Solaris 8 Migration Assistant 1.0 (Project Etude)

Dan Price announced that Solaris 8 Migration Assistant 1.0 (also known as Project Etude) is now available from Sun.

• Download and install the product (a free 90 day evaluation license is provided)
• The download site also includes a 560Mb Solaris 8 flash archive that can be used for testing
• A patch is also required. (127111)


• Browse the documentation online

BrandZ provides the framework to create non-global zones that contain non-native operating environments. Branded zones are used in the Solaris Operating System to run applications that cannot be run in a native environment. The brand described here is the solaris8 brand, Solaris 8 Branded Zones

• Read the FAQ

1. What is the Solaris 8 Migration Assistant?
2. What are the software components of the offering?
3. What are the service components of the offering?
4. Why is Solaris 10 support required?
5. How does the Solaris 8 Migration Assistant work?
6. What does this conversion tool do?
7. How does the Solaris 8 Container work?
8. Can you run multiple Solaris 8 Containers on the same system?
9. What are the benefits of using the Solaris 8 Migration Assistant?When should I use Solaris 8 Migration Assistant?
10. Will all of my Solaris 8 applications run with the Solaris 8 Migration Assistant?
11. Does this extend the support life of Solaris 8?
12. Sun guarantees that application binaries that run on previous releases of Solaris will continue to work on newer releases. If that's the case, why is Sun making the Solaris 8 Migration Assistant available?
13. What about patching?
14. Do all the Solaris 8 Containers need to be at the same patch levels?
15. Which Solaris 8 versions will be supported?
16. What software do I need on the source and target systems to do the installation?
    
17. Can I use Solaris 10 features such as ZFS, DTrace and Predictive Self Healing with the Solaris 8 Container?
18. Can a customer easily and safely implement this software?
19. How does the licensing work inside other virtualization technologies like Dynamic Domains?
20. How do I purchase Solaris 8 Migration Assistant Subscription?

• Learn more from Dan's previous blog entries about Etude (here, and here)

Dan's summary:

In a nutshell, the product provides a migration solution from Solaris 8 to Solaris 10 by creating a bridge between the two operating systems. You can perform P2V (physical-to-virtual) conversions of existing Solaris 8 systems, and drop those into Solaris 8 containers running on your Solaris 10 host.

Note that an annual license is required for this product. A valid Solaris 8 license is also required as is a Sun PS Enterprise Migration Implementation Service.