Solaris

Hi,

I'm not expert with solaris. I Familiar with Linux variant only. Could anyone point me to right tutorial?

I got one > but not sure it can be use or not.

I'm doing fresh install for new server. The server spec did not come out yet. Please assist me.

Thanks.

Are you installing the freebie Solaris on x86? Please tell us more about your hardware.

Server Spec:

SPARC T4 8-core 2.85Ghz
128GB Memory
600GB HDD x4
Oracle Solaris and Oracle VM Server for SPARC preinstall (for factory installation)

Can you clarify your question?
You wrote want the right tutorial, but for doing what precisely ?
To install Solaris 11 with ZFS: any method you like given the fact Solaris 11 cannot be installed without ZFS.
To set-up root pool mirroring: the document you link is outdated, being related to a now obsolete pre-Solaris 11 release. Have a look to https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E36784_01...835/gjtui.html

You have several choices :

Raid controllers if you have - this will not take advantage of zfs filesystem features, but will simplify administration by lowering the number of devices on the OS layer depending of the raid protection chosen.

Disk slices for rpool(s), mirroring between two physical disks, or even third as a hot spare - this will take advantage of zfs filesystem features and will leave other slices to be used for other purpose.

Depending of the use, if you plan Oracle VM, you might consider using SVM mirroring/raid of slices with single md device presented to ldom which runs rpool on top - this will not take advantage of zfs features but will provide less administration overhead in case of disk failure (remirroring of all disk slices will be done with couple of commands on hypervisor)

I would advise against using ZVOLs as backend devices.

I've been using option 2 and 3 depending, not using controllers.

Hope that helps

Regards
Peasant.

Another advantage of using RAID controllers if you have them: replacing a failed disk is usually really easy with today's RAID controllers:

Remove the failed disk, put in a new disk.

The ZFS features you wouldn't be using by using hardware RAID? You'd fail to be using the ZFS software RAID.

Use the hardware RAID if you have it.

---------- Post updated at 12:42 PM ---------- Previous update was at 12:31 PM ----------

If this is supposed to be a production server that will have a long life and have to go through multiple operating system upgrades and patches, you'll also want to use a total of four disks for two completely separate ZFS root pools. Put the four disks into two separate mirrored hardware RAID arrays.

See the man page for "beadm".

Also, read this:

https://blogs.oracle.com/orasysat/en...ng_solaris_111

One problem with that, in my experience: using just one root pool will result in a convoluted mess of ZFS snapshots and clones as your boot environments evolve over the life of the server. But if you always create a new boot environment in a ZFS pool that's separate from the ZFS pool the source boot environment resides on, there's no mess of ZFS snapshots and clones created.

Why would you want to use boot environments? Because you can create a new boot environment, patch and upgrade the new one while your server is still running, then simply boot to the new environment. And if it fails, you just reboot back to the old one.

It's a lot more reliable than "yum upgrade". Try reverting that if it doesn't work...

Achenle - i was referring to zfs features such as bit rot protection and others which are being used only in case of zpools with raid.
You may use property copies=2 to achieve similar per zfs filesystem.

Why do you think HW raid controllers are better to use then zpool SW raids in case of zpools ?