Oracle Solaris 11 uses the Image Packaging System (IPS) for package management. IPS simplifies the process of managing patches and updates to reduce the risk of operating system maintenance issues. It is a comprehensive delivery framework that spans the complete software life cycle, addressing software installation, updates, system upgrades, and the removal of software packages. IPS relies on network accessible or locally available software repositories as a delivery mechanism. For more information, see Copying and Creating Package Repositories in Oracle Solaris 11.3.
Each IPS package is represented by a Fault Management Resource Identifier (FMRI), that provides information about the package. For example, the FMRI pkg://solaris/system/library@0.5.11,5.11-0.151.0.1:20101105T004750Z consists of the following sequence of information:
Scheme – pkg
Publisher – Oracle Solaris
Category – system
Package name – library
Version string, which consists of four components :
Component version – 5.11
Build version – 5.11
Branch version – 151.0.1
Timestamp in ISO-8601 basic format: 20101105T004750Z
For more information about packaging and delivering, see Packaging and Delivering Software With the Image Packaging System in Oracle Solaris 11.3.