Certification Programs:
What certification programs are offered?
The Systems Hardware Certification Program enables you to certify the x86 systems
as compatible with the Solaris OS on x86 platforms.
Systems include desktop systems, laptops, servers, motherboards, and integrated components.
The component Hardware Certification Program enables you to certify the
following components or device types:
- Network components
10-GB ethernet
Gigabit ethernet
Fast ethernet
- InfiniBand HCA
- Serial I/O components
Serial Asynchronous Interface (SAI/P)
- Storage components
SCSI
iSCSI
RAID
Fibre channel
SATA
SAS
- USB devices
USB hard disk and solid-state storage device
USB CD/DVD reader device
USB CD/DVD writer device
USB keyboard device
- CD-ROM/DVD-ROM
- CD-RW/DVD-RW
- Audio
- Video
- WiFi cards
What additional certification programs are
available?
Vendors and developers are also recommended to register their
products for the Solaris Ready program.
Information about the registration procedure and the requirements to attain Solaris Ready
certification is at
http://www.sun.com/solarisready.
Sun is constantly monitoring its certification programs to ensure that these
programs meet the needs of IHVs, OEMs, and customers.
If you still have questions, contact
HCL feedback or
HCTS support.
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Program Changes:
What has changed since HCTS 4.0?
The HCTS 4.1 Release
Notes lists the new features in HCTS 4.1.
Will HCTS 4.0 still be available?
No. HCTS 4.1 includes all the functionalities of HCTS 4.0.
Only HCTS 4.1 is available.
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General:
Where is the Hardware Compatibility List (HCL)?
The HCL is at:
http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/hcl
Does this program applies for AMD and Intel based systems?
Yes. Sun supports the Solaris OS on a range of x86-architecture CPUs,
including the popular Intel Core, Pentium and Xeon families and AMD Athlon and
Opteron processors. The HCL also lists systems based on the compatible CPUs from
other vendors such as VIA.
Does this program applies for 64-bit x86 systems?
Yes.
What are the potential benefits of certifying
systems and components?
There are numerous potential benefits to certify that your products are
compatible with the Solaris OS.
Benefits to OEMs, system vendors, IHVs, and Sun partners include the
following:
Increased sales. Compete in the new markets and ensure that your products
stay competitive in current markets.
Links to your web site.
- Links can be installed from your certified systems on the
HCL to direct customers to the Solaris OS related content
on your web site.
- HCL entries can point to your driver download page.
Included in the HCL. Your certified systems and components will be
listed in the HCL, which is often used as a buyer's
guide by customers choosing systems and peripherals for x86-architecture
platforms.
Increased exposure. The device drivers and the certified components
they support gains increased exposure to customers whose purchasing
policy requires them to select certified peripherals.
Cost-effectiveness. The certification process can be completed quickly
and is free of charge.
Benefits to end users include the following:
Assurance. Certifying a system or component provides confidence that
your hardware works well with the Solaris OS.
Included in the HCL. You can search the
HCL to find additional hardware that is likely to
work well with your system.
Which companies have certified their products
for the Solaris OS on x86 architectures?
For the latest list of Test Suite Certified products, refer to the
HCL.
What is the cost of hardware certification?
Sun provides a free Hardware Certification
Test Suite. Limited free engineering support is available via
email.
How can I learn more?
For more information, visit the Hardware
Certification Test Suite web site.
If you have questions or comments about HCTS, submit them in the
Hardware Certification Test
Suite support form.
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Process:
How long does the HCTS takes to test systems and
components? How much of the testing is automated?
Set up your test systems for the type of certification you want to do as
described in the Getting
Started Guide.
Once the HCTS gathers information about the test system and verifies that it
meets minimum system requirements, the tests are run.
A successful system certification is expected to run for approximately 12
hours plus 3 hours for each additional storage component.
The HCTS 4.1 README file
lists the durations of the certification tests provided in HCTS 4.1.
For run times of other HCTS tests, see the online help in the GUI or the man
page for the hctscli(1M) command.
When should the systems or components be re-certified
for the HCL?
Sun does not require re-certification for each new release of the
Solaris OS. See
Statement of
Policy for a detailed description of this policy.
Note: Systems that you want to certify should be designed using
components for which Solaris OS device drivers exist.
These Solaris system drivers might be
included in the OS or
might be
provided by the third parties.
If possible, add-in cards and attached peripheral devices that you want to
include in a system for certification should first be certified separately as
individual components.
What kind of Solaris OS installation do I need
to do?
See the Getting
Started Guide for information on any customizations you need to make when
you install the Solaris OS before running HCTS.
For Solaris 10 installation details, see the
Release and Installation
Collection for the particular Solaris 10 release that you want to install.
Start with the Installation Guide: Basic Installations.
For Solaris Express Developer Edition installation details, see
Solaris Express,
Developer Edition Installation Guide.
For additional help with Solaris OS installation, see the
Solaris OS
Install web site.
If you are installing the Solaris 10 OS, you must make the following
customizations:
- Perform at least a Developer group installation.
- Select "None" for "Name Service."
You might want to back up your test systems and reinstall the Solaris OS
before you install and run the HCTS.
Does HCTS affects data on my test systems?
HCTS is not recommended for use on production systems. HCTS should only be
installed on a non-production system on an isolated network segment.
If you have critical data on your test systems, back up that data before you
run HCTS. The recommended method for running HCTS is to back up the entire test
system and reinstall the Solaris OS before you install and run HCTS.
If the test system contains more than one hard drive, data might be lost.
Any secondary disks that do not contain a slice mounted to /,
/usr, /opt, /var, or /export/home* are
formatted during a system certification or a storage certification.
If a disk is to be formatted, a warning is displayed during the initialization
period of the certification. You have 60 seconds to stop the certification if
you do not want the specified disks to be formatted.
When will I hear from Sun after the test results
are submitted?
In approximately five business days, depending on the demand for
certification services, you will be notified via email of your test result
audit. If your results cannot be confirmed, Sun will do the best to help you out in the
troubleshooting.
How secure is the HCTS and test results audit?
As the certification tests are conducted at your own facility, you
are protected by your own security measures during the certification process.
The certification process must be carried out on a non-production system on an
isolated network segment. Sun strongly suggests that you reinstall the systems
before using them for other work. Testing on systems in a production
environment is not recommended. All the test results and Certification agreements
sent to Sun are kept confidential, on file in a secure facility.
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System Certification:
How do I see which PC Manufacturers and System
Integrators have certified their systems?
See the Solaris OS: Hardware Compatibility Lists
(HCL).
How do I certify a 64-bit x86 system?
See System, Network, InfiniBand, WIFi, and Serial
I/O Test Environment Setup to install the Solaris OS and HCTS
on the System Under Test and start the system certification from the HCTS GUI
or from the HCTS CLI.
Be sure to submit 64-bit test results to the HCL.
Results from a 32-bit test run are not acceptable to certify a 64-bit system.
My system already has a very large memory size. Why does the test requires a large swap space?
This requirement comes from the I/O benchmark test bonnie. In order to test the real
disk I/O, it is necessary to allocate a large swap space to run an auxiliary program
to lock the surplus physical memory. The larger the system memory size, the larger the swap space required.
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Component Certification:
Does HCL accepts the virtual USB keyboard submission?
No. HCL does not accept submission of virtual USB keyboard.
Are any IHV component products already
certified?
Yes, the current list of certified products is on the
HCL.
Will the certified IHV drivers be integrated with
Solaris software?
Selected IHV drivers, which have passed extensive testing beyond the scope
of this program, are integrated with the Solaris OS.
Where can I buy the products listed on the Sun HCL?
The HCL now contains a wide range of Sun and
third-party products. Sun products are available through your normal Sun
reseller. For non-Sun products, contact the vendor directly.
Why are the progress meters of some WiFi test cases not accurate as other test cases?
The testcase progress meter in HCTS indicates the longest possible run time of a testcase. A WiFi connection has the characteristic of instability, and it will negotiate connection speed from time to time, based on the surrounding environment. It is possible that the testcases run in your environment for a much shorter time than the maximum allowed, so the progress meter seems not accurate. This does not affect the certification result.
When I start a WiFi certification by using the command hctscli certify WiFi in an automatic network setup mode, I received a warning message indicating that the HCTS randomly picks up one wireless network to connect. How do I make HCTS connect to the wireless network of my choice, with which I can do the certification test?
When WiFi certification is started using the command hctscli certify WiFi in an automatic network setup mode, the following error message is displayed:
You are running WiFi card (wireless NIC) test in automatic network setup mode without select target card to test and/or wireless network to connect to.
HCTS is going to test all detected WiFi cards. For each testable WiFi card, HCTS will randomly pick one wireless network to connect to.
If this is not what you want, stop the test now and modify HCTS settings.
If you just switched HCTS from manual network setup mode to automatic network setup mode, make sure you rescan the system before start a WiFi card test.
HCTS 4.1 CLI allows you to run a certification or test without selecting the device to run on. But there is no way for WiFi certification or test program to know which wireless network is the one that can communicate with the Test Manager (TM) if there is more than one wireless network which is not encrypted. In this case, you must select a wireless network to connect to. Otherwise, HCTS framework randomly picks up a wireless network and proceeds to the WiFi certification or test program, that might result in failure of the connection.
If you are using automatic network setup for WiFi certification or test, you can omit the selection of wireless network on CLI only when you are sure that each interface to be tested can find one wireless network which is not encrypted and can connect to the TM. In this case, all the detected WiFi cards are certified or tested.
Otherwise, use any of the following commands to customize and start the WiFi certification:
hctscli certify -d WiFi
or
hctscli test-component -d WiFi_IPv6
Use the following command to get the available wireless network IDs:
hctscli list-device WiFi|WiFi_IPv6
Other than the wireless network interface that is going to be certified, I have another wireless interface in SUT that was connected to an AP using static IP address before the beginning of the WiFi certification. But after the certification finished, I found that the wireless interface that was not involved in the testing was unplumbed. Why is the wireless interface not involved in testing has got affected and why would not it be restored?
It is most likely that the wireless network interface not involved in the testing is using an IP address which is in the same network segment that the HCTS uses. If an interface has an IP address which is in the same network segment that the HCTS uses, HCTS will unplumb that interface to avoid interference from it. You need to manually set up the wireless connection if needed. Be sure not to run this certification on a production system; only use this test on a machine dedicated for testing purposes.
The wireless network generated by my AP does not appear on the HCTS UI. What is the reason and how can I make it available on the UI for me to choose?
This is likely because the name of the wireless network contains special characters such as " and \. Check the WiFi probe log file in /opt/SUNWhcts/logs directory for more information. Some special characters have certain meanings in the the Solaris OS and will be handled differently. If such a character appears in the name of a wireless network, HCTS might behave abnormally. Although some special characters might be valid for your AP, it is highly recommended to use an alphanumeric string as the name of the wireless network for HCTS test. Refer to the Getting
Started Guide to see how to set up the WiFi testing environment.
If my system has more than one IB HCA, what can I do if I want to certify one of them?
Due to the function limitation of HCTS4.1 InfiniBand certification, you can certify only one IB HCA at a time. If there is more than one IB HCA in your system with the drivers in Solaris OS, none of them can be certified. You can take one of them down and restart the test to certify the remaining one.
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Troubleshooting:
Why does my monitor go black and frozen during the video test?
The xscreensaver process is in conflict with the video testcase. Please
execute the following command to stop 'xscreensaver' before running
the video test:
#pkill xscreensaver
Why did I get "syntax error" when I set a
string which has space(s) and/or tab(s) in it to a text type variable
using CLI even if I have used quote mark to quote the string?
This is a limitation in HCTS 4.1 CLI, for a text type variable. It
only accepts the string that does not have space or tab in it and even the quote mark will not
work in this case.
I added a network card after installing the Solaris OS.
Why is HCTS not including this card when I try to certify?
Do the following to add a new network card to a machine on which the Solaris OS is running:
Physically install the card in the machine.
Start the system.
Use either the drvconfig(1M) command or the
devfsadm(1M) command to tell the Solaris OS that a new network card
has been added. If you do not use one of these two commands, HCTS might be
unable to certify your newly added card because the system might have out-dated
hardware information. If the new card is still not recognized, reboot your
machine by using the following command to force the Solaris OS to update the
hardware information.
# reboot -- -r
How do I generate the package if I find that there is no package generated after the completion of test?
Check the file xtf.log that is located in /opt/SUNWhcts/diagnosis
directory. If "Not enough space" IOException is found in this file, add more swap space to the System Under
Test. Make sure that you have more than 2GB swap space. Restart your
test.
You can use either one of the following methods to add swap space to
the system:
Execute the following commands as user root:
# mkfile 2g /export/home/swap.file
# swap -a /export/home/swap.file
Note: If you reboot this system, the swap space added in this way will be lost.
Re-install the System Under Test and re-allocate the swap space.
Restart the test after adding the swap space.
You can generate the package manually by executing the pkg_result command.
For example:
#/opt/SUNWhcts/prgs/pkg_result /opt/SUNWhcts/package/ HCTS4.1_Test_Result
The package 'HCTS4.1_Test_Result.tar.gz' is generated in the /opt/SUNWhcts/package directory.
Why is my CD-ROM/DVD-ROM test running for so
long during the system certification?
The run time of the CD-ROM/DVD-ROM test fluctuates depending on the amount
of data on the disk that you are using for the test. The average run time that the
documentation shows for the CD-ROM/DVD-ROM test is based on using a nearly full
capacity CD. If you are using a full capacity DVD, the test can take up to 4
hours. In addition, you can use of the make_mixed_mode_cd utility that is available
at /opt/SUNWhcts/bin in order to create one mixed-mode CD that qualifies for
helping the certification process. See the HCTS man page for more information.
Why are my network settings not completely
restored when a test finishes?
HCTS is not recommended to be used on the productive systems. HCTS should only be
installed on a non-productive system on an isolated network segment.
The recommended method for restoring your test system is to reinstall the
Solaris OS after all the HCTS tests are completed.
To ensure HCTS to operate in a stable manner, not all the network
configuration is restored after a test has been finished. System configuration files
related to the network, network interfaces with static IPs, and the logical
interfaces attached to those static IP interfaces are restored. Other network
configuration, such as DHCP interfaces, can be restored by rebooting the system.
How can I connect my TM and SUT if I do not want
to use back-to-back network connections?
HCTS should only be installed on a non-productive system on an isolated
network segment.
HCTS uses a set of predefined IP addresses when automatically
configuring the network setup between the Test Manager system (TM) and the
System Under Test (SUT). See Step 5 under
Test Manager
System Setup for the description of these IP addresses. Any network devices
between the Test Manager system and the System Under Test must be configured to
allow these IP addresses.
What can I do if my TM and SUT fail to
connect?
In a two-system certification, if your network setup fails, use the
ifconfig command to check your interface connections.
On the TM, enter the following command to ensure that all the interfaces are
marked with the "RUNNING" flag:
# ifconfig -a
On the SUT, enter the following command for each interface to manually
plumb all the interfaces:
# ifconfig interface_name plumb
Finally, use ifconfig -a again to check whether all the interfaces are
marked with the "RUNNING" flag.
If at least one port is not marked "RUNNING," make sure the physical
connection is working for that port. Check the network cable and the LEDs on
the RJ45 jack.
Why is the SUT acting abnormally or hung after connecting
to the TM?
Make sure that the Test Manager system (TM) and the System Under Test (SUT) are
connected back-to-back or through a private switch. Make sure you have followed
all the instructions in
Two-System Setup.
If NIS was enabled on the System Under Test, make sure NIS is disabled before
the System Under Test is connected to the Test Manager system. See
Two-System Setup for
instructions on disabling the NIS.
Why is my NIC not detected? Why is my WiFi device detected as NIC?
HCTS might fail to detect some NICs that have non-standard class codes. Meanwhile, if a WiFi
device uses the standard class code of NIC (00020000), it will be detected as a NIC. In these cases,
you can gather information and send it to HCTS support as described in the following steps:
On the System Under Test, execute the following commands as user
root:
# /usr/sbin/prtconf -pv > prtconf.out
# /opt/SUNWhcts/prgs/bin/all_devices > all_devices.out
Attach these two files to an email message to
hcts-support@sun.com.
Why did the floppy test fail?
Your floppy drive might fail testing for one of the following reasons:
- No diskette is inserted into the floppy drive. Insert a writable diskette
into the diskette drive.
- You might have run into a known Solaris OS problem that causes
fdformat to fail.
Note that the floppy drive test is not required for any certification.
The ftpstress test case always fails when running OpenSolaris 2008.05 on the Test Manager system, what can I do?
Make sure this system has been set up as an HCTS Test Manager properly following the document instructions. Copy the file /lib/libsendfile.so.1 to the /export/home/ftp/lib/ directory.
Why does my storage test fail in spite of having a hard drive of more than 1 TB capacity? What can I do in this case?
The current labeling scheme of the Solaris OS on x86 platform does not support hard drives with the capacity of more than 1 TB. So when the HCTS storage test program tries to format this hard drive, it fails with the following error message:
Unable to create Solaris partition.
In this situation, you need to create a ZFS file system on this hard drive. For instance, if this hard drive is identified as c0t0d0 in Solaris OS, run the following commands in a terminal to create the ZFS file system and make it ready for HCTS testing:
zpool create hcts_pool /dev/dsk/c0t0d0
zfs create hcts_pool/test
mkdir -p /export/home_hcts_pool
zfs set mountpoint=/export/home_hcts_pool hcts_pool/test
Click the Rescan button on HCTS GUI. Restart the storage test when the rescan process is finished.
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Support:
How will Sun support systems listed on the
HCL?
Sun will support the Solaris OS on any system listed in the
HCL. For additional information, see the support
options on
Solaris
Operating System on x86 Support.
Will Sun support the driver used during
certification of my components?
Sun supports only those drivers that are integrated with the Solaris OS.
Third-party drivers are supported by the IHVs that have developed them.
What developer education and support is
available?
Sun Training offers Solaris
internals and driver development courses. Additional technical support is also
available through the
Solaris Developer Center
of the
Sun Developer Network web site.
See the Technical Articles library under the
Device Drivers category.
Is there any sample code available for IHVs who want
to start writing drivers for x86-based systems?
The following sites provide developer information and sample code:
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SPARC Based Systems:
How can peripherals be certified for SPARC
platforms?
Peripheral certification is available for SPARC based systems manufactured
by Sun and by the IHVs. For further details, visit the
I/O Technologies and Solutions
web site.
How do I write a driver that supports both SPARC and
x86-based systems?
Since the release of the Solaris 2.5.1 OS, it has been possible to
design device drivers to use a single source for SPARC and x86 platforms.
This source is independent of the architecture, and includes support for both
big-endian and little-endian binaries. More information is available at the
Driver Development
site and in the
Writing Device
Drivers book.
Why does not Sun offer certification for SPARC and
x86 platforms under a single program?
Certification and branding for SPARC-based systems is very different from
running the HCTS on x86-based systems. Therefore, different programs are
offered. Note that for peripheral devices, it is possible for third parties to
achieve Solaris Ready branding
for the Solaris OS running on both SPARC and x86 platforms.
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