Ask Slashdot: Finding Legacy UnixWare Installation Media? 193
First time accepted submitter lukpac writes "We have an old (ancient) Unisys server in production that hosts a legacy system and are attempting to virtualize it. Unfortunately we don't have a generic UnixWare (2.1.2) installation CD, just a Unisys-specific one, and given the recent unpleasantness (see Groklaw for details), SCO isn't much of an option. We're not looking at pirating it (as above, we do still have the Unisys-specific media), but do need a generic copy of UnixWare. What options, if any, are available?"
Virtualize as bare metal (Score:5, Insightful)
How about doing a dd of the entire drive from the current system to a virtual disk and trying to make that work? Is the Unisys hardware that special? If not, you might be able to get it working by manipulating the virtual hardware of your VM.
Re:no p2v for unix? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, systems this old need to be retired.
Seriously, that isn't always an option.
Re:Is old Unisys server x86? (Score:5, Insightful)
If that server is truly ancient, qemu might handle it at speeds comparable to your old hardware -- or perhaps even faster.
Re:no p2v for unix? (Score:1, Insightful)
Seriously, that isn't always an option.
Not when you're being cheap about it.
Re:no p2v for unix? (Score:5, Insightful)
A system doesn't need to be supported to be able to fully work. If an environment is completely stable why does it need support?
Back it up, make sure you can still buy hardware for it to run on, and you're set. There's no point in upgrading a system which simply works as designed and is never modified. And I say this as someone who has applied the paddles of life to a machine running DOS at my work this year to keep an old proprietary system up and running. It's due for an upgrade in 2015.