---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Florida SunFlash SUNSOFT DELIVERS SOLARIS 2.0 FOR SPARC SunFLASH Vol 42 #28 June 1992 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- SunSoft, the system software subsidiary of Sun Microsystems, Inc., today announced the first customer ship of Solaris 2.0 for SPARC users. The press release, which includes background information on the key technologies offered in Solaris 2.0, is attached for your reference. SMCC announced that Solaris 2.0 is available for all Sun workstations currently being shipped. Solaris 2.0 support for the SPARCstation 10, SPARCserver 10 and the SPARCserver 600 MP series is scheduled for later this year. All future SMCC workstation and server products will be based on Solaris 2.0 and future Solaris releases. Press inquiries to Amy Choice at 415-336-0594. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shrink-Wraps Multiprocessing, Multithreading, Networking For High Volume Markets Bill Joy Golden Edition Delivered To Customers On Schedule MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., June 23, 1992 -- SunSoft today announced the on-schedule shipment of the Solaris 2.0 software environment, the culmination of one of the computer industry's most ambitious software undertakings. Requiring more than 1,000 man years of development time, Solaris is the first system software product to combine the features of high-performance computing -- such as multitasking, multiprocessing, multithreading and network security -- with the ease of use of a personal computer bringing traditionally expensive commercial and technical computing processes to mainstream desktop computers. In addition, it is the only software solution available today that provides a compatible path to next-generation object-based computing. Solaris 2.0 will ship to customers worldwide in a special limited edition Compact Disc (CD) package -- the Bill Joy Golden Edition. Signed by UNIX pioneer and Sun cofounder, Bill Joy, the gold CD encapsulates 32-bit power, industry-standard networking, a robust developer environment and a 3-D multimedia desktop. The Bill Joy Golden Edition will be shipped to customers, including Toshiba, CompuAdd, Solbourne, Tatung and Sun Microsystems Computer Corp. (SMCC) beginning next week. These companies design computers based on the world's most widely used RISC microprocessor, SPARC. "By combining the features of high-end computing -- multiprocessing, multithreading, security -- with the ease-of-use of personal computers, Solaris delivers the platform of choice for corporate rightsizing," said Edward J. Zander, president of SunSoft. "Our ongoing efforts to incorporate future breakthrough technologies, such as objects and nomadic capabilities, into Solaris will empower the interactive enterprise of the 1990s and beyond." SunSoft also announced the shipment of the Solaris 2.0 OEM Multiprocessing Kit, a CD that allows system manufacturers to take advantage of the symmetri multiprocessing features offered in the Solaris kernel. The kit allows manufacturers to tune and verify the symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) features of Solaris for their specific hardware implementations. In addition, the Solaris 2.0 Multiprocessing Kit brings the power of symmetric multiprocessing to the volume commercial market, giving users the benefits of parallel processing at the desktop. SPARC system manufacturers are aggressively moving to offer Solaris 2.0 on their computers. Sun Microsystems Computer Corp. today said that Solaris 2.0 is available for all Sun workstations being shipped. Solaris 2.0 support for the symmetric multiprocessor desktops and servers, including the SPARCstation 10, SPARCserver 10 and SPARCserver 600 MP series, is scheduled for later this year. All future SMCC workstation and server products will be based on Solaris 2.0 and future Solaris releases. Solaris is the volume leader in the 32-bit computing market in terms of volume and applications. It runs on the world's highest volume RISC and CISC microprocessors. According to International Data Corp.(IDC), a market research firm based in Framingham, Mass., SPARC owned 63.1% of the total RISC market in 1991. Intel X86-based systems accounted for 79.3 percent of total PCs shipped in 1991 according to IDC. Solaris has a run rate of more than 300,000 units per year. In addition, Solaris 2.0 inherits more than 4,000 SPARC applications, including popular packages from Lotus Development Corp, WordPerfect, Borland, Autodesk, Informix, Frame Technology and Oracle. Currently more than 700 software applications are in the Solaris 2.0 migration program. SOLARIS 2.0: THE KILLER ENVIRONMENT Designed to address the needs of end users, software developers and system administrators, Solaris 2.0 is comprised of three components: the foundation technology the developer environment and the user environment. SOLARIS FOUNDATION: Turbo-Charged UNIX With Heterogeneous Connectivity * SunOS 5.0 SunOS 5.0, the foundation of Solaris 2.0, includes System V Release 4 (SVR4), the industry-standard UNIX operating system jointly developed by SunSoft and UNIX System Laboratories, Inc. Solaris is the culmination of the leading versions of UNIX -- Xenix, BSD, SunOS and System V-- that unites more than 80 percent of the over 10 million UNIX users. Solaris extends the base SVR4 kernel to feature numerous new technologies, designed to increase workgroup productivity. These include: * Built-In Networking With an installed base of more than 3 million nodes, Solaris ONC is the industry standard for enterprise-wide multivendor networks. More than 300 companies have licensed ONC, including IBM, Apple, DEC, HP and Novell. ONC implementations provide interoperability across all major types of computers from PCs to mainframes and across all major operating systems including MS-DOS, MacOS, UNIX, MVS and VMS. Solaris 2.0 includes a suite of enhancements for ONC. Called ONC+, these services enable system administrators, end users and developers to more effectively access, share and control information across heterogeneous networks.Enhancements include: * Powerful Naming Service NIS+ is a flexible and powerful naming service particularly suited for streamlined system and network administration that fully supports the global enterprise. It allows system administrators to easily access and manage information across multiple heterogeneous networks, increasing user productivityand lowering the cost of everyday system administration. * Industry-Standard File Sharing Solaris 2.0 takes the industry-standard NFS file system and ONC-based distributed computing mechanisms to the next level of computing with the incorporation of a number of technologies. It features a fully multithreaded NFS file system and support for new authentication and encryption technologies. * Network-Independent Protocols Solaris 2.0 features the transport-independent remote procedure, called (TI-RPC), which enables developers to create applications that run unmodified across different networking environments. * Solaris Federated Services The Solaris Federated Services allows third-party network services to plug into Solaris. These include Novell's NetWare, the Open Software Foundations's Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) and the International Standards Organization's Open Systems Interconnect (OSI). A technology demonstration of the naming, filing and security features of the federated services is offered in the Solaris 2.0 solution. * Multithreading (MT) This feature greatly speeds up I/O processing and concurrency, increasing the performance of mission-critical applications, such as commercial databases and simulation software packages. It serves as the base for system manufacturers to take advantage of symmetric multiprocessing. In addition, multithreading serves as an underpinning for SunSoft's future distributed object technologies. * Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) Symmetric Multiprocessing significantly boosts overall system performance. The multithreaded kernel in Solaris 2.0 allows hardware manufacturers to fine tune SMP support for their specific hardware implementations. * Real-Time Support Real-time capabilities make Solaris ideal for applications that require dependable and split-second response such as on-line transaction processing, telecommunications switching and military command and control. In addition, real-time provides an underpinning for SunSoft's multimedia desktop features. * Security Solaris 2.0 offers Kerberos and secure ONC RPC support for network authentication. It also supports SunSoft's ARM and ASET products for increased network security. * Commercial Enhancements Solaris features a suite of commercial enhancements, critical for managing large heterogenous networks in the commercial market. These products include disk mirroring, in which the system makes a "mirror" copy of a user's file on another disk and automatically uses it in case of a system failure; disk striping that increases application performance by spreading the I/O load across several disks; and disk concatenation that enables system administrators to easily move large files around the network without interrupting users; and a terabyte file system for rapid recovery from system folders. * Internationalization Solaris 2.0 offers international support, enabling software developers to localize their applications in different languages and giving users a familiar desktop environment. Solaris SunOS 5.0 provides 8-bit clean characters,international keyboards and local language formatting and messaging. It supports localization of Asian languages, including Japanese, Korean and two Chinese languages, and a host of European languages such as French, German, Dutch and Swedish. * Standards Solaris complies with all major industry standards and specifications including IEEE POSIX 1003.1, X/OPEN Portability Guide (XPG) 3, ISO 9660, AT&T System V Interface Definition (SVID) 3 and the SPARC Compliance Definition (SCD) 2.0. Support of SCD 2.0 means that software developers are able to create shrink-wrapped applications that will run on all SPARC-based UNIX systems without modification. SOLARIS DEVELOPER ENVIRONMENT: Tomorrow's Applications Today *OpenWindows Version 3 Solaris 2.0 also offers a new developer environment, called OpenWindows Version 3 (OWV3). It features technologies and products to accelerate user interface development and create distributed applications that are easier to use and adapted for the international market. These include: * ToolTalk ToolTalk is SunSoft's popular object-oriented software that enables multiple applications to share data across networks regardless of hardware platform. Since its introduction last year, ToolTalk has become the de-facto standard for network-based interoperability between software applications. ToolTalk has been endorsed by more than 50 vendors including Lotus Development Corp., Cadence Design Systems, Frame Technology, Interleaf Corp., Centerline Software and Clarity. In addition, Silicon Graphics Inc. will bundle ToolTalk with its IRIS 4D systems by the end of 1992. * OpenWindows Developers' Guide Version 3 DevGuide is a revolutionary user interface builder which significantly reduces development time and cost. The software allows developers to build and test interfaces using icons without writing a single line of programming code. Instead, DevGuide takes the writer's input and automatically generates code for the multiple toolkits supported in Solaris. These are the OPEN LOOK Intrinsics Toolkit (OLIT), which offers a programming interface based on the MIT X intrinsics definition and the XView Toolkit, which allows applications to move from the SunView interface to the OPEN LOOK interface. SOLARIS 2.0 USER ENVIRONMENT: So Easy, It Can't Be UNIX * DeskSet Version 3 The Solaris 2.0 user experience is defined by DeskSet Version 3, a full range of 15 productivity applications and utilities based on the OPEN LOOK graphical user interface. The Solaris 2.0 Deskset also allows users in international countries to tailor their desktops with date and time formats and local language messages. These international applications include: * Multimedia Mail The application offers users the ability to attach text, graphics, sound and video to mail messages and send them across networks. * Audio Tool The new product enables users to record and play back audio, as well as make, edit and listen to voice messages sent through Multimedia Mail. *Workgroup Calendar Manager This features allows users to update and schedule their own appointments on-line as well as access colleague's calendars across the world to schedule times with them. * Magnify Help The application provides users with immediate help on the screen. Users need only click on a specific icon to get a brief help message. Users can also access the help handbooks that provide on-line detailed help on the use of specific icon or application. PROJECT DOE (DISTRIBUTED OBJECTS EVERYWHERE) Solaris provides the path toward Project DOE, SunSoft's vision for a new computing paradigm where modular applications are created out of distributed objects that can interpreted across multiple platforms. ToolTalk is the first component of Project DOE. SunSoft was also instrumental in defining the OMG standard for distributed objects, which has been endorsed by 200 major computer vendors and consortia in the United States and Europe. SunSoft is investing significant research and development efforts on Project DOE. The company will begin unveiling additional components of Project DOE in early 1993. PRICING AND AVAILABILITY Solaris 2.0 for SPARC systems ships next week to OEMs in a shrink-wrapped package which includes a CD and documentation. Solaris 2.0 is offered at a manufacturers suggested retail price of $795 for desktop systems in single quantity. This price includes the full Solaris environment with networking, multiprocessing,multithreading, OpenWindows and DeskSet. SunSoft has also established an aggressive upgrade program for current OEMs of Solaris 1.0 to migrate to Solaris 2.0. SunSoft, headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., is the system software subsidiary of Sun Microsystems, Inc. The company has offices in North America, Europe and Asia and is the leading supplier for 32-bit software solutions. SunSoft's products are targeted at ens users, software developers and system administrators. The products are licensed by SunSoft and distributed through major computer manufacturers and resellers worldwide. ## 1992 Copyright Sun Microsystems, Inc. SunSoft, Solaris, SunOS, ONC, OpenWindows, ToolTalk, NFS, OpenWindows Developers Guide, XView, DeskSet, SPARCstation and SPARCserver are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. UNIX and OPEN LOOK are registered trademarks of UNIX System Laboratories, Inc. SPARC is a registered trademark of SPARC International, Inc. All other products or service names mentioned herein are trademarks of their respective owners. SunSoft Press Contacts: Shernaz Daver SunSoft, Inc. 415-336-0678 Claudia Carasso Hi Tech Communications 415-904-7000 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ For information send mail to info-sunflash@sunvice.East.Sun.COM. Subscription requests should be sent to sunflash-request@sunvice.East.Sun.COM. Archives are on solar.nova.edu, paris.cs.miami.edu, uunet.uu.net, src.doc.ic.ac.uk and ftp.adelaide.edu.au All prices, availability, and other statements relating to Sun or third party products are valid in the U.S. only. Please contact your local Sales Representative for details of pricing and product availability in your region. Descriptions of, or references to products or publications within SunFlash does not imply an endorsement of that product or publication by Sun Microsystems. John McLaughlin, SunFlash editor, flash@sunvice.East.Sun.COM. (305) 776-7770.