This page describes the most standard manual installation of OpenIndiana using the interactive installer. For specific use-cases there are other advanced installation methods, described on other pages of this Wiki and blog posts around the Internet.
Table of Contents
Installing OpenIndiana
You need a PC (32 or 64-bit) with at least 512 megabytes of RAM (768 megabytes recommended), and 4 gigabytes (2 gigabytes for the text installer) of available disk space. You can also use virtual machine software such as VirtualBox, SmartOS, or VMware.
- Download the OpenIndiana installer image from http://openindiana.org/download/ or from a mirror and write it to a DVD or USB stick.
 | To create a bootable USB device, you must use a USB storage device exactly 1 gigabyte (GB) or larger. |
Boot your computer with the medium inserted. You may have to change the boot device order in your BIOS configuration.
In VirtualBox 3.2 or later, "Use host I/O cache" must be enabled in the emulated storage controller used by the virtual machine to successfully boot OpenIndiana.
- When you see a menu, press Enter to start OpenIndiana on your computer. As it runs, you will be prompted with a few questions.
- You should eventually be presented with a desktop. You can use the Device Driver Utility to check if your hardware requires additional drivers.
- Click on Install OpenIndiana to permanently install OpenIndiana on your computer.
| If you do not see a menu after booting your computer with the DVD or USB device, and instead see some text and a "grub>" prompt, there may be an error in your copy of the installer, or it was created incorrectly. |
| If you see a "login:" prompt after selecting your keyboard and language and no desktop appears after several seconds, there may be a problem with the drivers for your graphics hardware. Please let us know if this happens. Include error messages you see on the console, and the output of the command The login for the text session is username jack, password jack. The installer is graphical and requires X11, although it is possible to use it over a network with SSH X forwarding if you enable SSH. For administrative access, prepend your commands with |
Creating the dd USB Live Image from OS X
Using Mac OS X to create the USB Live Image of OpenIndiana? These instructions may help.
You'll need at least a 2GB USB stick; this example uses a 4GB.
OS X includes all tools needed:
- cURL - the - excellent! -tool for download (to know it is to love it!: cURL - by Daniel Stenberg)
- md5 - to checksum the download
- diskutil - to manage your disks
- dd - writes the bootable image to USB stick
1. Download the dd image, and the corresponding checksum file. Be sure to download the image 'writable with dd'!
2. Checksum your download - be sure you have a match!
3. After plugging in the USB device you will use - and assuming it's been formatted, it will appear in diskutil.
In our example, we've used a 4GB USB stick, disk2, with a 1GB FAT_16 partition:
| CAUTION: dd will erase all partitions, and all data, on this stick. Be sure of the disk# you are using! |
4. unmount the USB stick, if mounted:
5. Write the image using dd; we timed it:
Welcome to OpenIndiana! Enjoy!
24 Comments
Hide/Show CommentsSep 14, 2011
Anonymous
The OpenSolaris Live USB Creator is not working for me, it just doesn't write anything to my USB. Im using the oi-dev-151a-x86-20110912-1.usb file and Osol Live USB Creator 0.03
Sep 15, 2011
Anonymous
my usb stick was formatted with FAT32. i had to delete the partition for the USB utility to correctly image the stick.
Sep 16, 2011
Anonymous
hi.
wheres the sparc port of it? or openindiana is now a "intel (amd) only os?"?
Sep 17, 2011
Anonymous
works for me
with fdisk delete all partition , leave empty space unlabeled.
this cerate all >
cat 1G.header <USB image file> | dd bs=1024k of=<path to raw USB storage device>
on grub screen have very strange font
Sep 18, 2011
Anonymous
thanks, I just ran into the same thing, if you don't have fdisk (because you're on win 7)
you can use diskpart
type diskpart
list disks
select disk #
list partition
select partition #
delete partition override
should cover you.
Sep 23, 2011
Anonymous
I did
select disk #
clean (all)
it wasn't letting me select a partition
Sep 24, 2011
Anonymous
I event deleted the partition on mys USB stick but no luck. Can someone help?
Sep 26, 2011
Anonymous
The usbcopy does not work with Solaris 10 - it is not able to detect the USB device. Looking at the source code it is not clear how it could ever detect a USB device. It uses the output from rmformat -l command, which looks like (vold disabled):
rmformat -l
1. Logical Node: /dev/rdsk/c0t1d0s2
Physical Node: /pci@1f,0/ide@d/sd@1,0
Connected Device: LITEON DVD-ROM LTD163 G3HA
Device Type: <Unknown>
2. Logical Node: /dev/rdsk/c6t0d0s2
Physical Node: /pci@1f,0/usb@c,3/storage@2/disk@0,0
Connected Device: SanDisk Cruzer Blade 1.00
Device Type: Removable
In order to parse the USB device from that data, the following nawk inline code is used inside the usbcopy script:
#nawk script to o/p the details of plugged in USB drives
rmformat 2>/dev/null | nawk 'BEGIN {
FS = ":";
lnode=0;
physdev="";
node = "";
devname = "";
bus = "";
size = 0;
bustype = "USB";
} {
if (lnode == 1 && match($1, "Logical Node"))
else {
if (match($1, "Logical Node"))
else if (match($1, "Bus"))
else if (match($1, "Connected Device"))
else if (match($1, "Size"))
else if (match($1, "Physical Node"))
}
} END {
if (lnode == 1)
}' >/tmp/ulst
Problems:
---------
==> the code looks for upper case USB, which does not exist in the data
==> the code tries to match the string 'Bus' which does not exist in the data
==> the "if (match(bus, bustype))" will always fail because bus will always be "", therefore the nawk script will never produce output ...
Need to find time to change the usbcopy ... or missing something ?
Sep 26, 2011
Albert Lee
The script just wasn't intended for Solaris 10, where the USB architecture is different. In OI or Solaris 11 the
rmformat -loutput should look like:{{
1. Logical Node: /dev/rdsk/c2t0d0p0
Physical Node: /pci@0,0/pci1025,460@1a/hub@1/storage@6/disk@0,0
Connected Device: Generic- Multi-Card 1.00
Device Type: <Unknown>
Bus: USB
Size: <Unknown>
Label: <Unknown>
Access permissions: <Unknown>
}}
If you get it to work, you're welcome to submit a patch to the oi-dev mailing list though.
Oct 10, 2011
Anonymous
I was able to use usbcopy with Solaris 11 Express to create a USB based installer using oi-dev-151a-text-x86.usb. The installer ran fine going through all the install steps right through the end. However, the system does not boot off freshly installed hard disk. I either get a blank screen with the word 'GRUB' on the upper right hand corner of the screen. Or I get a disk boot failure error. I've tried to run the install multiple times. I know my hardware is good as I was able to install Solaris Express just fine on this system. Can someone please help me understand how to figure out what's going on ?
Oct 27, 2011
Anonymous
Useless utility does nothing...
Boot just displays a GRUB ...
get some life people and do something professional work!
Nov 08, 2011
Anonymous
lol .. Boot just displays a Grub .. you select to run (x86 or x64) Version of your choice and hit enter .. and there it goes ....
Nov 10, 2011
Anonymous
Okay, so after a lot of trouble it finally installed on a usb disk. Now it won't boot into 64-bit mode thus doesn't detect my 2 TB drives. How does this auto-pick work.
Nov 23, 2011
Anonymous
I made a mini-howto for openindiana on virtualbox: http://alexander-truemper.blogspot.com/p/open-indiana-aka-open-solaris-running.html
Jan 01, 2012
Anonymous
The correct URL seems to be: http://www.tooshoo.de/2011/11/openindiana-on-virtualbox.html
Feb 04, 2012
Anonymous
the post is gone
Dec 05, 2011
Anonymous
I tried to install as a dual boot system along XP. I chose to install on 212Gb of free unformatted space after the XP partition. it gave me a totally crazy solution, moving solaris to the front and resizing and moving my windows partitions.
wish I had kept the osol 10 CD. this thing is way too buggy.
Dec 19, 2011
Anonymous
Hello I'm r3N0oV4.
This post is to know if it is possible to installa OI server from Desktop DVD.
Thank you for the great work done guys.
r3N0oV4
Dec 20, 2011
Anonymous
Hi,
i think that only difference between Desktop and Server distributions is GUI on Desktop.
So, if you install Desktop, you will have already Server installed (OK, maybe some more packages has to be added later, depending what function/role your server has to have/play).
Basically, if you switch OFF X server, you will get Server.
If i am wrong, i would like to know.
Best regards
Predrag Zecevic
Dec 20, 2011
Anonymous
Maybe you are right, but I prefer to start from a minimal installation when it is for servers.
Is there a way to install server sets from the Desktop DVD?
Thank you
r3N0oV4
Dec 20, 2011
Anonymous
Read here:
http://wiki.openindiana.org/oi/Frequently+Asked+Questions#FrequentlyAskedQuestions-IsOpenIndianaadesktoporaserveroperatingsystem%3F
Well, then download and install Server distro (text install).
This is exactly why Server distro is separated.
Best regards.
Predrag ZEcevic
Dec 21, 2011
Anonymous
Try ultraiso for windows it is very reliable for writing to usb as compared to unetbootin or dd
run with admin rights
Feb 15, 2012
Anonymous
On OSX try untetbootin.It works with fat32 only though.
Mar 09, 2012
Joy Funshine
I tried the dvd with a usb disk drive with no success (the dvd works fine in an ide disk drive).
The usbcopy script did not work straight away for me in solaris 11 (oracle), but some interpretation yielded partial success (though not a bootable usb stick).
The concatenation of the "1G.header" file with the (dot)usb image, piped into dd produced a bootable usb for the atom netbook.
Thanks for the pointers.