> I have started to create a page to explain some of the jargon that is
> specific to Solaris and/or Sun but I'm stock on a few terms. Can some
> knowledgeable folk possibly have a look and reply here with definitions
> for those I've not got meanings for, and also check I've got the rest
> correct? The page is here:
>
> http://sites.google.com/site/solarium/solaris-jargon
>
Here are some key terms. The FCS or GA release and the ABI, the SPI and API.
I have always been curious what the difference was between FCS and GA. I
think that GA means General Availability and perhaps is the same as FCS.
The GA release of a given Solaris release may be considered to be the acid
test for anything that follows on that Solaris rev. For example, I have
Solaris 10 GA CDROM sets here that all say build 74L2a on them. I think
that "74L2a" is the rev of the WOS in the GA release. Let me show you an
example :
$ uname -a
SunOS mail0 5.10 Generic_118833-03 sun4u sparc SUNW,UltraSPARC-IIi-cEngine
$ cat /etc/release
Solaris 10 3/05 s10_74L2a SPARC
Copyright 2005 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Use is subject to license terms.
Assembled 22 January 2005
See the "s10_74L2a" there ? This is a GA or FCS ( someone clarify that
for me ) release of Solaris 10 that I installed back in early 2005. I
should point out that the machine is bullet proof and in production since
the day I installed it. Someday .. I may patch it again. Someday.
Why is GA or FCS important to me ? ( perhaps others also )
As a general rule, if a piece of software works as expected on the Solaris
N GA release then it is safe to assume that it will always work on Solaris
N regardless of the patches applied. If I am wrong I'd love to hear about
it. This is the golden rule of "trust Solaris to work forever" in which
software that works yesterday keeps working tomorrow even if you apply
patches.
As an extension to that concept of GA or FCS versions for the lowest
common denominator in software testing on a given Solaris rev I have also
made the assumption that the Solaris ABI can be trusted across versions of
Solaris from Solaris 8 upwards to Solaris 10. Possibly even further?
ABI == Application Binary Interface
see http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/817-4415/solarisabi-6?a=view
Two other terms often used in the Solaris programming world may be seen
here, taken from the Solaris 8 docs :
http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/806-4750/6jdqdflsg?l=en&a=view
Let me copy a bit of that here :
Each programming interface to Solaris is also "visible" to the developer
at two levels: source level and binary. When you see the acronyms API and
SPI, this indicates the source level programming interface to the system.
The terms Application Binary Interface (ABI) and System Binary Interface
(SBI) indicate the binary interfaces corresponding to the respective
source level programming interfaces. (Because the phrase "the ABI" can be
confused with other binary interfaces, the "Solaris ABI" is refered to
only by name.)
so SPI is "system programming interface".
you may know that API is the "application programming interface".
So what is the importance of this ?
Here is an excerpt from the Solaris 8 docs :
Interface Functions
The SunOS 5.0 through 5.8 functions discussed in this
manual are the interfaces between the services provided
by the kernel and application programs.
The absolute greatest thing about Solaris ( to me ) is that your software
works today and tomorrow for any given amount of "tomorrow" that you want
to toss on there. This is why I have GA releases and very old Solaris
machines running in my server farm. Note that the SunOS revs mentioned
above are from 5.0 through 5.8 and we could extend that to 5.11 perhaps.
If you wrote code that compiles and runs on the earliest Solaris revs then
there is good reason to *think* it will run forever.
Hopefully someone can define the term "SunOS" as it relates to "Solaris".
For testing purposes I have this :
$ uname -a
SunOS apophis 5.8 Generic sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-5_10
$ cat /etc/release
Solaris 8 s28_38shwp2 SPARC
Copyright 2000 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Assembled 21 January 2000
There are no patches on that box and it *may* be running the GA/FCS
release of Solaris 8. There were major releases of Solaris 8 at June 2000
and also October 2000 as Solaris 8 6/00 and Solaris 10/00 respectively. I
can not find anything earlier other than Solaris 8 beta CDROMs and thus I
think that WOS version of "s28_38shwp2" is the lowest common denominator.
So there we have some terms for you as well as my interpretation of what
they mean. Hopefully others can clarify where I am wrong for our mutual
edification :-)
--
Dennis Clarke
http://www.blastwave.org
ps: I still have Solaris 2.5.1 x86 also but that is really pushing the
limits.
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