booting solaris
 

I've got a solaris 8 box and each time it boots, an error message pops up saying that the Xsession cannot be displayed. Is there a way to boot into run level 3, similar to linux? Thanks.

You just need to disable CDE: "dtconfig -d", run level have different roles between Solaris and Linux (and sometimes between Linux distros too).

Do you disable CDE prior to logging in?

You disable CDE whenever you want.

by the way, in solaris 8, rc3 is the default. However, rc3 in solaris is multi user mode with shared resources (includes gui, unless disabled). the gui loads in rc2 in /etc/rc2.d/S99dtlogin. be aware rc3 in linux not= rc3 in solaris

Correct, and even rc3 is linux is not always rc3 in linux ...
Some distros do not follow the same conventions.
Everyone agree on what are run levels 0, 1 and 6, but the other ones may vary.