LXer: Transition to AIX from Solaris
 

Published at LXer:

Need to know how to work with partitioning and virtualization? Want to know the differences between WPARs and zones and how the process differs from creating zones and WPARs? Have your questions addressed with this article and make your transition easier.

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Hmm, what is the point moving from a free and open source technology running on commodity hardware to a closed source one that runs only on proprietary hardware ?

This article is also carefully ignoring several features and advantages zones and Solaris have compared to WPAR / AIX ...

AIX LPARS WPARs
 

AIX Power5 / Power6 is an open architecture. PowerVM Lx86. you can actually load an off the shelf RHEL OS. Solaris linux is built into the Sun OS. Sun Linux Kernal support is only at Red Hat Enterprise 3. again, the dependency for Sun and SLA with ISV's is something I want to stay away from. From the books it looks good - once you get under the covers, lots of grey. if you need L Kenrel 2.6 or greater Sun is not your choice.

Try going to the ibm.com site plenty of read books ( a wealth of info )
See Getting started with PowerVM Lx86
Introduction to Work Load Partitioning and management
IBM advanced Virtualization best practices
introduction to LPARS .... etc..

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/ai...y/au-workload/

Transition from Sun to AIX
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/ai...ry/au-solaris/

AIX is closed source, non free and proprietary.
Power architecture is indeed open as being backed by a independant organization. However, I doubt the specifications are free to implement without some sort of royalties so it's still proprietary to me.
For an Open Source Initiative compliant CPU architecture (GPL'd), have a look there:
http://www.opensparc.net/
Correct
Indeed, and that is one of its strenghts as it can benefit some Solaris kernel features not available under the Linux one, like dtrace and ZFS.
But it is known to run several other Gnu/Linux distributions.
Using PowerVM Lx86 is a more vendor dependant solution in my opinion.
Looks fud to me.
Kernel 2.6 support with brandz is a work in progress: http://opensolaris.org/os/community/...odo/linux_2_6/

Moreover, LX Branded zones aren't the only solution to run Linux binaries in or along a Solaris environment.
You can run Linux kernel 2.6.23 and newer at native CPU speed (not like Lx86 bytecode translation) with UltraSPARC T based LDoms.
You can run Linux distributions under Xen (xVM).
All of these technologies a freely downloadable, are free for personal, educational and commercial use and are open sourced.
All but LDoms do run on cheap no-name PCs.
The alternative solution you promote is far from that.

Moreover, you'll soon be able to run Linux under VirtualBOX on top of Solaris too. Beta available here: http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads

Agree and Disagree on some respects but it is all perspective
 

Thanks!

Also, the PowerVM Lx86 is the x86 linux translator that allows most linux binaries to run without modification - where it is an additional layer / software that translates x86 instructions to POWER instructions. It transforms x86 calls into calls to the POWER linux kernel. This is what IBM refers to as compile and go, however, I wouldn't use it. There is no need. It would also have addition performance degradation. It is an offering that is not really used much at all.

The Power cpu's have the latest release of RHEL kernal. RH and IBM Power are in sync. And you can run off the shelf RHEL in an LPAR or WPAR to run your linux apps.

I agree and disagree, I had run into some short comings say moving to the Sun T5220 architecture that I could not move forward with my projects, which is really simply a matter of getting there. Unfortunately I can't wait. Ideally LDOM/LPAR /container/WPAR micro-partitioning and all other features - matter of taste, need and perspective.

I did also run into a problem planning for HA with the Geographic clustering for this new Sun architecture in that it does not support clustering on the LPAR app level. That is a situation for me. however, Sun speaking, .. they believe it will be in the next release.

Thanks - do know anything about VMware ? ESX and GSX ?