x86: PXE Network Boot

The x86 pre-boot execution environment (PXE) enables you to boot a Solaris x86 system directly from the network without using the Solaris boot diskette. The x86 system must support PXE. On a system that supports PXE, enable the system to use PXE by using the system's BIOS setup tool or the network adapter's configuration setup tool. The Solaris boot diskette is available for the systems that do not support this feature.

For further information, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Longer Package Names

The pkgmk utility can now be used to create packages with names up to 32 characters in length. See the pkgmk(1) and pkgadd(1M) man pages.

Installation From the Solaris DVD

You can now install the Solaris operating environment and additional software from the Solaris DVD. The DVD enables you to perform either a Solaris™ Web Start installation or a custom JumpStart installation. The Solaris DVD includes the Solaris software, ExtraValue software, and the Solaris documentation.

For detailed instructions, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Solaris Web Start Program Uses sysidcfg File

The Solaris Web Start program has been modified to use the sysidcfg file to configure system information during an installation or upgrade. Create a sysidcfg file with configuration information for your system. With this file in place, the Solaris Web Start program does not prompt you to enter the system information during installation.

For detailed instructions, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Enhancements to the Solaris Web Start Program

The Solaris Web Start program was updated to enable you to perform the following functions during the Solaris installation or upgrade:

• Select to automatically reboot the system after installation

• Select to automatically eject the CD or DVD after installation

• Select to preserve file systems

For detailed instructions, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Additions to Time Zone Selections

The number of time zones that are available in the Solaris 9 operating environment has dramatically increased. When you install the Solaris operating environment, you can select time zones by geographic region. The time zone selections in the lists of continents and countries have been expanded.

For detailed instructions, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Solaris Web Start Wizards SDK 3.0.1

Solaris Web Start Wizards™ SDK simplifies the installation, setup, and administration of native Solaris, Java, and non-Java applications. With Solaris Web Start Wizards software, developers can copackage both Solaris versions and Microsoft Windows versions of their applications. The installation wizard manages the platform specifics.

The Web Start Wizards SDK 3.0.1 is now included with the Solaris 9 release. SDK 3.0.1 can be installed by using the Solaris Web Start program.

New Boot Options for a Custom JumpStart Installation

New options have been added for use with the boot command when you perform a custom JumpStart installation.

With the boot command, you can specify the location of the configuration files to use to perform the installation. You can specify a path to an HTTP server, an NFS server, or a file that is available on local media. If you do not know the path to the files, you can require that the installation program prompt you for the path. The prompt is displayed after the machine boots and connects to the network.

The nowin option enables you to specify that the custom JumpStart program not begin the X program. You do not need to use the X program to perform a custom JumpStart installation. You can shorten the installation time by using the nowin option.

For detailed instructions about how to use these new options, refer to "Custom JumpStart Installation (Topics)" in Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Upgrading Mirrors

The Solaris 9 release now supports operating environment upgrades of root mirrors and metadevices that were created by the Solaris Volume Manager, formerly Solstice DiskSuite. If you are upgrading a system that has a metadevice that was created by the Solaris Volume Manager, you no longer need to edit the system's vfstab. The root mirror is detected, and the operating environment on the mirror is upgraded. This process runs just as in a typical upgrade without metadevices.

Default Routing With System Identification Utilities

The system identification utilities automatically attempt to determine the default router during installation.

For installation information, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Configuration With System Identification Utilities

During system identification, the system identification utilities can configure systems to be LDAP clients. Prior Solaris releases allowed the configuration of a machine only as an NIS, NIS+, or DNS client.

For installation information, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

Patch Analyzer

The Patch Analyzer is now available when you use the Solaris Web Start program to upgrade to a Solaris Update release. The Patch Analyzer performs an analysis on your system. This analysis determines which patches would be removed or downgraded by an upgrade to a Solaris Update release. You do not need to use the Patch Analyzer when you upgrade to the Solaris 9 release.

For further installation information, see the Solaris 9 4/04 Installation Guide.

System Performance Enhancements

The Solaris 9 release includes the following system performance enhancements.

SPARC: Multiple Page Size Support

Multiple Page Size Support (MPSS) allows a program to use any hardware-supported page sizes to access portions of virtual memory. Previously, only 8-KB pages were available on UltraSPARC platforms for a program's stack, heap, or anonymous memory mapped with mmap().

You can use MPSS to run legacy applications with specific memory page size settings where the applications benefit from this sort of performance tuning. The use of larger page sizes might significantly improve the performance of programs that intensively use large amounts of memory.

For more information, see the man pages pagesize(1), mpss.so.1(1), ppgsz(1), and mmap(2).

Improved Multithreading Library

This release includes an improved and faster multithreading library, which was available as the alternate libthread in previous Solaris software releases.

For further information, see the Multithreaded Programming Guide and the threads(3THR) man page.

Solaris Network Cache and Accelerator (NCA)

The Solaris Network Cache and Accelerator (NCA) has been improved with the addition of a sockets interface to NCA. Any web server can, with minimal modifications, communicate with NCA through this sockets interface. See Networking Enhancements.

SPARC: Performance Improvement for Servers

Enhancements have been made to the algorithm that controls virtual pages and physical pages and how the pages are cached. These enhancements deliver increased system performance of around 10% for general user loads in servers.

Dynamic Intimate Shared Memory (DISM)

Dynamic Intimate Shared Memory (DISM) allows a database to dynamically extend or reduce the size of the shared data segment. This feature eliminates the misconfiguration problem and denial-of-service security vulnerability of Intimate Shared Memory (ISM).

The ISM is a shared memory segment that consists of large locked memory pages. The ISM number of locked pages remains constant or unchanged. Dynamic ISM (DISM) is pageable ISM shared memory, where the number of locked pages is variable or changeable. Therefore, the DISM supports releasing or adding more physical memory to the system during dynamic reconfiguration. The size of the DISM can span available physical memory plus disk swap.

See the man page shmop(2).

Note - Large-page support is available for DISM in the Solaris 9 9/02 Update release. For a description of this large-page support, see SPARC: Dynamic Intimate Shared Memory (DISM) Large-Page Support.

Server and Client Management

The Solaris 9 release includes the following enhancements for server and client management.