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Solaris is a UNIX-based† operating system made by Sun MicroSystems that runs on Sun SPARC and Intel/Cyrix/AMD Pentium.
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“SunOS (1.x - 4.x) is Sun’s original, BSD-based Unix. Solaris 2.x is Sun’s newer, System V Release 4-based Unix. Which means it has STREAMS networking, System V interprocess communication, and so on, as well as some SunOS compatibility libraries so it can still run SunOS software. Solaris 1.x — this is the part where it gets confusing — is the same as SunOS 4.x.” —Chris Hansone55
“Sun OS is basically all the “real unix” stuff. Solaris is a bundling of Sun-OS with all the “window dressing” (pun intended) like CDE (Common Desktop Environment) a.k.a. the GUI, and other OS “accessories” like a Web browser, etc.” —Greg T. Loosee57
Intended purpose
server/mainframe: medium to large scale servers; corporate databases; supercomputers
desktop/workstation: workstations (for those with UNIX familiarity)
handheld: not appropriate
real time: not appropriate
Kind of OS: proprietary System V Release 4-based UNIX†e55
“SunOS is part of Solaris. Current versions of SunOS were originally based on the AT&T SVR4.0 flavor of Unix. Since then it has diverged. SunOS is compliant with the Open Group’s Unix 98 specifications (http://www.UNIX-systems.org/).” —Greg Onufere68
Current Version: 8e116
Cost: $695 single user or 5-user licensew40
Hardware Supported: Sun SPARC, Intel/Cyrix/AMD Pentium, Intel 486DXw28
Maximum Number of Processors: 64e64
“SunOS 4 supports 1 processor per system except in some very old configurations (4/6xx series machines with slow processors). SunOS 5 supports up to 64 processors in a single box (the E10000, for example).” —Greg Onufere64
“Digital UNIX continues to dominate the 64-bit arena, leaving HP-UX and IRIX to contest the second position, followed closely by AIX. Solaris and NT trail significantly behind. Solaris does not yet provide support for 64-bit processes, so it falls somewhat further behind and potential compatibility issues remain largely unknown. Still, Sun has migrated over half its product line to 64-bit hardware, and provides support for large amounts of physical memory, both of which are still missing from NT.” —D.H. Brown Associatesw43
Kernel: proprietary
POSIX: compatible
Peripherals: “all current Sparc peripherals, some PC peripherals” —Kristian Elof Sørensenw36
www.novalink.com/freeport-express “FreePort Express is a binary translator (running on Alpha) which permits you to convert your SunOS 4.1.x (same as Solaris 1.x) user executables into Digital UNIX executables in minutes. FreePort Express runs under Digital UNIX V3.0 or later, and is available FREE of charge (hence the name).”w55
Text Command Shell: UNIX shells
User Interface (graphic): Common Desktop Environment (CDE)e57
Businesses and organizations with servers powered by Solaris: AccountOnline.com, AllHealth.com, Amiga.org, Andover.net, AOL (America On Line), Apple Computers (also uses Mac OS X Server), Aria.com, AT&T, BabyCenter.com, BillGates.com, BMGMusicService.com, CNN (Cable News Network), CNNSI.com, Discovery.com, Disney.com, Epicurious.com, Equifax, E-Trade.com, FoodTV.com, General Electric, General Motors, GetSmart.com, Java.Sun.com, MacroMedia, More.com, MTV, MyCoupons.com, nCipher, Netscape, NYTimes.com, Oracle, OurHouse.com, Penthouse, PepsiCo, Playboy, Shockwave.com, SportsLine.com, Sun MicroSystems, Virgin.com, WashingtonPost.com, Weather.com, WhiteHouse.gov, W3.orgw52
ftp://ftp.eng.auburn.edu/pub/doug/ “bootp-DH2.x” free, patched CMU BOOTP-DD2.4.x server from Doug Hughes of auburn.edu. Supports DHCP, even for Win95 clients. Adds the patches from the Samba mailing list to support PCNFS and Win95 simultaneously. For SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x, Linux, and NetBSD servers.
http://www.isc.org/products/DHCP “Internet Software Consortium DHCP Server, Client, and Relay agent” freely redistributable tools: source builds on most Unix platforms, Mac, NeXTStep, and Rhapsody.
http://www.princeton.edu/~irwin/dhcpd.html “Princeton Patches to CMU dhcpd 3.3.7” free software provides DHCP, bootp, tftp, true dynamic IP addresses, and reporting tool for NetBSD and Solaris.
http://www.join.com “JOIN DHCP/DDNS” commercial integrated DHCP and DDNS servers from Join Systems for DHCP and BootP clients running on SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x SPARC and x86, Digital UNIX, HP-UX 10.x using Motif GUI, evaluation copies available online.
http://www.baynetworks.com/Products/nav/f_netid_3_0.html “NetID” commercial DHCP/DDNS server from Bay Networks that runs on Solaris, HP-UX, Windows NT 4.0, and Windows 95; links into Oracle and Sybase, with tools for managing IP addresses.
Sun follows, with good support for NFS functions and the second-place array of TCP/IP extensions. However, Sun relies on its own Web server, rather than Netscape, Microsoft or Apache, and lacks authoring tools as well as important services such as Novell’s NDS directory service.” —Digital Equipment Corporation, “AIX 4.3 Leaps To 64-Bits In Dead Heat With Digital UNIX 4.0”w51
See also chart of internet features.
Other:
“Yesterday’s college students learned their Unix expertise on Linux and FreeBSD. Today they’re working in IT departments, and many of them are openly hostile to both Microsoft and Windows NT. As a result, Linux, BSD, Solaris, and other forms of Unix are finding their way into IT departments, both overtly and on the sly.” —Nicholas Petreley, “The new Unix alters NT’s orbit”, NC Worldw74
“Solaris 2.6 scores moderately well in system management and PC interoperability, but falls short in remaining areas. The operating system is unable to match many useful line-item features found in other systems that have benefited from a massive investment.” —D.H. Brown Associatesw42
(for your convenience, look for this symbol 
marking passages about Solaris)
Please send recommendations on additional URLs to Milo.
http://www.sun.com/solaris/index.html “Sun Solaris”
http://docs.sun.com on-line documentation of Solaris
http://www.stokely.com (“We have tons of Solaris info at http://www.stokely.com.”—Celeste Stokely)e6
http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/products.html “UNC’s Sunsite repository”
http://www.unixguide.net/unixguide.shtml “UNIXguide.net (AIX, FreeBSD, HP-UX, LINUX, SOLARIS & Tru64)”; a guide for comparable commands and directories in several popular forms of UNIX.
http://home.earthlink.net/~bhami/rosetta.html “Rosetta Stone for Unix”; a guide for comparable commands and directories in several popular forms of UNIX (AIX, Darwin, DG-UX, FreeBSD, HP-UX, IRIX, Linux, NetBSD, OpenBSD, SCO OpenServer, Solaris, SunOS, Tru64, and ULTRIX).
HP-UX/Sun Interoperability Cookbook: a detailed comparison of commands, OS calls, data structures, directories, and other parts of Sun-OS and HP-UX, especially for those going from one OS to the other.
SunOS to HP-UX 9.05 Porting Guide: a detailed comparison of commands, OS calls, data structures, directories, and other parts of Sun-OS and HP-UX, especially for those going from one OS to the other.
ftp://ftp.eng.auburn.edu/pub/doug/ “bootp-DH2.x” free, patched CMU BOOTP-DD2.4.x server from Doug Hughes of auburn.edu. Supports DHCP, even for Win95 clients. Adds the patches from the Samba mailing list to support PCNFS and Win95 simultaneously. For SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x, Linux, and NetBSD servers.
http://www.isc.org/products/DHCP “Internet Software Consortium DHCP Server, Client, and Relay agent” freely redistributable tools: source builds on most Unix platforms, Mac, NeXTStep, and Rhapsody.
http://www.princeton.edu/~irwin/dhcpd.html “Princeton Patches to CMU dhcpd 3.3.7” free software provides DHCP, bootp, tftp, true dynamic IP addresses, and reporting tool for NetBSD and Solaris.
http://www.rite-group.com/consulting/solaris_dhcp.html “Setting up a Solaris DHCP Client”
http://www.rite-group.com/consulting/solaris_nat.html “Setting up NAT on Solaris using IP Filter”
http://www.zdjournals.com/sun/9905/sun9951.htm “xDSL and cable modems in a Solaris home network”
http://home.austin.rr.com/sunhelp/rr/solarisrr.html “How to Setup your Solaris 2.5, 2.6, or Solaris 7 system for use with Austin’s RoadRunner service by Time Warner” using rrlogin, Perl, DHCP, MD5.
Stokely’s Sun System Administrator FAQ links
http://www.linuxrx.com/WS_Linux/OS_comparison.html “The Linux resource exchange — Operating systems comparison” LINUX, HPUX, Windows NT, BSDi, FreeBSD, IRIX, Digital UNIX, Solaris, Macintosh, OS/2, UnixWare, OpenServere83
http://www.unix-vs-nt.org/ John Kirch’s article “Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0 versus UNIX”
http://www.dhbrown.com/pdfs/osscorecard.html “Operating System Scorecard — D.H. Brown Associates”
http://www.join.com “JOIN DHCP/DDNS” commercial integrated DHCP and DDNS servers from Join Systems for DHCP and BootP clients running on SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x SPARC and x86, Digital UNIX, HP-UX 10.x using Motif GUI, evaluation copies available online.
http://www.baynetworks.com/Products/nav/f_netid_3_0.html “NetID” commercial DHCP/DDNS server from Bay Networks that runs on Solaris, HP-UX, Windows NT 4.0, and Windows 95; links into Oracle and Sybase, with tools for managing IP addresses.
For more UNIX book listings, see also the general book listings on the UNIX web page.
If you want your book reviewed, please send a copy to: Milo, POB 1361, Tustin, CA 92781, USA.
Price listings are for courtesy purposes only and may be changed by the referenced businesses at any time without notice.
A Practical Guide to the Unix System; by Mark G. Sobell; Addison-Wesley Pub Co; October 1994; ISBN 0805375651; paperback; 800 pages; $37.95
Solaris 2.X: System Administrator’s Guide (J. Ranade Workstations); by S. Lee Henry, John R. Graham, Lee S. Henry; Computing McGraw-Hill; October 1994; ISBN 0070293686; paperback; 320 pages; $38.36
Essential System Administration: Help for Unix System Administrators (Nutshell Handbook); 2nd edition; by Aeleen Frisch; O’Reilly & Associates; December 1996; ISBN 1565921275; paperback; 788 pages; $27.96
Universal Command Guide; by Guy Lotgering (UCG Team); Hungry Minds, Inc; April 2002; ISBN 0764548336; hardcover with CD-ROM; 1,600 pages; $69.99; cross references all of the commands from: AIX; Solaris; RedHat Linux; Berkeley BSD; NetWare 3.2, 4.11, 5, and 6; DOS 6.22; Windows 95, 98, ME, XP, NT 4 Workstation, NT 4 Server, NT 4 Terminal Server, 2000 Professional, 2000 Server, 2000 Advanced Server; Citrix Mainframe 1.8; and Mac 9
The Complete Guide to Netware 4.11/Intranetware; 2nd edition; by James E. Gaskin; Sybex; December 1996; ISBN 078211931X; paperback; $47.99; includes information on getting NetWare working with Windows, Macintosh, UNIX, and OS/2
Building a Unix Internet Server; by George Eckel; New Riders Publishing; June 1995; ISBN 1562054945; paperback (with CD-ROM); 325 pages; $30.40
Solaris 2.X: Internals and Architecture (J. Ranade Workstation); by John R. Graham; McGraw Hill Text; July 1995; ISBN 0079118763; paperback (with disk); 222 pages; $49.00
Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment (Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series); by W. Richard Stevens; Addison-Wesley Pub Co; June 1992; ISBN 0201563177; hardcover; 744 pages; $63.95
If you want your book reviewed, please send a copy to: Milo, POB 1361, Tustin, CA 92781, USA.
“If you’re a UNIX user, all UNIX are pretty much the same. If you’re a UNIX programmer, all UNIX are a little bit different. If you’re a UNIX system admin, all UNIX are completely different! That’s comming from ULTRIX, AIX, HP-UX, Solaris, and Digital UNIX experiences. Might as well count linux, too.” —Bob Koehler, Hubble Space Telescope Payload Flight Software Team
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A web site on dozens of operating systems simply can’t be maintained by one person. This is a cooperative effort. If you spot an error in fact, grammar, syntax, or spelling, or a broken link, or have additional information, commentary, or constructive criticism, please e-mail Milo. If you have any extra copies of docs, manuals, or other materials that can assist in accuracy and completeness, please send them to Milo, PO Box 1361, Tustin, CA, USA, 92781.
If you have an extra or unwanted copy of any official manuals or documentation on this operating system, please send them to: Milo, POB 1361, Tustin, CA 92781, USA. I have the following items: NONE.
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†UNIX used as a generic term unless specifically used as a trademark (such as in the phrase “UNIX certified”). UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, licensed exclusively through X/Open Company Ltd.
Names and logos of various OSs are trademarks of their respective owners.
Copyright © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 Milo
Last Updated: April 19, 2002
Created: June 22, 1998
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