Q: Are Solaris 8 Containers and Solaris 9 Containers the same thing?

A: They provide the same basic functionality but are not interchangeable. Sun offers a support subscription for each.

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Q: Do Solaris 8 Containers run on x86 systems?

A: Solaris 8 (or 9) Containers only run on SPARC systems.

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Q: Is there a performance penalty?

A: Solaris 8 (or 9) Containers do not perform instruction emulation, but they do perform system call translation. The performance overhead is typically 0-5% when running on the same hardware. On newer, more powerful hardware, the performance increase of the hardware should greatly outweigh the performance overhead of the system call translations.

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Q: Once the Solaris 8/9 server images are moved into the Solaris 10 branded Solaris 8/9 Containers, can these images be patched, with stuff like security patches, for their respective OS's? Could you apply a Solaris 9 rec/sec patch bundle to the Solaris 9 branded container/zone to satisfy the security folks, as an example? Or can you never apply another patch to that server/zone?

A: Yes, you can apply normal Solaris 8 patches to a Solaris 8 Container, and Solaris 9 patches to a Solaris 9 Container. You would use the same steps you use now to patch Solaris 8 and 9 systems.

Further, almost all of the current management processes that you use to manage Solaris 8 and Solaris 9 systems can be used, unchanged, in Solaris 8 and Solaris 9 Containers. As another example, you can telnet to a Solaris 8 Container, ftp a package into the Container, and use pkgadd to add it.

Steve - June 11, 2008 Back to top

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Q: What can I do if I need to install a Solaris 8 kernel patch after migrating to the Solaris 8 Container?

A: You can install the Solaris 8 kernel patch in a Solaris 8 Container. This will modify the appropriate files and resolve patch dependencies.

Man Lai - June 12, 2008 Back to top

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Q: Once you've created a Solaris 8 or 9 Container on a Solaris 10 host, can you upgrade the container to the Solaris 10 OS? With a CD for example?

A: Although a Solaris 8 or 9 Container can be patched, it cannot be upgraded to be a Solaris 10 Container. A new Solaris 10 Container must be created, applications must be installed into it, and data moved over. Solaris 8/9 Containers provide the ability to quickly move to the Solaris 10 OS while reducing the number of variables being changed at one time.

Marilyn Hughes - June 13, 2008 Back to top

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Q: Can a Solaris 8 Container be used for developmental work, such as building libraries and applications?

A: Yes, this is an ideal use for Solaris 8 Containers. If you continue to use the same development tools, the binaries that are produced in a Solaris 8 Container will be just like the binaries produced in a Solaris 8 system.

Sridhar - June 16, 2008 Back to top

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Q: Why do I need to use containers? I have been compiling on the Solaris 8 or 9 OS and running on Solaris 10 OS with no problems. Have I just been lucky, or are you talking about a different situation?

A: The Solaris OS has a binary compatibility guarantee which, as you demonstrate, removes the need to re-compile an application for Solaris 10. Solaris 8/9 Containers provide value where:

• The application does not follow the rules of the Solaris API, e.g. applications which use undocumented kernel interfaces.
• The application includes non-binary components, e.g. shell scripts, which ran correctly on Solaris 8 but do not run as intended on Solaris 10. A classic example is installation scripts which compare the system's Solaris version number (e.g. 10) to a fixed number (e.g. 8) in order to determine if the installed version of Solaris is "new enough". But using a simple ASCII string comparison, the first character of "10" is 'less than' the first character of "8" and the application fails to install, for no good reason.

There are other situations where Solaris 8/9 Containers are valuable. A common example is corporations that have computer policies requiring re-certification of applications on a new operating system version. If the corporation is upgrading many servers at one time, there may be insufficient time to re-certify all of the applications. Using Solaris 8/9 Containers may enable the hardware upgrades to happen quickly, but allow time, at a later date, for the re-certifications.

Bob McNaughton - June 17, 2008 Back to top

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Q: Can my zonepaths be in ZFS for a Solaris 9 Container? Will the Solaris 9 zone just see it as UFS?

A: Yes, you can use ZFS as the underlying storage for a Solaris 9 Container (or for a Solaris 8 Container). Generally, a zone doesn't know what file system type its zonepath is on.

Bill - June 17, 2008 Back to top

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Q: We use a third-party telecoms SS7 network product that uses PCI cards for RJ48c connections (SS7 TDM connections). As well as drivers for the card residing in the kernel, some processing of the network traffic is also accomplished via kernel drivers. The drivers are loaded dynamically when the application starts. Is it feasible to use this product (Ulticom Signalware) in a Solaris 9 Container on, for example, a T5220 running the Solaris 10 OS?

A: Kernel drivers cannot be installed from within a Solaris 9 Container. If Signalware has a new version of the driver that will run on the Solaris 10 OS, the driver can be installed in the global zone, and the application can run in the Solaris 9 Container.

David Lloyd - June 17, 2008 Back to top

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