Alta's HowTo's Complement
Wednesday Jan 30, 2008
Boot into 32-bit kernel on 64-bit platform
Sometimes you need to boot into the 32-bit kernel on a 64-bit platform. Perhaps you have an application that is 32-bit only. Or perhaps you have developed a device driver for the Solaris OS. In general, Solaris device drivers must work both in 32-bit mode and in 64-bit mode.
To boot into the 32-bit kernel on a 64-bit platform, edit the GRUB menu. Either edit the file /boot/grub/menu.lst and reboot, or reboot and enter e at the grub menu.
For Solaris 10, the lines in the menu.lst file look something like this:
title Solaris 10 11/06 s10x_u3wos_10 X86 root (hd0,2,a) kernel /platform/i86pc/multiboot module /platform/i86pc/boot_archive
Change the kernel line to this:
kernel /platform/i86pc/kernel/unix
For Solaris Express (nevada, SXDE, SXCE, OpenSolaris), the lines in the menu.lst file look something like this:
title Solaris Express Community Edition snv_79 X86 kernel$ /platform/i86pc/kernel/$ISADIR/unix module$ /platform/i86pc/$ISADIR/boot_archive
Change the kernel and module lines to this:
kernel$ /platform/i86pc/kernel/unix module$ /platform/i86pc/boot_archive
Save and reboot
To make this change persistent across reboots, become the root user and make this change using
eeprom boot-file="kernel/unix"
See also Forcing Solaris to load 32 bit kernel.
For more information on the GRUB menu, see GRUB's user interface on the GNU web site.
Posted at 08:14PM Jan 30, 2008 by alta in Device Support | Comments[7]
Thanks a ton for this information.
Posted by Jitander Das on November 11, 2008 at 06:36 AM PST #
If you have a 32-bit only application it will run fine even if Solaris runs in 64-bit mode...
Posted by Henrik Johansson on December 28, 2008 at 04:45 PM PST #
I meant for this post to be about developing, not running. I should have been more specific. For example, you can boot into 32-bit mode (rather than use a machine that is 32-bit only) to compile and test a 32-bit driver that you have developed.
Posted by Alta on January 05, 2009 at 08:29 AM PST #
Can any one help me in when I go to install this do I make another partition or can this be install while in Windows vista?
Posted by Charles Bates on November 19, 2009 at 09:23 AM PST #
You can install OpenSolaris as a guest in a virtual environment such as VirtualBox. See "Getting Started with OpenSolaris 2009.06" at http://dlc.sun.com/osol/docs/content/2009.06/getstart/sysreq.html
See also this screencast showing how to install OpenSolaris in VirtualBox: http://blogs.sun.com/observatory/entry/screencast_installing_opensolaris_in_virtualbox
Posted by Alta on November 19, 2009 at 09:51 AM PST #
I was just thinking of burning to a disk then just booting to it?
Posted by Charles Bates on November 19, 2009 at 10:10 AM PST #
Yes, you can burn to a disk and run that. Go to http://www.opensolaris.com/get/ and click LiveCD image in the upper right. See links to information at the bottom of that page, including the Getting Started Guide: http://dlc.sun.com/osol/docs/content/2009.06/getstart/
Note that you are limited in what you can do when you run from the LiveCD. You certainly can get a feel for it though.
Posted by Alta on November 19, 2009 at 12:03 PM PST #