Learn more about the world's largest InfiniBand core switch - the Sun Datacenter Switch 3456 [19003]. For more on Sun's HPC innovations, listen to a podcast featuring Distinguished Engineer Josh Simons, who discusses the company's latest HPC technologies [19014].
Sign-up for an upcoming live Web chat with Sun engineers on the latest Sun/Microsoft interoperability [19018]
Interesting new OpenSolaris projects include CIFS Server and CIFS Client for Solaris [18957] and the Common Multiprotocol SCSI Target (COMSTAR) [19011]. In other OpenSolaris news: ZFS Automatic Snapshot Service 0.9 and Backup Service 0.2 are available [18936] as are Solaris Package Companion v0.7 [18954] and Fault Management Architecture Demo Kit [18935].
Security covers Sun's encryption strategies [18986], Distinguished Engineer Glenn Brunette's deconstruction of Solaris 10 OS security capabilities [19001], and the release of the UltraSPARC T2 cryptographic activation file [18969].
Find out more about the new Sun Netra ATCA Product Family in a November white paper [19000], Sun Blade T6320 SPARC Server Module [18968], and Sun Fire X4450 Intel Xeon-based x64 Server [18810].
Developer articles cover setting up PostgreSQL 8.2 on SXDE 9/07 to work with NetBeans 6.0 [18950], object-based storage device (OSD) support in the Solaris OS [18791], and deploying PHP5 runtime within the Sun Java System Web Server 7 [18951].
Sun is offering its new Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers with 64-thread UltraSPARC T2 processors free for 60 days. Evaluate the power of these servers that offer record-breaking performance at up to half the cost, up to a quarter of the space and up to half the power consumption.
Evaluate VMware VI3 and Solaris 10 Appliance for VMware risk free on the Enterprise Class Sun Fire X64 system of your choice: A Sun Fire X4600 M2 server, Sun Fire X4100 or a Sun Fire X4200 M2 server.
Sun has introduced the world's largest InfiniBand core switch, the Sun Datacenter Switch 3456. The total data throughput for the switch is 110,100 Gbps with a port-to-port latency of 700 nanosecond.
Sun showcased its latest HPC technologies and services at Supercomputing 2007. To learn more about the benefits and rationale behind some of these innovations, listen to a podcast featuring Solaris Engineering's Distinguished Engineer Josh Simons, who discussed these new technologies with Sun Vice President of Global Systems Engineering Hal Stern on an edition of Innovating@Sun.
Join a live web chat with Sun engineers on Sun/Microsoft Interoperability on November 28, 2007, at 10:30 a.m. EST, 15:30 London, 16:30 Paris, 17:30 Athens times. Explore results from three years of engineering partnership between Sun and Microsoft. Plus learn about Sun/Intel collaboration and new Sun x64 systems with Intel Xeon CPUs.
Sun and 11 other entities are collaborating in the construction of an underground data center in a worked-out coal mine in the Chubu region on Japan's Honshu island. Sun will contribute its signature Project Blackbox, which can typically provide 250 servers mounted in seven racks inside a standard 20-foot shipping container, as Chris Mellor, of Techworld reports. With T-series processors, Sun claims a single Blackbox can hold up to 2,000 cores, providing 8,000 simultaneous processing threads.
SNI Editor-in-Chief/CTO John J. McLaughlin posts items of interest to Sun Users on a
regular basis on his blog. A quick recap of John's posts for the last week, include Sun HPC ClusterTools 7.1, Sun at Supercomputing 2007, Java SE 6 u2 Performance - 75% Better SPECjbb2005, COMSTAR - Solaris as a SCSI (not iSCSI, SCSI) Target, Sun Datacenter Switch 3456, Open xVM Website and Deconstructing the Security Capabilities of the Solaris 10 OS.
Sun has donated server software source code that implements the Common Internet File System (CIFS) protocol, also known as Server Message Block (SMB), to facilitate Microsoft Windows interoperability. CIFS is the standard for Windows file sharing services. Two OpenSolaris projects have been launched to promote file-sharing between Windows and OpenSolaris, and improve the usefulness of OpenSolaris in data environments that serve NFS and CIFS clients.
The OpenSolaris Project: COMSTAR (Common Multiprotocol SCSI Target) is a software framework that allows a server running OpenSolaris to look like a SCSI storage array to another server. It features extensive LUN masking and mapping functions, multipathing across different transport protocols, multiple parallel transfers per SCSI command, a scalable design approach and works with generic HBAs.
Two new packages for ZFS -- Snapshots 0.9 and Backups 0.2 -- are available on Tim Foster's blog. The changes include additional GUI integration and some simple zenity tools that will allow users to configure services without having to use the command line. These will be found in the GNOME menu under "Administration" after install, Foster writes, including further instructions that some users may require in order to see the change.
Distinguished Engineer Glenn Brunette has published an updated version of the Solaris Package Companion (SPC), version 0.7, which is a small Korn shell script that helps users define relationships between Solaris metaclusters, clusters and packages, and their respective dependencies.
The OpenSolaris Fault Management Community is hosting the Solaris Fault Management Architecture (FMA) Demo Kit, consisting of a set of PERL and Korn shell scripts which implement an automated harness for executing FMA demos. A downloadable tarball is available for interested readers and can be extracted anywhere on the system. Additionally, Scott Davenport has added support for the UltraSPARC T1 and UltraSPARC T2 processors to the kit.
Jim Grisanzio, Tokyo-based OpenSolaris engineering community manager, identified the release of Project Indiana as OpenSolaris Developer Preview as the biggest current news for the community. He shared this information with Sun's Carolyn Wong. Project Indiana is also credited with having made the developer involvement easier through downloads of "Slim Install."
Yet again, Jim Laurent hefts his broadsword and resumes his now familiar dragon-slayer role, this time in the myth-busting blog,"Solaris FAQ: Myths and facts about Solaris swap space." He undertook this combat, he writes, because of the frequent questions put to him in his Sun OS Ambassador travels.
Sun HPC ClusterTools 7.1 is an update release of the integrated toolkit that allows developers to create and tune Message-passing Interface (MPI) applications that run on high performance clusters and SMPs. This latest version includes Sun's MPI library for Solaris x86/x64 and SPARC, Intel 32- and 64-bit support, improved parallel debugger support, PBS Pro validation, improved memory usage for communication and other bug fixes by the Open MPI community.
Sun Management Center (MC) provides in-depth monitoring and management capabilities for Sun enterprise servers on the Solaris Operating System (Solaris OS) and Linux. Its newest release, version 4.0, provides a better user experience, an improved and simplified installation experience, a seamless experience on SPARC and x86 hardware and more.
Gartner places Sun in the Leaders Quadrant for Web Access Management, 2H07. Companies earn this distinction based on strong products and strong year-over-year growth, ability to execute and completeness of vision.
A free download of CoolTuner 1.0.6 is accessible from the Sun Download Center. This software tool is designed to automatically tune an UltraSPARC T1- and now UltraSPARC T2-based system, applying patches and setting system parameters to bring these systems up to best practice recommendations.
The Sun White Paper "Enabling End-to-end 10 GB Ethernet in the Sun Netra ATCA Product Family" provides an overview of Sun's 10 Gbps Ethernet-enabled ATCA System Platform and blade offerings, outlining the company's new ecosystem of products and discussing how Sun's 10 Gbps Ethernet ASIC integrates deeply into its ATCA blades. The paper provides an architectural-level overview of the UltraSPARC T2 and AMD Opteron processor-powered ATCA blades, the 10 Gbps Ethernet ATCA switch, 10 Gbps Ethernet System Platform, Advanced Rear Transition Modules, and the carrier-grade software that can be used to enhance and manage the platform.
As of November 14, all Pick-to-Order (PTO) Assemblies of the Sun Blade T6320 SPARC Server Module have been made available. The T6320 offers extreme blade density, high I/O performance, many other key features and beneficial service plans.
Standard and XATO configurations for the Sun Fire X4450 are now generally available for what Sun calls the best enterprise class 4-socket x64 server in terms of performance, density and power efficiency. See a list of this server's features, key highlights, services as well as the supported processors, new features in Intel's core microarchitecture and Front Side Bus architecture.
Each week, we determine which articles have been most frequently referenced by logged-in subscribers to provide you with a list of the most popular articles for the last 4 issues. The top 10 articles for last week, Vol 117 Issue 2, were:
Sun's Q1 Report Seen from Jonathan Schwartz's Perspective [18975]
For a how-to on quickly setting up PostgreSQL 8.2 on Solaris Express Developer Edition (SXDE) 9/07 to make it work with NetBeans 6.0., click the link in the online version of this article for a two-command procedure that will give you what the blog calls the "perfect" combination.
Readers of Ramana Srikanth's Sun Developer Network blog will find an article that focuses on object-based storage device (OSD) support in the Solaris OS. Following a comparison of traditional file systems and OSD, Srikanth turns to an examination of the architecture of OSD in the Solaris Operating System (Solaris OS).
Sun Web Server team member Sriram Natarajan voices a preference for PHP5 runtime bundled with Cool Stack 1.2, which now includes FastCGI. Having this support within PHP5 runtime, he notes, allows PHP applications to be deployed on top of web servers like the Sun Java System Web Server 7 or Apache 2 worker MPM. His blog includes a quick run through on the steps involved in deploying the Cool Stack's PHP runtime within Sun Java System Web Server 7.
The next Java Mobile & Embedded Developer Days Conference is scheduled for January 23-24, 2008, in the Sun Santa Clara Campus Auditorium. VP and Sun Fellow James Gosling will be the keynote speaker. Register before November 30 and save $50.
Though it has become a truism, the Sun White Paper "Encryption Strategies: The Key to Controlling Data" does not hesitate to pronounce that, in the current and future digital era, deleting a file is not a viable means of controlling data. The focus in the paper is controlling access to data, rather than the data itself. The paper further outlines Sun’s encryption strategy, discusses the pros and cons of three possible encryption methods, and discusses the challenge of key management in an encrypted world.
Sun Distinguished Engineer Glenn Brunette leads the interested reader on a four-part journey through the undergrowth a determined hacker would have to penetrate in order to attain root access inside a Solaris 10 OS non-global zone. He calls the trip "Hack-Fu - Deconstructing the Security Capabilities of the Solaris 10 OS."
The UltraSPARC T2 IPSec cryptographic operations performed by the crypto hardware accelerator on the Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120/T5220 and the Sun Blade 6320 need to be activated by either downloading the activation file or ordering a CD. Under current U.S. export control laws, the activation file enabling IPSec is restricted.
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