I just finished installing Solaris Express Developer Edition 9/07 on VMWare Fusion 1.1 on my MacBook Pro.
Well, I don't know what to say. I just can't think of any complaints. The install was simple and painless, I was able to install the VMWare Fusion tools without a hitch [1], networking Just Works, Firefox Just Works, NetBeans 5.5 Just Works, including Java DB is Just There and Works. File sharing works. Navigation between Solaris and Mac applications works.
I have tried many early installs of Solaris, and I have never been in this baffling situation of having absolutely nothing to complain about (and believe me, I don't keep my mouth shut).
I can go to full screen mode, and it stays in full screen even when I suspend and resume (unlike Ubuntu under Fusion).
I'm downloading Ant and am going to give a NetBeans build a go. We'll see how it goes; I am getting myself ready to shift over to a real developer's platform, that actually has Java 6 and a working version of Open Office and top-level AMP and PostgreSQL support. I'll keep the Mac around for consumer-oriented stuff like playing Rhapsody, but I think in general it's going to start moving to the background of my day...
One other nice thing about running Solaris in Fusion on the Mac -- I can suspend my computer. If you have Solaris installed natively, no suspend. They're working on it, but meanwhile, this is a pretty good workaround.
[1] Well, just one hitch, per Felipe's blog. After installing and you reboot, VMWare thinks you are booting a 64 bit OS in a 32 bit guest. You have to do add the following to the .vmx configuration file:
monitor_control.disable_longmode = 1After you successfully boot this way, VMWare recommends you remove this line as it can confuse some applications.
10 comments:
Hello David,
I'm having some problems getting Solaris Express Developer Edition 9/07 working with VMWare Fusion 1.1. I was hoping that you could offer some advice.
The install works perfectly, and when I reboot the boot loader comes up (GRUB I think). When I select the default entry the screen goes blank, I see a small white underscore and nothing else happens.
If I select safe mode I boot up into a shell.
Any suggestions? How did you originally set up the OS in VMWare? As Solaris 10?
Thanks,
Robert
I'm not sure if this is the cause of your problem, but see this blog for one important tip:
In the .vmx file for the SXDE virtual machine, you need to add this setting:
monitor_control.disable_longmode = 1
Hello David,
Thanks for the tip - I will try it tomorrow and provide an update.
Robert
I'm trying to install on my Mac Mini. I get no network. I've tried NAT and Bridged. Is there a way to get network after the fact? Can I use the airport for the fusion VM? (I use the wired ethernet for the mac).
Hi, Paul. I'm sorry, I don't know what's wrong with your setup. My networking worked right out of the box.
Take a look at
this blog, maybe it will help? I would also take your question to the opensolaris and vmware communities - they're both quite active.
Good luck!
David
Hi David,
I am getting my iMac in the next few
days and I got VW Fusion 1.0. Any idea if I can install a Solaris version of Oracle in this setup?
(after I install Solaris on the iMac of course)
Thanks,
Lin
Hi, Lin. Any reason why you're using Fusion 1.0 instead of Fusion 1.1. My understanding is 1.1 has a lot of important improvements and bug fixes.
In terms of installing Oracle, sure, it should work. It really is like you're running the operating system native, so everything should work the same.
The main thing is to make sure you allocate enough disk space and memory for your virtual machine.
Hi David,
I bought VMWare from Amazon last
week and it was 1.0. I saw from VMWare site that I can get 1.1 for free if you have 1.0. So I will install 1.1 instead.
I will try install Solaris and then
Oracle on the VM.
Thanks a lot for the feedback!
Lin
Hi David,
I am able to install the ready made SXDE907 VM from sun.com on a Fusion 1.1 VM without any real issue, and the guest OS runs find. When I tried to see the USB drive on the iMac, it was not mounted. I was looking for /hgfs and /mnt/hgfs.
I then tried to make a brand new VM for SXDE907 myself and it was successful. However, I am still not able to see the USB drive in the guest OS.
In both cases, I configured Shard Folder in Fusion under Virtual Machine and restarted the VM.
Did you have any issue like this? Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Lin
Hi, Lin, sorry I didn't get back to you. I haven't tried to use a USB drive inside VMWare so I don't know about this.
I suggest posting your question on the opensolaris-discuss forum, there are a lot of people out there using Solaris under VMWare Fusion.
Good luck!
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