[ug-dfwosug] OpenSolaris 2008-05 available for download

[Bob Netherton]

OpenSolaris 2008-05, the long awaited distribution of the OpenSolaris
project is now available for download.  Well, it has been available
for a couple of weeks, but this is the first I've had a chance to
talk about it :-)

Some things you will find in OpenSolaris 2008-05

- ZFS as a root filesystem.   Now this is huge.   The end of
backoutpatch as we know it.  Snapshot your root filesytem,
apply a patch cluster or package update and if things go
wrong, just boot back to the previous snapshot.

- New packaging system.

- New package repositories (see http://pkg.opensolaris.org)

- Live CD plus installer

- USB boot image (very cool!)   Fedora isn't the only distribution that
has this.   Not that many of the Linux reviewers are going to notice.

- Simplified installer

- Root's home directory now /root (and also a role on the live CD)

- Gnome 2.20 desktop (although some components unchanged from 2.18)

And most important - support!


I run it today in a VirtualBox VM (http://virtualbox.org).  The latest
version (1.6) includes guest extensions for Solaris - so we get
scalable desktop, mouse integration.  Beautiful stuff indeed.


Now, I have it on relatively good authority that Solaris 10 will soon
have ZFS root capability (install, boot, zoneroots).  To get yourself
ready for capability, I would recommend that you install OpenSolaris
2008-05 (or a recent Nevada build - you will have to roll your own
boot pool until the installer is integrated) and see what this is
all about.   And meet our new friend beadm(1M).


Bob