Outside Links
Items on this page are resources that I think are important enough that I
want a quick reference to, whereever I am. With possibly one exception,
they are all solaris related.
Sadly, at this point, they are all very old. Mostly written around 2000. But keeping this stuff for
historical purposes.
Informative Pages
Non-solaris info:
(Just cause ABit doesnt seem to have a download site any more) If youre
looking for a user manual for the ABit BP6,
download it here
Really important Sun links
.... I used to have a collection of obscure but really useful links directly inside sun.com URLS here.
But since oracle bought sun,their website under .sun.com no longer functions :(
I used to have links for things like the following
-
Order media for $75 ($45 for intel)
-
Freeware
Binaries: Sun's "Companion CD", that either comes with the solaris
media, or you can download an ISO image.
- Solaris Fingerprints Database:
If you're wondering if an executable has been compromised, compare its
checksum against the official ones for all solaris executables that sun
has distributed
-
Maintaince Updates (MUs):
Keep your solaris up to date with the latest
Maintainance Update. You need a free userid from running 'solregis'.
- Latest
boot floppy for solaris 8 x86 (Sunsolve patch)
-
sun (used to) offer direct binaries of GridEngine for solx86
-
Data Encryption Suppliment for Solaris 9 (x86 and sparc)
- IPsec between microsoft windows and solaris 9
For recovering Disksuite or Veritas Volumns, Sun has released
tools to let you boot off the net and recover them. They called them the
Rapid Recovery tools.
Tools and programs
- opencsw.org, your best source for
precompiled binaries of freeware for solaris x86 and sparc. Binaries
are validated with md5 and gpg, and auto-installed via pkg-get.
Any problems with packages can be reported through the bug-tracking
system.
- A Wine emulator port
done by Bob Lunnon
- Antivirus mail filters under UNIX:
- RAV antivirus. These guys actually
have a solx86 binary as well as sparc!
(for now.. but since mirosoft bought them out, they will probably
pull it soon)
- ClamAV (Open Source)
- mailscanner
a tool to integrate antivirus/antispam filtering into mail systems.
- sar graphing tool:
SarGraph.
Needs 'gd' lib, gnuplot, and libpng. Which are all available
in binary form at
CSW mirror sites
- per-process Input/Output statistics:
pio
(and "topio")
- M$-Exchange alternatives
If you still have to support the M$ clients, & M$-calendaring:
On the other hand, if you can go "legacy-free", you might consider
these other, FREE alternatives:
- TWIG, a web-based, FREE email/"groupware" suite written in php, is at
http://twig.screwdriver.net/
- PHPgroupware can be previewed and downloaded from
http://www.phpgroupware.org.
TWIG has seniority. However, phpgroupware looks nicer, and has
multiple "themes"(?) to chose from.
- Project Management
PhProjekt is a free
PHP-based project management tool. If you are specifically
looking for project management software, it is more fully
featured than the "ToDo" module of phpGroupware. Not to mention
that you can run the demo without enabling javascript.
MrProject is a
GNOME-based standalone application that is nipping at the heels
of MSproject.
- Tools for converting various microsoft file formats can be found
at http://www.wvWare.com/
-
HP JetAdmin for Solaris x86 is available through
http://www.vividata.com/.
There is a free registration process, and then you should be able to get
it from their various free downloads.
-
(free) nSCSI Tape controller software
Stctl. Unlike other
efforts, this software is targetted specifically for Solaris.
- Adobe PDF reader alternatives
If you have Solaris sparc, you'll probably be happy with adobe's
acroread.
However, for some unfathomable reason, the solx86 version has a huge memory
leak in it, so you'll be interested in hearing about alternatives.
One obvious alternative is using xpdf. However, it does not handle all
PDF options like something straight from Adobe.
One option now is the java reader from Adobe,
Acrobat Viewer.
The good news is, the java version renders okay, and has the search feature
in it. The only thing missing is PageUp/PageDown key support.
The interesting thing is that for a 5 page .PDF, the binary "acroread" uses
17 megs, but the java version only uses 21 megs of ram.
NOTE: When they say "java1.1.8", they are not kidding. It
will not run properly with more recent versions. Sigh. So be sure to use
/usr/java1.1/bin/java as the runtime.
The bad news: the stupid ZeroG "Launch Anywhere" stuff is really,
really lame. Once you have run the installer script to install to
/opt/AcroView, you can then make a simpler script to run it, like the
following:
#!/bin/sh
/usr/java1.1/bin/java -classpath /opt/AcroView/acrobat.jar \
-ms33554432 -mx134217728 com.adobe.acrobat.Viewer $@
This makes the other "lax" junk in that directory unneccessary.
Speaking of book type things, the O'Reilly Motif Programing books are now
freely available for download.
Bluefish
is an HTML editor that is recommended by quite a few people.
Feeling left out of AOL instance messaging? They dont seem to publicise
that they have a
java version! It's
called "QuickBuddy".
Unfortunately, they made it launch with javascript, so here's the
Direct start page.
You need a "direct" connection. The java version does not work through
proxies. It does work through NAT, though.
I recommend using it with appletviewer. That way it doesnt drag down your
browser. eg:
/usr/java1.1/bin/appletviewer http://toc.oscar.aol.com/tic.html
Other folk's scripts
- mit-cookie2sun-des-1.ksh will
enable SUN-DES-1 xauth on your solaris box running Xsun and connected to a
NIS+ server. By Roland Mainz.
-
preenmail, a perl script to "expire" email older than some
number of days safely from a user mail box in
/var/mail
- ps2pcl is a quick wrapper I wrote,similar to ps2ascii, etc. But it
converts postscript to "PCL", the format expected by HP laserjet printers,
and similar HP printers, using ghostscript (gs).
HOWEVER, if you want to set up
something so that "lp" will work directly, you should look at this page
at
toocool.calpoly.edu instead.
Drivers and low-level tools
- How to (hopefully)
recover a deleted file, if you're quick enough.
-
ANDIrand provides a
/dev/random, if you are running a system prior to solaris 9.
solaris 8 now has patch 112439 that provides Sun's /dev/random
-
wakeup.c
is a utility to power off a sparc (sun4u) box, and then power ON automatically
at a future time.
Commercial FiberChannel drivers for x86 |
Emulex |
Qlogic |
Agilent |
drivers |
(QLogic FC Driver v3.04)
Currently not on website, but exists "somewhere"
If unobtainable, use feral.com drivers, below? |
[Driver page for solx86 not found] |
-
www.feral.com has an "ISP" section,
with free source code,
that alleges Solaris support for "ISP" controller cards, to give you
fiberchannel support for qlogic controllers
(FC-AL, some 'fabric' support)
-
zynx
sells multi-interface enternet controllers, with drivers for Solaris x86
and sparc. Their drivers have an option for link aggregation, failover,
and load balancing.
-
Sound card drivers for many (but not all) built in sound cards that claim
to have "AC97" hardware, can be found at
Jürgen Keil's audio
page, along with drivers for some other audio cards.
-
Jürgen also has an "experimental"
Logitech QuickCam
Express driver.
-
Garrett D'amore's Ethernet drivers. have support for macronix, lite-on, accton,
or ADM ethernet cards, with possibly more on the way.
- Masayuki Murayama's
driver page has his drivers for NE2000 compatible cards, and others
like RTL8139 (RealTek), SiS, and now the "Tulip" class of cards, too!
- Video Capture Driver
for BrookTree BT848 and compatible cards.
Provides Video4Linux compatible APIs
-
Realtek provides solaris drivers directly, for some realtek cards,
on
www.realtek.com.tw.
- HLTMOD
is a kernel module that allows for HLT powersaving mode for multi-cpu
solx86 machines. Solaris x86
8+ comes with automatic support for shutting down the CPU for a while when
it is not scheduled to do any work (like laptops do). However,
it does not support multiple CPUs. hltmod adds that support.
[Later releases of sol9 may now have support for this ]
- PPTP-linux
is rumored to also work with solaris, if you MUST have it.
Not that I endorse PPTP in ANY way, shape or form. L2TP is the modern,
actually secure standard. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be a
solaris implementation of it.
- J. Schilling's site
has a great set of SCSI-related tools, and 'direct' scsi drivers.
-
SANE has scanner support for
multiple platforms, including solaris! (And you can use my epson USB scanner driver
with it)
-
Here's drivers for a
Pansonic DC100 series camera
- Drivers for an Olympus MO332S magnito-optical drive can
be found at
Vitaly Filatov's page , although you need a parallel-to-SCSI
adaptor.
A list of other drivers (mostly vendor drivers, without source) can be
found on the solarisonintel mailing list
ISV/IHV database pages
Vendors
This section holds links to a limited set of vendors. I am making this
section for hard-to-find items.
- SyneRAID.com
(alternative
here)
has some low-cost drive SCSI-attach arrays with hardware-raid, that are
configurable over a tty. So they are compatible with both x86 and sparc
Solaris.
Solaris fun
And now, some links for fun with solaris! (party like it's 1999, ha)
DVD Player
Ogle is a DVD player
that alegedly runs on both Solaris and Linux. I havent tried it myself -
I have a standalone DVD player, and a Playstation 2. I dont need to watch
DVDs on my computer :-)
But for general playing of mov,mpeg, and DIVX format files, I like
Xine. It's an easy compile, and
plays most anything, including mp3 and wav. Trouble is, the controls are
quirky, and dont always STOP :-) So for audio, I prefer...
MP3/WAV/audio Player
XMMS, the best audio player available for
Solaris, IMO. Only drawback is that it doesnt handle CD playing properly,
in my experience. To jass it up, try the
XLiquid
"Skin" for it. BTW: a binary for XMMS is available via
pkg-get
Precompiled games
RuneScape. 3d RPG.
NICE!!
The site also has quite a few "classic" games, done in java, like
Checkers, Chess, as well as a few new ones.
These are converted to a 3d view, with proffesional quality graphics!
Nuclear War
(I dont quite understand this one)
3d shooter, and racing game, at
http://www.brackeen.com/home/
Misc other impressive games at
JavaGaming.org
Apart from java games, a good trick is to look for linux games, and try to
compile them ;-)
A nice single place to look is
Debian's 'games' source repository!
But here's some other games I specifically like:
You'll look at Angband, and say "What, no graphics? this sux". But try
PLAYING it for 10 minutes :-)
If you would like to actually see all those damn "EMBED"ed movies in
browsers more easily...; try installing
Plugger.
It's a neat tool that lets you tell netscape, "Go play that 'embedded'
stuff in an external window" (So not only do you get to see it, but you're
less crash-prone now, too)
Speaking of movies,
http://xine.sourceforge.net/
is rumored to be a DVD player program that works under solaris as well as other
UNIXen.
Jokes...
Sysadmin types:
Which one is me?
The sysadmin's rule:
always be prepared