Solaris 11 Express is out

[Paul Griffith]

Solaris 11 Express:

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

[Edward Ned Harvey]

Post by Paul Griffith
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-
storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

It looks like they're releasing it free, for development purposes only. I
wonder about open source...

The one other thing that's unclear is what to do if you want to use it for
more than just development purposes. I could be reading this wrong, but it
looks like you can purchase "Support for Operating Systems," and it seems to
include any Oracle OS. Solaris. (Express?) Linux. And Oracle VM. Seems
to be one price, for any OS.

If you go to the download page for sol11exp, and you click on "overview"
instead of "download," then they list "Support for Operating Systems" under
"solaris 11 express" under "support."
we grant you a perpetual [...], nonexclusive, nontransferable, limited
License to use the Programs only for the purpose of developing, testing,
prototyping and demonstrating your applications, and not for any other
purpose.

All rights not expressly granted above are hereby reserved. If you want to
use the Programs for any purpose other than as permitted under this
agreement, [...] you must obtain a valid license permitting such use.

[Glynn Foster]

Post by Edward Ned Harvey

[mailto:opensolaris-
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-
storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

It looks like they're releasing it free, for development purposes only. I
wonder about open source...
The one other thing that's unclear is what to do if you want to use it for
more than just development purposes. I could be reading this wrong, but it
looks like you can purchase "Support for Operating Systems," and it seems to
include any Oracle OS. Solaris. (Express?) Linux. And Oracle VM. Seems
to be one price, for any OS.

That's correct. Oracle Solaris 11 Express is covered under Oracle's
existing Premier Support and Oracle Solaris Premier Subscription
support agreements.


Glynn

[Pablo León]

Hi Glynn

Those are good news.

Now OpenIndiana at home and Solaris 11 at work ;)

What I haven't seen (not much time anyway) is the migration path for those on b134.

Will it be 134.0.2 on pkg.opensolaris.org,
and then to 151 on pkg.oracle.com/solaris/relese ?

regards
- Pablo

[Mike Brancato]

Just to clarify, what is my path forward from OS 2009.06?

The release is for development, prototyping, etc. To quote the license: "only for the purpose of developing, testing, prototyping and demonstrating your applications, and not for any other purpose."

I'm doing none of those things. I'm an "end-user" if you will in what I want to continue using OpenSolaris for. I use it for purely personal purposes, mainly a ZFS NAS.

Now, the FAQ implies that Solaris 11 Express may be used for other means: "Oracle Solaris 11 Express is the latest release of the Oracle Solaris operating system. This release is the path forward for developers, end-users and partners using previous generations of OpenSolaris releases."

Really? That seems to disregard the license. Does buying support then modify your license to include non-development or prototyping-related activities?

So do I stick with Solaris 11, and more importantly, may I for personal use? Or do I plan on going to either a dedicated NAS distribution such as Nexenta or to OpenIndiana? The latter two both have free licenses which I know are compatible with my current use.

[Alan Coopersmith]

Post by Mike Brancato
Really? That seems to disregard the license. Does buying support then modify your license to include non-development or prototyping-related activities?

Yes.

[Nikola M]

Post by Edward Ned Harvey
All rights not expressly granted above are hereby reserved. If you want to
use the Programs for any purpose other than as permitted under this
agreement, [...] you must obtain a valid license permitting such use.

I think that S11Express include more then enough programs (if not all
user programs) that are covered by GPL (GNOME, etc) and that rights for
It's use can not be invalidated whatever Oracle is saying.
So Oracle can not reserve all rights if it includes GPL or CDDL
non-Oracle software.

Therefore, that license restrictions can be applied only to binary parts
of S11Express that are closed source ATM and not covered by license that
allows free use of binary builds (as Oracle's OS/Net).

OpenIndiana does just that: It uses open ON(OS/Net) consolidation and
will use IllumOS ON consolidation in near future, instead of Oracle
closed source ON and it adds on top of it other consolidations and
programs, so you can use OpenIndiana without restrictions that Oracle
Solaris wants to force to users.

[Edward Ned Harvey]

From the What's New: (Amongst many other things)

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/documentation/sol
aris-express-whatsnew-201011-175308.pdf

Image Packaging System (IPS) is a new network based package management
system included in Oracle Solaris 11 Express 2010.11.

IPS includes a number of command-line utilities including pkg(1) and
graphical tools

UFS is no longer supported as a root filesystem

ZFS deduplication support has been added

ZFS Diff: Users with the appropriate privilege can now view what file and
directory level changes have occurred between snapshots, such as files or
directories added, removed, modified or renamed in a later snapshot.

[Karel Gardas]

interesting would be to know if the upgrade from OS 2009.06 is working well or not.

Karel

[Shawn Walker]

Post by Karel Gardas
interesting would be to know if the upgrade from OS 2009.06 is working well or not.

Yes, the process is described here and was noted in the release
announcement:

http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/821-1479/gklaa?l=en&a=view

-Shawn

[Karel Gardas]

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately it seems I'm not able to use VirtualBox for testing the upgrade way, since b134b seems to be crashing there. i.e. I just see first boot message (Solaris & Oracle copyright) then just something what looks like a stackdump (backtrace) and then immediate reboot... Is this already known bug? I'm using VBox 3.1.4 here on OS 2009.06 for this.
Thanks,
Karel

[Paul Gress]

Post by Karel Gardas
interesting would be to know if the upgrade from OS 2009.06 is working well or not.
Karel

Yes, I just finished upgrading from Opensolaris b134 (note, NOT b134b). It booted up fine. You just have to follow the instructions in the release notes. For you, you'll have to upgrade Opensolaris to b134b, Oracle has updated the Development release to b134 to allow upgrading to Solaris Express.


Paul

[Mike Gerdts]

Post by Karel Gardas
interesting would be to know if the upgrade from OS 2009.06 is working well or not.

I haven't tried that exact path, but I have image-update'd from
OpenIndiana to something that looks quite similar to Solaris 11
Express (build 150 instead of 151a) I've been using the machine on
which I did this as my primary machine for a couple weeks now without
any problems.

[Nicholas George]

Post by Paul Griffith
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

Can someone post the MD1 and SHA256 hashes for the ISO files, please?

Nicholas

[Glynn Foster]

Post by Nicholas George

Post by Paul Griffith
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

Can someone post the MD1 and SHA256 hashes for the ISO files, please?

http://opensolaris.pastebin.ca/1992347

We're just in the process of getting these posted to the Download page.


Glynn

[Richard L. Hamilton]

Well you know some of us home users aren't going to be happy.

*Supported on sun4v and sun4u based systems with OBP
(Open Boot PROM) level 4.17 or higher.

$ uname -a;prtdiag -v|tail -2
SunOS paradox 5.11 snv_97 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Blade-1000
OBP 4.16.4 2004/12/18 05:18
POST 4.16.3 2004/11/05 20:02

...so I suppose I have to wait for the source release, and for someone
(or do it myself - not likely) to do something about that restriction.

Ouch.

That's the latest OBP firmware for that hardware, AFAIK; and
the Sun Blade 1000, 2000, Sun Fire 280R, and Netra 20 would all
be affected.

Ironically, my Sun Blade 100 (a wimp by comparison) has 4.17.1, so it's
ok. The one I don't want to upgrade, I can, and the good one is orphaned.

Blech.

[Dave Miner]

Post by Richard L. Hamilton
Well you know some of us home users aren't going to be happy.

*Supported on sun4v and sun4u based systems with OBP
(Open Boot PROM) level 4.17 or higher.

$ uname -a;prtdiag -v|tail -2
SunOS paradox 5.11 snv_97 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Blade-1000
OBP 4.16.4 2004/12/18 05:18
POST 4.16.3 2004/11/05 20:02
...so I suppose I have to wait for the source release, and for someone
(or do it myself - not likely) to do something about that restriction.
Ouch.
That's the latest OBP firmware for that hardware, AFAIK; and
the Sun Blade 1000, 2000, Sun Fire 280R, and Netra 20 would all
be affected.
Ironically, my Sun Blade 100 (a wimp by comparison) has 4.17.1, so it's
ok. The one I don't want to upgrade, I can, and the good one is orphaned.
Blech.

It's likely that it will work for you if you install from the text
installer media, but automated installation requires that level of OBP.

Dave

[Richard L. Hamilton]

Post by Dave Miner
It's likely that it will work for you if you install
from the text
installer media, but automated installation requires
that level of OBP.

I'd have to use a text-based installer anyway, since
anything that no longer includes Xsun won't support anything
other than an XVR-100 that would work on that system, at
least not out of the box. (I think I do have an XVR-100, somewhere;
big step down from an XVR-1000, though.)

[Sean M. Brannon]

What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e. is an Oracle support contract required to gain access to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?

Page seven of the release notes refers to accessing information about updates:

For information about current security alerts and critical patch updates for Oracle Solaris, see

http://www.oracle.com/technology/deploy/security/alerts.htm.

However, I have been unable to find reference to the requirements necessary to receive software and security updates, nor even whether such updates are planned for Solaris 11 Express.

Anyone have an idea what the update policy is?

[Alan Coopersmith]

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e. is an Oracle support contract required to gain access to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?

Yes.

[Dave Koelmeyer]

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

[Alan Coopersmith]

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

Free trial/evaluation software. Like Solaris 10, production
use requires support contracts.

[Andrew Watkins]

Post by Alan Coopersmith

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

Free trial/evaluation software. Like Solaris 10, production
use requires support contracts.

But, I thought security patches were always available for free?
But, I could be wrong!

Andrew

[Alan Coopersmith]

Post by Andrew Watkins

Post by Alan Coopersmith

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

Free trial/evaluation software. Like Solaris 10, production
use requires support contracts.

But, I thought security patches were always available for free?

Not since the Oracle acquisition.

[Bayard Bell]

Alan, come on. What does access to basic patches have to do with production deployment? Even at home, I don't look at some set of my boxes and even think, oh, those can go without patches. And the idea that you've got a product that's supposed to be available for evaluation and development but that can only be bought for the same price charged for production support on a product that's increasingly targeted to enterprise environments ($1k USD per socket per year)... Last time I tried to get a price on this, I spent weeks being passed between sales people, so I've got no appetite to go through that process in search of a reasonable price. Where's the recognition of where the product makes sense and a SKU to get it there?

Why aren't there reasonably priced subscriptions available for development, education, and evaluation that package support and tools? The principle that patches aren't a basic requirement of running an OS and only available through a licensing model targeting enterprises for production together tell me that Oracle hasn't found the plot they lost when they withdrew OpenSolaris and decided that the primary mission of Solaris should be to maximise revenue from enterprise sales. I don't want to build relationships with Oracle through the sale organisation any more than I want to have to spend time with a car salesman: I just want a reasonable list price to get software I need that I'm not buying with someone else's money, and I gotta say, the only other major game where I have to buy such a package at all is Microsoft, where Oracle is asking a multiple of their list. Dave is right: this is demoware, and the only person who want to run this as offered is someone who wants a Solaris install that only lasts long enough to make a sales pitch.

Post by Alan Coopersmith

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

Free trial/evaluation software. Like Solaris 10, production
use requires support contracts.
--
Oracle Solaris Platform Engineering: X Window System
_______________________________________________
opensolaris-discuss mailing list

[Alan Coopersmith]

Post by Bayard Bell
Alan, come on. What does access to basic patches have to do with production deployment?

Because that's the business model Oracle's business people have chosen.

Post by Bayard Bell
Why aren't there reasonably priced subscriptions available for development, education, and evaluation that package support and tools?

I have as little idea about that as you do. I can just tell you what
is, not why it is - I'm an engineer, not a VP or marketing analyst,
and ranting at me is wasting your time, there's nothing I can do but
sympathize.

[Ian Collins]

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

If you don't like the conditions, don't use it!

[Nikola M]

Post by Ian Collins

Post by Dave Koelmeyer

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e.

is an Oracle support contract required to gain access
to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
Yes.

Oh, awesome. More demo software.

If you don't like the conditions, don't use it!

Same goes for GLP software inside Solaris Express.

[Shawn Walker]

Post by Sean M. Brannon
What is the update/patch policy for Express? i.e. is an Oracle support contract required to gain access to Solaris 11 Express software/security updates?
For information about current security alerts and critical patch updates for Oracle Solaris, see
http://www.oracle.com/technology/deploy/security/alerts.htm.
However, I have been unable to find reference to the requirements necessary to receive software and security updates, nor even whether such updates are planned for Solaris 11 Express.
Anyone have an idea what the update policy is?

Your questions are answered in the FAQ linked from the Oracle Solaris 11
Express page here:

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/overview/index.html

See FAQ entries 11 and 36.

-Shawn

[Sean M. Brannon]

Thank you for the answers guys. Not that I'm happy about their content. :-(

My intent wasn't to use Solaris 11 Express in production. Or at least I wouldn't consider a home server as production. I wanted a chance to use Solaris 11 and re-familiarize myself with Solaris in general, and thought putting it on a new server I was building for my home could be a step in that direction. A major advantage of doing this at home is that I would have to deal with the draconian computer security apparatus at work and the paperwork and testing that is required to attach computer systems to our network.

I gave up on Solaris back around 8 as it didn't provide the proper value proposition for my environment. All of the developers I supported were moving or had moved to Linux. Our only need for Solaris was to provide a build environment as we still supported legacy systems for customers of our software.

OpenSolaris and the future Solaris 11 had me interested in Solaris as a server platform again. Even though Oracle had bought it, and quashed OpenSolaris, I still felt Solaris could prove itself able to provide features that would be compelling enough to move away from Linux for certain workloads.

Alas, it isn't to be I'm afraid. My work environment precludes the attachment to our network of any OS that could not be patched should security vulnerabilities arise. Even on test machines. Much of the US Federal gov't has the same requirements; whether or not all admins adhere to the rules is another question. In any case, I'm not going to buy a support agreement in order to put up a test environment. And I'm not sure I want to deal with a vendor that won't provide patches for test machines. It doesn't speak well of the corporate culture and their attitude toward customers. Hell, even Microsoft provides updates and security patches with their 120-day evals.

[Ian Collins]

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Thank you for the answers guys. Not that I'm happy about their content. :-(
OpenSolaris and the future Solaris 11 had me interested in Solaris as a server platform again. Even though Oracle had bought it, and quashed OpenSolaris, I still felt Solaris could prove itself able to provide features that would be compelling enough to move away from Linux for certain workloads.

It still does, whether you consider they justify the cost of support
only you can say.

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Alas, it isn't to be I'm afraid. My work environment precludes the attachment to our network of any OS that could not be patched should security vulnerabilities arise.

So you wouldn't have been able to attach an OpenSolaris system either.

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Even on test machines. Much of the US Federal gov't has the same requirements; whether or not all admins adhere to the rules is another question. In any case, I'm not going to buy a support agreement in order to put up a test environment. And I'm not sure I want to deal with a vendor that won't provide patches for test machines. It doesn't speak well of the corporate culture and their attitude toward customers. Hell, even Microsoft provides updates and security patches with their 120-day evals.

I can't argue with that. One would think customer feedback from an
express program would be worth the cost of providing patched and updates.

[Ivan Wang]

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Thank you for the answers guys. Not that I'm happy

about their content. :-(

Post by Sean M. Brannon
OpenSolaris and the future Solaris 11 had me

interested in Solaris as a server platform again.
Even though Oracle had bought it, and quashed
OpenSolaris, I still felt Solaris could prove itself
able to provide features that would be compelling
enough to move away from Linux for certain workloads.
It still does, whether you consider they justify the
cost of support
only you can say.

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Alas, it isn't to be I'm afraid. My work

environment precludes the attachment to our network
of any OS that could not be patched should security
vulnerabilities arise.
So you wouldn't have been able to attach an
OpenSolaris system either.

Well, maybe it's me reading too much into it..
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/documentation/s11sysadminwp101109final2-186770.pdf

see text near bottom of page 7 (9/26):

Table 2 lists default network-accessible repositories for Oracle Solaris 11 Express.
TABLE 2. ORACLE SOLARIS 11 EXPRESS REPOSITORIES
REPOSITORY DESCRIPTION
http://pkg.oracle.com/solaris/release Default repository for Oracle Solaris 11 Express. This repository contains
updates for each new release of Oracle Solaris. Significant bug fixes, security
updates and new software may be provided at any time for users to install at
Oracle's discretion.
https://pkg.oracle.com/solaris/support Support repository providing the latest bug fixes and updates. Access is
restricted to users with current Oracle Solaris support contracts.

So it somehow reminds me the old Recommended&Security patch cluster and Maintenance Update, where Recommended cluster is public available, MU is only available to customers under contract.

If it is set up and kept set up this way, I think it's good enough for a development environment. Of course, hope pkg can do a lot better than old smpatch&co..

Cheers,
Ivan.

Post by Sean M. Brannon

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Even on test machines. Much of the US Federal

gov't has the same requirements; whether or not all
admins adhere to the rules is another question. In
any case, I'm not going to buy a support agreement in
order to put up a test environment. And I'm not sure
I want to deal with a vendor that won't provide
patches for test machines. It doesn't speak well of
the corporate culture and their attitude toward
customers. Hell, even Microsoft provides updates and
security patches with their 120-day evals.
I can't argue with that. One would think customer
feedback from an
express program would be worth the cost of providing
patched and updates.
--
Ian.
_______________________________________________
opensolaris-discuss mailing list

[Chris Ridd]

Post by Ivan Wang
So it somehow reminds me the old Recommended&Security patch cluster and Maintenance Update, where Recommended cluster is public available, MU is only available to customers under contract.

Well it *could* be, but it seems more likely to be based on the OpenSolaris repos - the release repo is updated every 6 months (or so), the support repo is updated more regularly but only for paying customers. No recommended patches at all, unless you pay.

Cheers,

Chris

[Kyle McDonald]

Post by Ian Collins
It still does, whether you consider they justify the cost of
support only you can say.

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Alas, it isn't to be I'm afraid. My work environment precludes
the attachment to our network of any OS that could not be
patched should security vulnerabilities arise.

So you wouldn't have been able to attach an OpenSolaris system
either.

He might have been able to. The OpenSolaris development 2 weel release
cycle might have qualified as patches. They always had all the known
fixes in them.

-Kyle

[Nikola M]

Post by Ian Collins

Post by Sean M. Brannon
Alas, it isn't to be I'm afraid. My work environment precludes the
attachment to our network of any OS that could not be patched should
security vulnerabilities arise.

So you wouldn't have been able to attach an OpenSolaris system either.

OpenSolaris /dev releases included all known security patches up to
release date.
So yes. OpenSolaris was security patched inside development releases.

Since S11Express is a preview OS that is not released as often as /dev
opensolaris releases were, therefore SolarisExpress is not in-place
OpenSolaris replacement for development.
Maybe OpenIndiana is, since it does not have restrictions for use.