Sun released Solaris 9 Containers earlier this week. This set of software packages enables you to move an existing Solaris 9 system into a Solaris Container on a Solaris 10 system. It also allows you to create new Solaris 9 Containers on Solaris 10 systems. In other words, it's just like Solaris 8 Containers but for Solaris 9 systems.

This is particularly interesting for Sun's CMT systems - those systems based on the UltraSPARC-T1, -T2, and -T2+ (aka Niagara, Niagara 2, Niagara 2+). Those systems are well known for the high performance-per-watt characteristics, an important consideration as data centers exhaust their power capacity and the price of fossil fuels rise.

Solaris 8 (and 9) Containers can also take advantage of the impressive scalability of the Sun SPARC Enterprise M-series systems - from 4 to 64 dual-core SPARC CPUs. Because of the ability to mix Solaris 8 Containers and Solaris 9 Containers, alongside Solaris 10 Containers, you can move dozens of older SPARC systems into just a few new SPARC systems.

You can find product details, a videotaped demonstration, and free download at http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/containers/index.jsp.