What's New in the Solaris 9 Operating Environment

Software Developer Environment

Feature Description
SPARC: 64-bit Kodak Color Management System (KCMS) libraries Kodak Color Management System^TM (KCMS^TM) is now providing a 64-bit version of the libraries. Applications that currently use KCMS and are converted to the 64-bit operating environment can now retain color management.
Always Ready Power Management With the Solaris 8 operating environment, a device driver that uses the new device Power Management^TM interfaces will be power-managed automatically.
New `cpustat` and `cputrack` Commands The new `cpustat` and `cputrack` commands capture system-wide and per-process CPU statistics respectively, to monitor the performance of a system or a process.
Extensions to Runtime Link Auditing Additional means of invoking runtime link-auditing libraries is provided by the link editor options `-p` and `-P`. Additional runtime link-auditing interfaces, `la_activity()` and `la_objsearch()`, have been added.
Practical Extraction and Report Language (Perl) 5 The popular programming language, Perl 5.005_03, is included in the Solaris 8 release. Perl is commonly used for CGI scripting as well as for automating complex system administration tasks.
Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) for Developers The addition of RBAC to the Solaris operating environment gives developers the opportunity to deliver fine-grained security in new and modified applications. Developers can now create privileged functions that check for authorizations instead of checking for specific IDs such as superuser.
Secure Path Name Change from `/usr/lib` to `/usr/lib/secure` The secure directory from which files can be preloaded is now `/usr/lib/secure` for 32-bit objects and `/usr/lib/secure/sparcv9` for 64-bit SPARCV9 objects.
Dynamic String Token Support Greater flexibility in establishing instruction set-specific, and system-specific dependencies is provided with the new `$ISALIST`, `$OSNAME`, and `$OSREL` dynamic string tokens.
Function Update: `strftime()` The `%u` conversion specification for the `strftime()` function has been changed.
Alternate Libthread An alternate threads implementation provides a model in which user-level threads are associated one-to-one with lightweight processes (LWPs). This implementation is simpler than the standard implementation and might be beneficial to some multithreaded applications.
SPARC: Audio Mixer Driver The audio mixer driver now allows multiple applications to play and record audio simultaneously.
Updated DDI Interfaces for Cluster-Aware Device Drivers A documentation overview introduces the concept of device classes and the necessary interface modifications and additions for device driver writers.
8-bit Visual Support The 8-bit visual shared library enables device drivers with only 24-bit hardware to display 8-bit visual applications.

Feature Description

SPARC: 64-bit Kodak Color Management System (KCMS) libraries

Kodak Color Management System^TM (KCMS^TM) is now providing a 64-bit version of the libraries. Applications that currently use KCMS and are converted to the 64-bit operating environment can now retain color management.

Always Ready Power Management

With the Solaris 8 operating environment, a device driver that uses the new device Power Management^TM interfaces will be power-managed automatically.

New cpustat and cputrack Commands

The new cpustat and cputrack commands capture system-wide and per-process CPU statistics respectively, to monitor the performance of a system or a process.

Extensions to Runtime Link Auditing

Additional means of invoking runtime link-auditing libraries is provided by the link editor options -p and -P. Additional runtime link-auditing interfaces, la_activity() and la_objsearch(), have been added.

Practical Extraction and Report Language (Perl) 5

The popular programming language, Perl 5.005_03, is included in the Solaris 8 release. Perl is commonly used for CGI scripting as well as for automating complex system administration tasks.

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) for Developers

The addition of RBAC to the Solaris operating environment gives developers the opportunity to deliver fine-grained security in new and modified applications. Developers can now create privileged functions that check for authorizations instead of checking for specific IDs such as superuser.

Secure Path Name Change from /usr/lib to /usr/lib/secure

The secure directory from which files can be preloaded is now /usr/lib/secure for 32-bit objects and /usr/lib/secure/sparcv9 for 64-bit SPARCV9 objects.

Dynamic String Token Support

Greater flexibility in establishing instruction set-specific, and system-specific dependencies is provided with the new $ISALIST, $OSNAME, and $OSREL dynamic string tokens.

Function Update: strftime()

The %u conversion specification for the strftime() function has been changed.

Alternate Libthread

An alternate threads implementation provides a model in which user-level threads are associated one-to-one with lightweight processes (LWPs). This implementation is simpler than the standard implementation and might be beneficial to some multithreaded applications.

SPARC: Audio Mixer Driver

The audio mixer driver now allows multiple applications to play and record audio simultaneously.

Updated DDI Interfaces for Cluster-Aware Device Drivers

A documentation overview introduces the concept of device classes and the necessary interface modifications and additions for device driver writers.

8-bit Visual Support

The 8-bit visual shared library enables device drivers with only 24-bit hardware to display 8-bit visual applications.