Are there any advantages to using OpenSolaris over linux other than ZFS? [closed]
Are there any advantages to using OpenSolaris, other than ZFS, rather than using a common linux distribution such as CentOS or Ubuntu?
I ask because I'm interested in using OpenSolaris on AWS to take advantage of ZFS-snapshots for backing up to S3 -- specifically for MySQL backups. I'd like to know if OpenSolaris has clear advantages over CentOS for running webservers in the cloud.
Yes, many. Just to name a few :
- DTrace, which allows you to display detailled and precise statistics about ressource usage using one line scripts
- SMF, which allows a clean and streamlined management of services. For example, it restarts services that crash and display short explanations about services refusing to stard.
- the included firewall is very simple to use.
- Loooong support cycle (somewhat depending on Oracle but for the past it has been long)
- xVM, Xen integration made trivial
- Zones, very simple to create, administer and use.
I could go on for a while. I have switched my personal machines from Debian to OpenSolaris and am not looking back.
The downsides :
- very little drivers. If you plan to use anything but very standard hardware, be prepared for lots of pain. Even getting an off-the-mill IBM server running is atrocious.
- disk performance sucks. I mean compared to the standard ill-configured ext3 linux disks, ZFS flies. However compared to a properly configured XFS it's unbelievably slow.
- Lots of idiosyncrasies break from old Unix hats habits entrenched in our souls for 30 years :-)
Some other OpenSolaris points:
- API stability, Gnu/Linux has no commitment on interfaces so software, and especially device drivers, can break with a new kernel or library release. Recompilation is often required for modules. (Open)Solaris has committed interfaces that stay compatible with new releases.
- Snap-upgrade (linked to ZFS). You can rollback to a previous system installation should you mess something for some reason.
- fair share scheduler / real-time scheduling class available standard
- RBAC (grant Administrator Role to yourself), simpler to administrate and use than sudo, fine grain privileges removing many of the root suid requirements.
- NFSv4 ACLs with ZFS
- network virtualization (crossbow)
- branded zones (Gnu/Linux and Solaris 10 zones).
- ZFS deduplication, this is pretty new (dev releases) but really cool.