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1. Introduction

1.1 Why Solaris?

This is actually a good question. Why use Solaris, when you can have Linux? Solaris is a commercial system, the hardware support is scarce. But if you are reading this you have probably already decided on using Solaris. If not, here are some reasons:

• I have a part-time job administrating Solaris machines. It is of no use that I learning all the neat command parameters and nifty Linux tricks at home, when I can't use them on my Solaris-Box.
• Sun was giving away Solaris for what they call ``Shipping and handling cost only'' for some time. They might do that again. And almost-free-of-charge is always a good deal.
• Another reason might be that you like CDE.

1.2 Things covered in this HOWTO

This HOWTO tries to help you install Solaris 7 or 8 on an x86 computer already running Linux. The main targets are

• not to destroy any data, see section Preparing your Harddrive
• To make Linux and Solaris coexist (boot manager), see section Boot-Managing
• To share data between Linux and Solaris, as described in section Sharing Data

1.3 Referenced versions

The reference versions used while creating this document where:

• Solaris 7 x86 (= Solaris 2.7 / SunOS 5.7)
• Solaris 8 x86 (= Solaris 2.8 / SunOS 5.8)
• Linux 2.2.14, 2.3.99-pre3
• fdisk v2.10f

1.4 Warning

Please back up any data before messing with your system! A lot of the things described in this document may result in excessive data loss! I am not responsible for any data loss! See also section Legal stuff