Solaris Live Upgrade Software Patch Requirements (Doc ID 1004881.1)

Last updated on JULY 18, 2024

Applies to:

Goal

Introduction

Oracle Solaris Live Upgrade can be used for two primary purposes:

1. Upgrading a system from one Oracle Solaris Release or Oracle Solaris Update to a later one - for example upgrading from Oracle Solaris 9 Update 5 to Oracle Solaris 10 Update 10, or from Oracle Solaris 10 Update 5 to Oracle Solaris 10 Update.
2. Patching a system.
   Live Upgrade does not update the current live environment, termed the PBE (Primary Boot Environment). Rather, Live Upgrade updates an inactive environment, termed an ABE (Alternate Boot Environment), which commonly is a copy of the PBE. This allows a system to continue in production without interruption while the update operations are taking place. The only interruption to production is the time to boot into the ABE once it's ready to go live.

While Live Upgrade updates an ABE, Live Upgrade itself runs on the PBE. This document details which packages and patches need to be installed on the PBE and preexisting ABEs for Live Upgrade to function correctly.

Before using Live Upgrade / lucreate to update an ABE, review the "[Solaris] Installation Guide: Solaris Live Upgrade and Upgrade Planning" section of the documentation for the Solaris Release or Solaris Update to which the ABE is being updated. This documentation details any Live Update caveats applicable to updating to that specific version, and also describes Oracle Solaris Operating System features introduced in the Solaris Update that are relevant to Live Upgrade.

For example, “ZFS Root Pool” was an Operating System feature introduced in Solaris 10 10/08 (Update 6), so a user would refer to the Solaris 10 10/08 Installation Guide: Solaris Live Upgrade and Upgrade Planning documentation for details of Live Upgrade support for the “ZFS Root Pool” feature. Note that new Oracle Solaris Operating System features in an upgraded ABE become available when that ABE is activated and booted into, do not expect these features to be come available in the PBE as a result of installing the packages and patches listed in this document.

In the case where a patched ABE has acquired new Operating System features that are relevant to Live Upgrade, the user is also referred to the above documentation if their intent is to make use of Live Upgrade support for these features.

This document does not detail how to use Live Upgrade to upgrade, apply patches, or manage the boot environments on a system. For information on using Live Upgrade, see the online man pages or the Solaris documentation collections on the Oracle Technical Network (e.g. Oracle Solaris 10 9/10 Live Upgrade documentation).

Solution