Sun Microsystems Inc. this week is planning to give users of its Solaris operating system a sneak peek at the next version and its new file system. Among the many new features of Solaris 10, due by year"s end, is the DFS (Dynamic File System)—a 128-bit system that will automate many common tasks for system administrators.
While the DFS, which will be previewed during Sun"s Network Computing 04Q2 Webcast, will complement Solaris, some say its development is even more strategic and will buttress Solaris as software partners such as Veritas Software Corp. continue to expand their support for rival operating systems. As for streamlining development tasks, the DFS reduces the number of separate tasks it takes to create a file system from 28 to five. The time it takes to add mirrored file systems for three users and then add more disk space has been reduced from 40 minutes to 10 seconds, said John Loiacono, executive vice president of software at Sun, in Santa Clara, Calif.