and powerful DTrace utility to rewrite essentially the tcp/ip stack... Which admittely has sucked in the past so it probably wasn't to hard to improve it.
DTrace is going to be sweet. read up on it.
Big change.... Better be, or I will say SUNset.
Of all the god-awful color schemes the /. editors come up with, this one I like. I have also never noticed it before. I'm thinking of installing proxomitron or something to change all the slashdot urls to linux.slashdot.org as I recently discovered you could do that to change the color scheme.
anyway, carry on.
Emory: Uh..we're still..beta testing that.
Oglethorpe: What you're testing is me and my patience!
Oh. I get it. That was supposed to be funny. Ha ha. ha. Kernel. Run. Legs. Oh the whit.
How is one supposed to compile the open source solaris?
It is very well known that gcc generates slow code for Sparc, and I don't even know if it can compile it at all.
They should at least provide a free beer version of their compiler.
I have a sparc server at work and it pisses me off that they don't provide a C compiler.
My heart is pure, but make no mistake, it's pure evil
So, does this mean you could run VMware with Solaris x86 as the host os? That would be interesting for me.
funny...i get the slashdot newsletters...and im starting to see the word "linux" alot. Especially with subjects that state that linux is uncluded on something. I like it.
It was the parent of this post that was offtopic. This post was merely a reply to a troll.
communist.
Hardware is a commodity, it will be free :2 7236&tid=102&tid=137/
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/01/16
Solaris will be OSS3 256&tid=102&tid=190&tid=130/ / 1248251&tid=102&tid=163&tid=130/
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/02/13
http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/08/04
Java will or will not be OSS0 6/04/002224&tid=108&tid=156&tid=102&tid=8/
0 6/05/183209&tid=108&tid=156&tid=102&tid=8/
Will : http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/
Won't: http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/
Leaves us with... A basically free OS, running on a free hardware able to run free software out of the box.
The only business model they seem to aim for is maintenance and services...
But... An OS as polished as Sun becoming free (and already available on x86) might become a new contender to Windows desktop/workstation. For this move they lack applications, but making it able to run Linux apps out of the box seems a smart move to close the gap...
Any feeling on those matters ?