New Features in Solaris Express 6/05
This section describes all features that are new or have been enhanced in
the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
x86: GRUB-Based Booting
This system performance enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
The Solaris OS is now loaded with the open source GRand Unified
Bootloader (GRUB). GRUB is responsible for loading a boot archive, which contains the kernel
modules and configuration files, into the system's memory. The Solaris kernel boots based
on the contents of the in-memory boot archive.
Because the Solaris kernel is fully compliant with the Multiboot Specification, you can
boot the Solaris OS on an x86 based system by using GRUB.
With GRUB, you can more easily boot the various operating systems that are
installed on your system. For example, on one x86 system, you could boot
the following operating systems:
Solaris OS
Linux
Microsoft Windows
A key benefit of GRUB is that it is intuitive about file
systems and kernel executable formats. This feature enables you to load an operating
system without recording the physical position of the kernel on the disk. With
GRUB-based booting, the kernel is loaded by specifying its file name, the drive,
and the partition where the kernel resides.
One notable change is the replacement of the Device Configuration Assistant (DCA) with
the GRUB menu. When an x86 based system boots, the GRUB menu
is displayed. From this menu, you can select an OS instance by using
the up-arrow and down-arrow keys. If you do not make a selection, the
default OS instance is booted.
The GRUB-based boot feature provides the following improvements:
Faster boot times on x86 based systems
Installation from USB CD or DVD drives
Ability to boot from USB storage devices
Simplified DHCP setup for PXE boot with no vendor-specific options
Elimination of all realmode drivers
In addition, the following two administrative commands have been added to assist with
managing system bootability:
- bootadm
This command rebuilds the boot archive.
- installgrub
This command installs GRUB boot blocks.
Note - As a part of this functionality, x86 based systems must have a minimum
of 256 Mbytes of RAM to boot and install the Solaris Express
6/05 release.
For more information about these enhancements, see System Administration Guide: Devices and File Systems and System Administration Guide: Basic Administration. See also
the bootadm(1M), grub(5), and installgrub(1M) man pages.
See the following resources for additional installation information:
Large Pages Enhancement
This system performance enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
This feature brings the benefits of large pages to a broader range
of applications without requiring application tuning or system tuning. This enhancement applies large pages
automatically for anonymous memory that is based on segment sizes.
Large Pages for Kernel Memory
This system performance enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
For 64-bit platforms, this feature supports mapping of the portion of the kernel
heap with large pages. This feature increases performance of the system by reducing
the number of Translation Lookaside Buffer (TLB) misses and the number of map
operations or unmap operations.
Kernel Page Relocation
This system performance enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
In this release, system performance has been enhanced on the Sun Fire 15K,
Sun Fire 20K, and Sun Fire 25K domains.
Enhancements for bge and xge Network Interfaces
This networking enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
The Solaris OS now contains features that extend the configuration possibilities for the
bge and xge network interfaces. System administrators can now group these interfaces into
LACP-capable link aggregations. These aggregations can support large-scale high availability or database implementations. In
addition, you can configure xge and bge interfaces into virtual local area
networks (VLANs) to extend network capability.
The new dladm command has been added for configuring and administering bge and
xge interfaces. For further information, refer to the dladm(1M) man page.
Source-Filtered Multicasting
This networking enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
Enhancements have been made to the Multicast Listener Discovery (MLD) protocol, for IPv6,
and the Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP), for IPv4. The Solaris implementation of
these protocols has been enhanced to support MLDv2 and IGMPv3. These extensions provide
support for source address filtering on multicast traffic. Also included is support for
IETF-specified socket extensions. This support enables applications to take advantage of source-filtered multicasting.
For further information, see the Programming Interfaces Guide and the System Administration Guide: IP Services.
Automatic Renewal of Kerberos Credentials
This security enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
A new option has been added to the /etc/warn.conf file. This option enables
the ktkt_warnd daemon to automatically renew credentials for users who are logged in.
If the renew option is set, the users no longer need to run
the kinit -R command in order to renew their credentials. In addition, options have
been added to the /etc/warn.conf file that enable you to log the result when
a renewal attempt is made.
See the warn.conf(4) man page for more information.
Enhancement to ikecert certlocal Command
This security enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
The ikecert certlocal command now has options to set the validity period for certificate
requests and for self-signed certificates. For more information, see the ikecert(1M) man page.
Enhanced Output With the metaimport Command
This system administration enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
The Solaris Volume Manager metaimport -r command has been enhanced. The command shows the
creation time for a disk set. The command also provides an advisory message
when a disk is found in more than one disk set. These changes
assist system administrators in determining which disk set to import.
For more information, see the Solaris Volume Manager Administration Guide.
Support for SCSI Disks Larger Than 2 Terabytes
This system administration enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
SCSI, Fibre Channel, and iSCSI disks that are larger than 2 terabytes are
now supported on 64–bit platforms. The format utility can be used to label,
configure, and partition these larger disks.
For more information, see the System Administration Guide: Devices and File Systems.
Advanced DDI Interrupts
This developer tool enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
The Solaris OS now provides a new DDI Interrupt framework for registering interrupts
and deregistering interrupts. Support for Message Signalled Interrupts (MSIs) is also provided.
New management interfaces enable you to manipulate priorities and capabilities, to interrupt masking,
and to obtain pending information.
The framework includes the following new interfaces:
Note - To take advantage of the features of the new framework, developers need to
use the new interfaces. Avoid using the following interfaces, which are retained for
compatibility only:
For more information, see “Interrupt Handlers” in the Writing Device Drivers manual. See also
the individual man pages for the new interfaces. All man pages for these
interfaces are in the 9F man page section.
Door Interface Revisions
This developer tool enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
Two new functions, door_setparam and door_getparam, have been added to the doors
interfaces. These functions enable door servers to set boundaries on the data size
and on the number of descriptors that are passed to door_call on the
door. These enhancements simplify the door's handler function.
The door_create interface has a new flag, DOOR_NO_CANCEL. This flag disables the cancellation
process of the server thread when the client aborts a door_call function due to
a signal. For door servers which do not take advantage of
cancellation, this change can prevent unwanted EINTR returns from interrupted system calls.
For more information, see the door_setparam(3C) and door_create(3C) man pages.
Memory Placement Optimization Hierarchical Lgroup Support
This performance enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
Hierarchical Lgroup Support (HLS) improves the Memory Placement Optimization (MPO) feature in the
Solaris OS. HLS enables the Solaris OS to optimize performance for machines that
have more than local memory and remote memory latencies. Machines with four or
more Opteron CPUs might have local memory, remote memory, and further remote memory.
On such machines, HLS enables the Solaris OS to distinguish between the degrees
of remoteness. HLS enables the Solaris OS to allocate resources with the lowest
possible latency for applications. The Solaris OS allocates local resources for a given
application. And, if local resources are not available by default, the Solaris OS
allocates the nearest remote resources.
The Programming Interfaces Guide explains the abstraction that is used by the Solaris OS to
identify which resources are near each other for optimizing localization. The guide also
describes the API that can be used for the locality group (lgroup) abstraction.
For more information, see liblgrp(3LIB).
Support for Virtual USB Keyboard and Mouse Devices
This desktop enhancement is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
This feature enables the Solaris OS to support multiple keyboards and mouse
devices simultaneously. The virtualkm feature also provides an auto-switch function that enables
users to obtain separate input for keyboards and for mouse devices. All
these enhancements are compatible with existing applications.
This feature is particularly useful for the following users:
Users of systems with KVMS support
Laptop users who connect an extra mouse
Users with special keypads or other devices that are declared as keyboards or mouse devices
For more information, see virtualkm(7D).
X Client Support for XFree86 Extensions
These X11 windowing enhancements are new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
These enhancements take advantage of X server extensions that were originally developed by
the XFree86 Project. These enhancements are now incorporated into the Xorg X server.
The new programs available include the following:
- xgamma
Alters a monitor's gamma correction through XF86VidMode extension
- xrandr
Resizes or rotates the screen through the RandR extension
- xvidtune
Provides video mode tuner for Xorg through XF86VidMode extension
- xvinfo
Prints X Video extension adapter information
Advanced users can use these applications to tune the settings of the Xorg
server at runtime. This process provides more information about the capabilities of the
current system hardware.
Note - These programs require support for the XFree86 extensions. As such, these programs do
not currently work with the Xsun X server. These programs do not work
with other X servers that lack this support.
For more information, see the man pages for each application. Add
/usr/X11/man to your $MANPATH, if needed, to view the man pages.
NVIDIA CK8-04 GE Driver Support
This driver support is new in the Solaris Express 6/05 release.
This release provides driver support for NVIDIA's gigabit Ethernet on the x86 platform.
This features supports NVIDIA's Nfore4 chipset, CK8-04.
For further information, see the nge(7D) man page.