Solaris runs Linux applications easily

Customers who want the stability and security of the Solaris Operating System and the flexibility to also use Linux applications won't have to wait much longer.

The forthcoming Solaris 10 Operating System will include a remarkable new feature that allows customers to run Linux applications unchanged on the Solaris OS. By enabling this functionality, code-named Project Janus, administrators can create an environment for running a range of Linux applications at near-native speeds.

Sun is offering Project Janus as an optional kernel service of the Solaris OS, enabling administrators to run Linux applications in a new and unique way on x86 platforms. In keeping with Sun's long-standing support of industry standards, Project Janus is designed for compliance with the Linux Standard Base specification.

Not only is Sun providing leading Linux compatibility, it's at no extra charge. Project Janus functionality is included in the Solaris 10 Operating System license price, and it is designed to be compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3. The technology includes installation tools to easily activate the feature of the Solaris 10 OS.

'With Project Janus, any company with a mix of Linux and Solaris applications can run them side by side on the same platform with the assurance that the underlying Solaris infrastructure will be stable and secure,' says Dr. Berny Goodheart, engineering project lead for Project Janus , Sun Microsystems.

Staying secure

The Solaris 10 OS contains a host of features, such as N1 Grid Containers technology, that contribute to a highly secure environment. With N1 Grid Containers, administrators can create more than 8000 secure, fault-isolated software partitions, or containers--each with its own IP address, memory space, file area, host name, and root password.

You can safely run Solaris and Linux applications side by side in the same container, or you can configure separate containers that isolate Solaris and Linux applications from each other and from system faults.

If an application fault occurs and the application needs to be restarted, other applications continue to run without interruption. Unlike technology previously available for running Linux in other non-Linux environments, Project Janus functionality is kernel-integrated and supported as an operating system feature.

Bottom-line benefits

Project Janus delivers all the benefits of the Solaris OS for your Linux applications. With this technology, customers can lower costs in numerous ways: by running Solaris and Linux applications on a single system, increasing server utilization, creating cross-platform development efficiencies, boosting porting flexibility, and lowering overall capital expenses.

Using Project Janus and N1 Grid Containers can lower administration and maintenance costs by reducing the number of systems that must be physically managed to run Solaris and Linux applications in your data center.

Project Janus increases server utilization because multiple Solaris and Linux workloads can run on the same system simultaneously. Customers can further increase utilization by scheduling a single system to run Solaris and Linux applications at different times. The feature has a nominal (5 percent or less) impact on performance.

With the technology, developers can simplify cross-platform development and save time by writing and testing Solaris and Linux applications on the same system without the need to reboot.

Developers can use the new Solaris 10 OS tools such as the dynamic tracing framework (DTrace) to vastly improve their ability to observe the performance and interaction between the kernel, the operating system, and the application.

Sun now offers parallel development tools with Sun Studio 9 software available on Linux as well, making it easier for development in both Solaris and Linux environments with a common development tool interface.

Project Janus also allows customers to strategically decide when to port applications to the Solaris OS. Before porting is complete, customers can continue to run selected Linux applications on Solaris for x86 platforms unchanged.

Project Janus helps lower capital costs because customers don't need to purchase additional hardware to migrate to Solaris OS. They can continue to run existing Linux applications on the same system while making the transition to Solaris OS.

Application momentum

What Linux applications run on the Solaris 10 OS with Project Janus enabled? Sun has used a range of applications, including the Opera browser, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Hancom Office, BEA WebLogic Server, Oracle Database Server, the StarOffice 7 software, Samba, and Apache.

There's no stopping the momentum of the Solaris 10 OS, particularly with features provided like Project Janus. 'Sun continues to promote open standards and provide customers with choice,' says Goodheart.

'Project Janus eases the hassles of heterogeneous data centers by enabling the integration of multiple hardware architectures and systems, the use of common development platforms, and the easy porting of applications between various environments.'

Project Janus is just one way Sun is helping customers protect their investment in Sun technology, while leveraging the benefits of Linux and the open source developer community.