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January 2004
The Linux Compatibility Assurance Toolkit 1.1 (LinCAT) is also known as the Linux Analyzer for C/C++ Source Code. In this toolkit, the oldworld and neworld utilities can simplify the process of moving your system configuration from Linux to the Solaris Operating System:
- The oldworld utility saves your Linux system configuration to a data file.
- The neworld utility restores your system configuration (from the file previously saved by oldworld) to the Solaris environment.
oldworld and neworld automate what can otherwise be a time-intensive and tedious manual migration task: reimplementing the Linux system configuration under the Solaris OS. This kit should help the move by:
- Reducing what the systems administrator needs to know to configure the Solaris OS.
- Reducing the possibility of missing configuration information.
- Speeding up the process through automation.
When oldworld and neworld are used in conjunction with JumpStart, systems can be reinstalled with the Solaris OS and should be functional in your environment within 15 minutes.
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oldworld knows about your Linux system configuration files. It will scan these files for the system administrator and determine if they have been modified from the default files shipped with Linux. If there have been modifications, then oldworld takes note of the changes and saves them for neworld. The system parameters and files that are ported may include:
- System configuration files
- Printer, terminal configuration files
- Remote mounts, exports and automounts
- System startup scripts
- cron files
- Parameters for all diskless clients
- All files in system directories that are not standard Linux files
Before Solaris is installed, the system administrator runs oldworld, saving files and system configuration information to an intermediate file or device. This may be any file or device not involved with the installation of the Solaris OS, for example, a floppy disk, a tape, or a file in an NFS mounted file system.
Note: This does not replace the requirement for the administrator to perform a full backup. Some files in system directories may not be saved by oldworld. Files not in system directories will not be saved by oldworld.
After Solaris is loaded, the system administrator will mount the file saved by oldworld and run neworld to reconfigure the system. neworld reads the dump file created by oldworld and updates the Solaris configuration files.
neworld understands how the changes saved by oldworld can be implemented in the Solaris environment. After installing Solaris and unpacking the configuration information stored by oldworld, your system configuration should resemble your Linux configuration.
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To invoke oldworld, become root, and then type:
oldworld [ -bivy ] [ -d dump-device ] [ -o log-file ]
[ -s file-size-limit ] [ -R root-path ]
[ -t tmp-directory ]
By default, oldworld runs in no-execution mode. This is helpful in examining what steps will be taken and how much space will be required by the dump file before executing with the -b or -y flags.
| -i |
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Prompt for user confirmation before saving a file. For example, if oldworld is going to save the password file, the user will be prompted for confirmation. |
| -v |
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Turn on verbose mode. This is helpful for seeing what oldworld is doing. |
| -y |
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Turn on execution mode. If execution mode is off, oldworld will not dump the system configuration to the dump-device. However, all status messages will be displayed and all log files created. Additionally, oldworld will print a summary of space required on the dump-device. Default is execution mode off. |
| -b |
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Turn on batch mode. This sets verbose and interactive (verify) modes off and execution mode on. Batch mode is useful for those occasions when you know exactly what you are doing and wish to use your system's at(1), batch(1) or JumpStart facilities with oldworld to start your migration.
Note: This facility is a convenience for experienced system administrators and is not intended for general use. |
-d dump-device |
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Specify the file or device which oldworld will use as the dump device. The dump-device may be any device or file, mounted locally or on a remote machine. When using remote dump devices or files, ensure that root has permissions to rsh(1) to the remote machine. The default dump-device is /dev/fd0, the floppy drive. Remote dump devices can be specified using the format:
host:/path.
For example: dumphost:/dumpfiles/dumpclient.dump |
| -o log-file |
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Specify the file or device to which to write the log-file. Default is /var/adm/oldworld.`hostname`.log |
| -s file-size-limit |
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When saving non-system files, oldworld will omit any file larger than file-size-limit. This feature is incorporated to prevent files of excess size from using up the space on the intermediate device. These files should be saved by dump(8) or tar(1). This feature can be disabled by setting file-size-limit to 0. The default file-size-limit is 100 KB. |
| -R root-path |
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In order to tell oldworld to analyze and process a different root directory other than /, the -R option must be used to specify the path to the root directory.
However, when neworld is used to restore an oldworld dump within this mode, the root directory must be mounted in the same place as when oldworld was run. The -R option is only available when running oldworld under the Solaris OS. |
| -t tmp-directory |
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This option tells oldworld to use a different directory for temporary files. The default temporary directory "/tmp" is used if this option is not specified. |
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OLDWORLD_DATA_FILES
This environment variable should be set to the directory path where the oldworld data files (ed-sys-dirlist, ed-std-*) are located. By default, oldworld will search for the data files in ../share (relative to the binary location). The default installation will place them there. You have to set this variable only if you are not using the default installation.
The suggested procedure for converting a system to the Solaris using oldworld and neworld is as follows:
- Run oldworld (as root) on the old machine to back up the system configuration.
- Run
cpio(1) or tar(1) on the old machine to back up all non-system directories and any large files in system directories (for example, third-party libraries).
- Install the Solaris OS on the new machine with the same hostname and IP address.
- Run neworld (as root) on the new machine to reinstall the system configuration.
- Reboot the system to make the system configuration effective.
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Run neworld as root after the Solaris installation is completed. As with oldworld, it is suggested that neworld be run in two passes. The first pass should run passively allowing verification of the actions that will be taken and warnings of potential error conditions. After making the appropriate decisions, run neworld again and migrate the configuration. Since neworld saves all files that it modifies, it is possible to restore a file in case of a problem (using the -r option). Larger installations will want to automate the execution of neworld by running it as part of a custom JumpStart finishing script. The options for neworld are the same as oldworld.
Problems Running Neworld
- Not the same node that was saved by oldworld.
Oldworld/neworld require that the host they migrate must have exactly the same hostname. If there is any difference, neworld will not proceed.
- Restoring from a backup file.
If there is any problem with the new Solaris configuration, the original files may be restored with the command:
neworld -r
The original files are copied back from the files that have been saved by neworld with the .sabak extension.
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