Managing Packages and Patches With Solaris Live Upgrade

You can use Solaris Live Upgrade to add patches and packages to a system. As with upgrading a machine, by using Live Upgrade to add patches to a machine, the only downtime the system incurs is that of a reboot. You can add patches and packages directly to a boot environment with the luupgrade command. Or, you can apply patches and packages to a master system and apply a Web Start Flash archive of that system to a boot environment by using Live Upgrade.

To add patches to a boot environment directly, create a new boot environment and use the luupgrade command with the -t option. To add packages to a boot environment, use the luupgrade command with the -p option. For more information, see the man page, luupgrade(1M).

Or, you can use Solaris Live Upgrade to install a Web Start Flash archive that contains a complete copy of a boot environment with new packages and patches already included. This complete boot environment or single reference system is called a master system. The process of creating a Web Start Flash archive begins with creating a master system. After you have created a master system, add any patches and packages that you want to install. Then, create a Web Start Flash archive of the master system. Use Solaris Live Upgrade to install the archive on the new boot environment. You can copy the boot environment, change it, and distribute it as many times as necessary. For details about how to create a Web Start Flash archive, see Chapter 18, Creating Web Start Flash Archives (Tasks). For information on using Solaris Live Upgrade to install a Web Start Flash archive, see "Installing Web Start Flash Archives on a Boot Environment".

When upgrading and adding and removing packages or patches, Solaris Live Upgrade requires packages or patches that comply with the SVR4 advanced packaging guidelines. While Sun packages conform to these guidelines, Sun cannot guarantee the conformance of packages from third-party vendors. A non-conformant package can cause the package-addition software during an upgrade to fail or worse, to alter the active boot environment.

For more information on adding and removing packages with Solaris Live Upgrade, see the man page, luupgrade(1M). For more information on packaging requirements, see Appendix C, Additional SvR4 Packaging Requirements (Reference).