Oracle Solaris provides a predetermined set of system-defined profiles, as well as the capability for creating various types of user-defined reactive profiles with properties and activation conditions that you specify to meet your particular networking needs. You can use profiles to simplify the basic configuration of datalinks and IP addresses on your system, as well as define more complex system-wide network configuration, for example, naming services, IP Filter, and IP Security (IPsec) configurations.
The following profile types are supported:
Network configuration profiles (NCPs) – An NCP is the principal profile type that is used to specify the configuration of network datalinks and IP interfaces. NCPs are configured with property values that specify how the network is configured when that particular NCP is activated on the system. NCPs can be reactive or fixed. You can have multiple reactive NCPs configured, but Oracle Solaris only supports one fixed NCP named DefaultFixed.
Network configuration units (NCUs) – The individual configuration information (properties) that defines an NCP are specified within NCUs. An NCU can represent a physical link or an interface and contains properties that specify the configuration for that link or interface.
Location profiles – A Location profile (also referred to as a Location) specifies system-wide network configuration, for example, naming services, domain, IP Filter configuration, and IPsec configuration.
External network modifiers (ENMs) – An ENM is a profile that manages applications that are responsible for creating network configuration that is external to the system's primary network configuration, for example, a VPN application.
Known WLANs – A Known WLAN is a profile that stores information about wireless networks that are discovered by your system.