Threading Library Improvements
New in 9

Underlying threading routines have been rewritten for higher performance and stability without changes to programming and binary interfaces.

Significantly improves scalability and performance of multi-threaded applications including Java[tm] platform based applications. No need to recompile or rewrite the application to take advantage of performance enhancements.

Multiple Page Size Support
New in 9

Allows a program to use any hardware supported page sizes to access portions of virtual memory.

Significantly improves virtual memory performance by allowing applications to use large page sizes, therefore improving resource efficiency and reducing overhead. This is accomplished without recompiling or recoding applications.

Java[tm] 2 Platform, Standard Edition (J2SE[tm]) 1.4
New in 9

Upgrade release offers new 64-bit support, enhanced security (GSS-API, Authentication and Authorization, Secure Socket Extension), improved logging and assert mechanisms, and IPv6 support.

Improved performance for EJBs (Enterprise Java Beans), Java Servlet, and instant messaging. Enhanced security with additional APIs for use by developers.

Memory Placement Optimization (MPO)
Coming Soon

Optimized memory usage on Sun Fire[tm] 3800 hardware and above.

Enhances performance and reduces processing time by allowing CPUs to identify and use the closest memory.

UFS Concurrent Direct I/O

UFS direct I/O, which streamlines database access to data devices, was introduced in the Solaris[tm] 2.6 platform. The concurrent feature allows multiple cooperating processes, such as those found within database systems, to write to the same file.

Improves database performance by approximately 87% over direct I/O alone. Combines the performance of "raw disk" access with the administrative convenience of file systems for database usage. ++

Advanced Page Coloring

Enhancements have been made to the algorithm that controls virtual/physical pages and how they are cached.

These enhancements deliver increased system performance of around 10% for general user loads in servers. The most benefit is realized for machines under heavy loads. ++

Enhanced Directory Name Look-up Cache (DNLC)

DNLC now provides improved performance when accessing large numbers of files.

Dramatically reduces the time required to look up a name in a directory that contains a large number of entries. For example in a recent test, creation of 262,000 files in a single directory was reduced the time from19 hours to 16 minutes.++

Dynamic Reconfiguration

With Dynamic Reconfiguration (DR), processors, memory and I/O interfaces can be hot-plugged into Sun Fire[tm] V880, 3800-6800, and 15K servers, and dynamically configured into or out of the operating environment's domain.

Enables critical components such as CPUs, memory and I/O interfaces to be replaced with no downtime.

Automated Dynamic Reconfiguration

This allows for Dynamic Reconfiguration to be scripted for unattended operation..

Saves time and reduces errors for the system administrator in replacing critical components. Enables policy-based reconfiguration such as time-based or load-based operations.

Dynamic System Domains

Sun Enterprise[tm] 10000, Sun Fire[tm} 3800-6800, 12K and 15K servers can be configured to have from one to multiple operating environments running on it with Dynamic Systems Domains. Each domain acts as if it were a separate server with physical resources allocated to it. These system resources can be re-allocated on the fly to rapidly adapt to changing workloads.

Very flexible system configuration to respond to changes in workload. Saves companies money because they can consolidate many services onto a single server that costs less to maintain. Additionally, resources can be re-allocated as workloads change or on a scheduled basis, for example to support on-line transaction processing during the day and large data warehouse queries at night.

mkfs Performance

The mkfs command has been updated to improve performance when you create file systems.

Reduces the length of time, often from hours to minutes, taken to create UFS file systems with large numbers of files. ++

Network Cache and Accelerator (NCA) Enhancements

Through the in-kernel cache, NCA uses system memory to significantly increase performance for HTTP requests normally handled by web servers. This increases web server performance by reducing the overhead between the kernel and the web server.

Significant performance enhancements for both cache-hits and cache-misses. This is accomplished without recoding or recompiling applications.

Remote Shared Memory API (RSMAPI)

In conjunction with SCI-PCI or WildCat interconnect in the Sun[tm] Cluster 3.0 environment, RSMAPI provides mechanisms with which user applications can build low-latency, high bandwidth messaging in order to directly access interconnect hardware.

Cluster aware applications can significantly reduce the time required to respond to events.

Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6)

IPv6 is the next-generation protocol that is designed to replace the current protocol, IPv4. IPv6 is superior to IPv4 because of the higher number of IP addresses available and improvements to routing and network auto-configuration.

Allows developers and end-users to prepare to utilize the next generation of internet technologies.

One Million Active Processes

Overcomes the historic UNIX limitation of a maximum of 30,000 concurrent processes on a system by enabling the scalability of one million active processes in a single instance.

Ability to serve larger workloads.

Solaris 64-bit Computing Environment

The 64-bit Solaris platform was introduced in the Solaris 7 OE and is a complete 32-bit and 64-bit application and development environment supported by a 64-bit system kernel. The 64-bit Solaris OE overcomes many of the limitations of traditional UNIX systems, most notably by supporting a 64-bit virtual address space as well as removing other existing 32-bit system limitations. The 64-bit kernel also allows applications to address greater than 4GB of memory.

Provides developers with complete 32-bit and 64-bit development environments without sacrificing 32-bit application compatibility or performance. Permits maximum compatibility and interoperability for existing applications, both source and binary.