IBM kit moves Solaris software to Linux

IBM plans to announce on Wednesday that it's giving away software to help customers and business partners adapt software written for Sun Microsystems' Solaris operating system to its open-source rival Linux. The Migration Kit helps people assess software written in C or C++ programming languages and move it from Solaris to Linux.

IBM is an aggressive Linux booster, though it competes with its own AIX version of Unix. Sun supports Linux, but prefers customers to buy Solaris support contracts.