Archive-name: Solaris2/FAQ
Version: 1.69
Last-Modified: 1999/10/25 13:27:03
Maintained-by: Casper Dik 

The following is a list of questions that are frequently asked about Solaris 2.x and later. Where the FAQ mentions "Solaris 2.x", it really refers to Solaris 2.x, Solaris 7 and later.

You can help make it an even better-quality FAQ by writing a short contribution or update and sending it BY EMAIL ONLY to me. A contribution should consist of a question and an answer, and increasing number of people sends me contributions of the form "I don't know the answer to this, but it must be a FAQ, please answer it for me"; please don't send me those.

Thanks!

As you may have noted, I have switched employers and work for Sun as of April 1st 1995. Sun is in no way responsible for the contents of this FAQ.

The latest Solaris 2 FAQ, including an HTML version, and some other goodies can be obtained through ftp from .

A new version of the FAQ is available with an index separate from all questions, it's . So it's a lot quicker to download. Also, an experimental FAQ search service at is now available.

Please note that these addresses have changed because of a reorg. Just replace "fwi" in the old addresses with "wins".

The HTML version of the FAQ contains references to most FTP sites and files mentioned in the FAQ. The references to ftp sites are always to either HTML files or directories, never to binary files.

I've added an index of questions and marked changed(*) and added questions(+). The FAQ is being reorganized, time permitting. The index is generated automatically, so there may be errors there. Not all questions are in the section they belong in. Suggestions on how best to subdivide/order the FAQ are welcome.

1. GENERAL

1.1) What's Solaris anyway?

Solaris(tm) is Sun's name for their UNIX-based user environment, including the UNIX(tm) operating system, window system (X11-based), and other stuff too.

Solaris 1.x is a retroactive (marketing?) name for SunOS 4.1.x (x>=1), a version of UNIX that is BSD-like with some SVR4 features, along with OpenWindows 3.0.

Solaris 2.x (which is what most everybody means by "Solaris") includes SunOS 5.x, which is an SVR4-derived UNIX, along with OpenWindows 3.x, tooltalk, and other stuff.

Solaris 7 and later are basically newer revisions of Solaris 2.x with the leading "2." stripped.

This FAQ covers Solaris 2.x and later.

(See 1.5 for a chart with more info)

1.2) Why should I upgrade?

Solaris 2 is more compatible with the rest of the UNIX industry. Other major UNIX vendors including IBM, HP, SGI, SCO, and others are based on System V rather than on BSD (though some of them are on SVR3, not SVR4). All but one commercial PC-based UNIXes are System V based (and mostly SVR4); the only commercial exception is from a small but interesting firm called BSDI.

Solaris 2 is where Sun has been putting almost all its development for the last few years now. There will be no new development on SunOS4; already much of Sun's add-on software is only available for Solaris 2. Solaris 2 is the only supported MP OS on all but the old 4/6x0-1x0 w/ Ross 605 modules. All the UltraSPARC systems require Solaris 2.x.

Sun software is being released first for Solaris 2.x and usually no longer for SunOS 4.1.x (No Sun JVM for 4.1.x)

Solaris 2.3 and above feature a standard X11R5 release of The X Window System, a benefit for those who didn't like NeWS or the V2/V3 OpenWindows server. (It's still called OpenWindows, but it is the X11R5 server with Adobe DPS added in). It is as fast or faster than MIT R5 or XC R6 (depending on the platform) and supports all Sun graphics hardware.

Solaris 2 is more standards-compliant than Solaris 1/SunOS 4.

Solaris 2.6 is also Y2000 compliant, so upgrading to the latest Solaris release is a must.

1.3) Should I move to Solaris 2.x now, or later, or never?

That depends - on you, your situation, your application mix, etc. Some year SunOS4.1.x will go the way of the 3/50 - it'll still be around, but Sun will no longer support it.

You don't have to upgrade immediately, but you should be planning your upgrade path by now.

1.4) What is Solaris 2? Is it really SVR4 based?

Solaris 2 is an "operating environment" that includes the SunOS 5.x operating system and the OpenWindows 3.x window environment.

SunOS 5.x is based on USL's SVR4.0. SVR4.0, in turn, was developed jointly by AT&T and Sun while Sun was developing 4.1.0, which is why things like RFS, STREAMS, shared memory, etc., are in SunOS 4.1.x, and why things like vnodes, NFS and XView are in SVR4.0. (RFS, by the way, was dropped effective Solaris 2.3).

1.5) What machines does Solaris 2.x run on?

Solaris 2.0 only ran on desktop SPARCstations and a few other Sun machines.

Solaris 2.1 and 2.4 and later come in two flavors, SPARC and "x86".

Solaris 2.1 (and 2.2, ...) for SPARC run on all SPARCstations and clones, as well as all models of the Sun-4 family. The old FPU on the 4/110 and 4/2x0 is not supported, so floating point will be SLOW, but it does work.

Starting with 2.5 support for machines with kernel architecture "sun4" is dropped. I.e., the machines on which "uname -m" and "arch -k" return "sun4"; not the machines on which those commands return sun4c, sun4m, sun4u or sun4d. The unsupported machine include the sun4/110 (not to be confused with the SS4 @110MHz), sun4/2xx, sun4/3xx and sun4/4xx. These are all VME based deskside/server configurations.

All version of the SPARC PROMs should work under Solaris 2.x, but you can run into the following problems:

1) No part of the boot partition may be offset more than 1 GB into the disk, unless you have a PROM with rev 2.6 or better. Note that the number behind the point is not a fraction, it's an integer. Hence 3.0 > 2.25 > 2.10 > 2.9 > 2.1 > 2.0 > 1.6.
2) If booting diskless, you need a link in the /tftpboot directory, "tftpboot -> .". Admintool will make that link automatically.

A Solaris port for the PowerPC has been completed, and has been released, effective Solaris 2.5.1. But support for it was dropped almost immediately as it went nowhere.

Solaris 2.1, 2.4 and above for x86 have been released to end users. It runs on a wide range of high-end PC-architecture machines. "High-end" means: 16MB of RAM and an 80486 (or 33MHz or faster 80386DX). It will not run on your 4 MB 16MHz 386SX, so don't bother trying! Also, floating point hardware (80387-style) is absolutely required in 2.1. Starting with Solaris 2.4 for x86, a fp CO-processor is no-longer required, though still recommended. All three buses are supported: ISA, EISA, MCA, PCI.

MCA and ISA/EISA support will go away in future. See also 3.38.

The following OS revision chart maps the major Solaris releases. Not all HW releases have been included as some are relatively unimportant.

Solaris SunOS     OpenWin               Comments
1.0     4.1.1B    2.0
        4.1.1_U1  2.0           sun3 EOL release (not named Solaris)
1.0.1   4.1.2     2.0           6[379]0-1[24]0 MP
1.1     4.1.3     3.0           SP Viking support
1.1C    4.1.3C    3.0           Classic/LX
1.1.1   4.1.3_U1  3.0_U1        4.1.3 + fixes + Classic/LX support
1.1.1 B 4.1.3_U1B 3.0_U1        1.1.1B + SS5/SS20 support
1.1.2   4.1.4     3_414         The "final" 4.x release (SS20 HS11)

2.0      5.0       3.0.1         sun4c only
2.1SPARC 5.1       3.1           Dec '92
2.1 x86  5.1       3.1           May '93
2.2SPARC 5.2       3.2           May '93
2.3SPARC 5.3       3.3           Nov '93
                        OpenWin 3.3 is X11R5 based: Display
                        PostScript instead of NeWS, no SunView.
                        It is still primarily OPEN LOOK.
                        The Spring 1995 OpenWin will be Motif
                        and COSE-based.
			    Statically linked BCP support
2.3 edition II SPARC    Special Solaris 2.3 distribution for
                        Voyager and SparcStation 5
2.3 HW 8/94 SPARC       Supports S24 (24 bits color for SS5),
                        POSIX 1003.2, Energy Start power management
                        and SunFastEthernet + patches.
2.4       5.4      3.4  From this moment on, the SPARC and x86
                        releases are in sync. Q3 '94
                        Adds motif runtime and headers (not mwm).
2.4 HW 11/94            First SMCC release of 2.4
2.4 HW  3/95            Second SMCC release of 2.4 (includes support
                        for booting from SSA)
2.5       5.5      3.5  UltraSPARC support, PCI support.
                        NFS V3, NFS/TCP, ACLs, CDE, Sendmail V8
                        name service cache, dynamic PPP
                        Posix threads, doors (new IPC mechanism)
                        many "BSD" type functions back in libc,
                        many "BSD" programs back in /usr/bin.
                        mixed mode BCP support (e.g., apps only
                        dynamically linked against libdl.so)
2.5 HW 1/96             Creator3D support (Creator3D/FFB+ is not
			    supported in 2.5 11/95, though the files
			    are present but of unsupported,
			    "mostly works", beta quality)
2.5.1                   Ultra-2 support, Sun Enterprise
			    server support.  Large (32bit UID)
			    support.  64bit KAIO (aioread64/aiowrite64),
			    3.75 GB of virtual memory.
			    Pentium/Pentium Pro optimizations.
			    (upto 25% for certain database apps)
			    Ultra ZX support.
			    Initial and last PowerPC desktop release.
2.5.1 HW 4/97           Support for Starfire (E10000) and Ultra-30
2.5.1 HW 8/97           Support for the Ultra-450
2.5.1 HW 11/97          Support for Ultra-5, Ultra-10 and Ultra-60 as
			    well as Elite3D
2.6       5.6      3.6  Largefiles, JVM + JIT, Hotjava, X11R6,
			    Web based answerbook, BOOTP/DHCP, SNMP agents,
			    VLSM, in-kernel sockets, XNTP, PAM,
			    CDE 1.2 as default desktop.
2.6 HW 3/98             Support for Ultra-5, Ultra-10, Ultra-60 Elite3d
	                    and Starfire (E10K)
2.6 HW 5/98             DR Support for Starfire
7         5.7     3.6.1 64-bit OS support, logging UFS.
8         5.8     3.6.2 Dropped support for sun4c and Voyager.

1.6) Will my old applications from 4.1.x run on Solaris 2?

There is quite a bit of support in SunOS 5.x for running 4.1.x binaries in an emulation mode called "Binary Compatibility" (BCP). This works by dynamically linking the 4.1.x binaries with a shared library that emulates the 4.1.x binary interface on top of 5.x, so there is some overhead.

In Solaris 2.2 and earlier, the programs needed to be fully dynamically linked.

In Solaris 2.3 and 2.4 fully statically linked programs are supported as well. However, they won't obey nsswitch.conf, but use the standard "use NIS if present, fall back to files" approach of SunOS 4.x. Those programs may therefor require a "passwd: compat" line and will only talk to NIS (or NIS+ in emulation mode) or read from files.

Starting Solaris 2.5, mixed mode (partly static/partly dynamic) executables are supported. Whether those programs will use /etc/nsswitch.conf depends on precisely how much was dynamically linked.

Be aware, though, that Sun may drop the binary compatibility package some year. Try to wean yourself and your users from depending on it, even if it means beating on your software vendors to offer "native" Solaris2 applications. But this will happen later, rather than sooner. Sun has not yet announced End-of-Life of this feature.

1.7) Will my SPARC binaries run unchanged on UltraSPARC machines?

Yes. One of the most important goals of the UltraSPARC project was full binary compatibility with existing SPARC hardware and software.

If it isn't compatible, it's a bug!

There are some things you should keep in mind though: if you broke the rules but got away with it in the previous generations of SPARC machines, your luck may just have run out.

When developing the UltraSPARC it was discovered that some code generators didn't leave all "reserved" bits in opcodes zero. Such instructions are either illegal instructions which are trapped and fixed in the UltraSPARC kernel or they are legal V9 instructions which will modify the program behaviour. All such programs can be run through "cleanv8", a program designed to correct the bogus instructions.

No instructions of the second category have been found, so even without "cleanv8" you should be safe.

Another thing is the memory map on UltraSPARC, some applications use an mmap(MAP_FIXED) call with an address that is illegal to use on UltraSPARC. Such calls are inherently non-portable. Such applications are relatively rare. One such applications is MAE, which should work again after "setenv MAE_NOMMAP_ENGINE".

A third problem discovered is in device drivers that copy data from/to userland directly, bypassing copyin(9f)/copyout(9f). On V8 SPARCs, such device drivers would work most of the time, but fail mysteriously with panics when the system is stressed and page mappings disappear; but on the UltraSPARC the drivers will fail always. The kernel will panic and will tell you in which module the panic occurred.

1.8) Will my old applications from SVR3 on the 386 run on Solaris 2/x86?

As with SPARC, there is an emulation mode that should run the majority of well-behaved SVR3 (iBCS) binaries. Most SVR3 stuff appears to work under Solaris 2.4.

Applications from any other vendor's standards-conforming 386/486 SVR4 should also run.

However, some vendors have made incompatible changes to their SVR4 release and programs linked on those versions may not work. Future versions of Solaris 2.x for Intel will address some/most of those incompatibilities. Unixware is one of the offenders.

1.9) Where has the XXX command gone now?

There are too many of these changes to include in this FAQ, but here are some key ones:

a. locations are often different

whoami

/usr/ucb/whoami

make

/usr/ccs/bin/make

hostid

/usr/ucb/hostid

hostname

/usr/ucb/hostname (or use uname -n)

Note that the last two commands are back in /usr/bin in Solaris 2.5.

b. some old commands don't exist or have replacements

pstat -s

swap -s (how much swap space?)

dkinfo

/usr/sbin/prtvtoc raw_dev_name

trace

truss

mount -a

mountall

exportfs

share

bar

cpio -H bar (read only)

This guide has undergone some changes from 2.0 -> 2.1 and beyond. Several manuals have ended up being combined into this single manual. This manual discusses administrative transition and developer transition issues.

The command "whatnow" (for Solaris 2.x) is included in the "Admigration Toolkit" package (see below). The Admigration toolkit can be obtained from:

Admigration toolkit

Sample output:

	% whatnow hostname
	hostname                                        4.x command only
	hostname        /usr/ucb/hostname               part of SCP package
	hostname        /usr/bin/uname -n               alternate command

The whatnow command is limited in that it may point to one command which may only implement a subset of the old command (e.g., pstat points to sar, while pstat -s is identical to swap -s)

1.10) When I upgrade, should I use SunInstall "upgrade", or start over?

You can't do a SunInstall "upgrade" from 4.1.x to Solaris2. You can use the Admigration toolkit (q.v.) to help you move from SunOS 4.1.x (Solaris 1, actually) to Solaris 2.

If you're moving from Solaris 2.x to 2.(x+y) [for small values of y] then you can use "upgrade" to preserve your existing partitions and local changes (including pkgadd!!), though it runs very slowly (about 1.5-2x the time for a reinstall) and does require that you have enough free space in / and /usr - make these big when you first install! If you run out of space in one of your partitions, you can always remove some components. Those will not be upgraded and can be installed elsewhere after initial upgrade (e.g., you can remove OW, Xil, Dxlib, manual pages, etc)

There is no need to backout patches before upgrading. In 2.2, the system would back them out for you, in 2.3 it won't back out the patches but removes them without a trace.

An upgrade may not work as well as a full install. E.g., the upgrade from 2.x (x<3) to 2.3 will leave aliases for all your ptys in /devices/pseudo.

There's no need to upgrade to all intermediate releases. You can go from Solaris 2.5 to Solaris 7 in one step. But be careful in checking release notes, each release typically only supports upgrades from a few earlier releases and not all.

When you upgrade a system, you must make sure that you read the release notes completely. Often, you'll need to upgrade to new versions of Veritas, DiskSuite, etc.

1.11) Is Solaris 2.x reliable/stable enough to use?

The consensus seems to be that yes, it is.

Binary compatibility was much improved in 2.3. That will help transition somewhat. The performance of 2.3 is adequate, though some parts of the system are still slower than SunOS 4.1.x. Solaris 2.3 is much more stable on MP machines than 2.2. The Solaris 2.3 version of OpenWindows is much faster and much more stable than the versions shipped with SunOS 4.1.x.

Solaris 2.1 and earlier should really be avoided. Solaris 2.2 should be avoided too, but some people need to stick to it until some applications get ported (2.2 is the last release with NeWS).

Solaris 2.3 still has some problems on high-end MP systems with large numbers of interactive users. Solaris 2.4 and Solaris 2.5 have delivered increasingly more stable and more scalable multi processing.

1.12) Why do some people dislike Solaris2?

There is a number of reasons why people dislike Solaris.

1) Change. In general people dislike change. Change requires re-learning and retraining. Old system administration practices no longer work. Commands have been replaced by other commands, some commands behave differently. And they ask why the change was necessary. SunOS 4.x worked for them.

2) Lack of migration support. Sun did not provide a lot of tools to ease migration. Many applications wouldn't run in the binary compatibility mode. The source compatibility mode was probably compatible with some OS, but it certainly wasn't SunOS. Lots of public domain and third party stuff that was needed wasn't immediately available for Solaris. NIS+, buggy, resource hungry and unstable replaced NIS in incompatible ways.

3) Missing functionality. When people migrate, at first they don't tend to notice new functionality. Instead, they stumble upon missing functionality such as screenblank, clear_colormap and the like (but see 3.23). And perhaps worst of all, no C compiler, not even a crippled one.

4) Slow and buggy. The initial Solaris releases didn't perform at all well and were extremely unstable. This has improved drastically, with Solaris 2.5 being stable and quick, even without many patches.

1.13) Why do some people like Solaris2?

There are improvements in Solaris 2.x.

1) OpenWindows 3.3+ (in Solaris 2.3+). Includes X11R5 and Display PostScript. X11R6 in Solaris 2.6.

2) Motif & CDE.

3) ANSI-C and POSIX development environment.

4) POSIX threads (2.5)

5) POSIX and X/OPEN command environment

6) UNIX 95 conformance.

7) UNIX 98 conformance (Solaris 7)

8) Posix shared memory and semaphores (2.6)

9) Multi-threaded kernel and real threads.

10) Real-time feature in the kernel

11) Faster clock ticks (optionally 1000Hz in 2.6)

12) Large files (2.6)

13) True multi-processing.

14) Goodies: vold, admintool and Wabi.

15) Easy patch installation/administration through installpatch/patchadd.

16) All software in easy to manage "packages".

17) Power management software & suspend/resume

18) Access control lists

19) NFS Version 3 and NFS over TCP (Solaris 2.5+).

20) A better automounter, autofs (not more /tmp_mnt and symlinks).

21) Jumpstart/autoinstall - hand off installation of clients.

22) Much better MP support.

23) Faster networking (ATM, fastethernet).

24) 64 bit OS (Solaris 7)

1.14) What is Sun doing to help me migrate?

Sun has recently started several projects to aid in the transition. Their WWW starting point is:

Solaris Migration Initiative home page

The project is a combination of new and existing efforts and includes:

1) Porting PD software to Solaris 2.x
2) Solaris Migration Tool: (formerly known as Pipeline tool) a tool to help you port your code.
3) Admigration Toolset. Tools to help you convert your SunOS 4 environment and to help you adjust to the new Solaris 2.x environment.
4) Appmap: a tool to simplify application administration in a mixed SunOS 4.x/Solaris 2.x environment
5) Solaris Transition CD
6) Native Solaris NIS
7) LP tools (simplified LP administration through NIS)

1.15) Can I use my SunOS 4 disks on Solaris 2.x?

Yes you can. The on disk format in Solaris 2.x isn't different from SunOS 4.1.x, as long as they've been formatted under SunOS 4.1.x. Disks formatted on older fses need to be converted with "fsck -c". If "dumpfs | head" (SunOS 4) or "fstyp -v | head" (Solaris 2) lists "format dynamic" as one of the first lines, the disk does not need to be converted.

UIDs > 60002 may give problems when moving disks from SunOS 4.x to Solaris 2.x. This is fixed in a Solaris 2.5.1 which has MAXUID defined as 2147483648. Note too that UID and GID 60001 and 60002 have been defined as nobody and noaccess on Solaris 2.x. If the target SunOS 4 system uses such IDs, you need to renumber them to avoid the collision

Moving disks the other way around may give problems: Solaris 2.5 supports on disks ACLs, and when MAXUID in 2.5.1 is increased beyond 65535, that will give added difficulties.

1.16) How can I enable System V IPC? Ipcs says it isn't configured in.

There's nothing you need to do to enable System V IPC, but on boot up "ipcs" always says:

	IPC status from  as of 
	Message Queue facility not in system.
	Shared Memory facility not in system.
	Semaphore facility not in system.

This just means that no one has yet used the Message Queue/Shared Memory or Semaphore facility yet. They'll be loaded on first use.

If you really want to have them loaded at boot time, add the following to /etc/system:

	forceload: sys/msgsys
	forceload: sys/semsys
	forceload: sys/shmsys

In Solaris 7, ipcs will report the unloaded facilities as inactive rather than "not present in system".

1.17) Solaris 7 is 64 bit, does that affect Solaris/IA-32?

No, Solaris 7 on Intel is still 32 bit; the only visible changes are that all types are now compile environment safe.

1.18) Solaris 7 is 64 bit, does this mean I can no longer use my old SPARCs?

No, a 32 bit kernel is still supported on sun4c, sun4m, sun4d and even sun4u hardware.

2. SOURCES OF INFORMATION

2.1) How can I RTFM when I don't have it anymore?

"RTFM" is an old saying: Read The "Fine" Manual. Sun still sells printed manuals, but doesn't automatically distribute them. As with all real UNIX systems, you do get a full set of online "man" pages. A smaller, lighter, bookshelf-friendly :-) set of CDROMs called "The AnswerBook"(tm) contains all the printed documents in machine-readable (PostScript) form, with hypertext capabilities and a keyword search engine. 90% of your introductory questions are answered therein!

In Solaris 2.x the Answerbook set gets increasingly more divided into pieces. It is currently split over a number of CDs, currently (2.5.1):

	Solaris 2.x CD:
	    Solaris 2.x User AnswerBook

	Solaris Desktop 1.x
	    Wabi 2.x Answerbook
	    Solaris Common Desktop Environment AnswerBook 1.0.x

	Updates for Solaris Operating Environment 2.x
	    Solaris 2.x on Sun Hardware Answerbook

	Server Supplement
	    NSKit 1.2 answerbook
	    Solaris 2.x System Administrator AnswerBook
	    (Solaris 2.5.1 Supplemental System Admin AnswerBook)
	    Solaris 2.x Reference Manual AnswerBook

	Solstice AutoClient & AdminSuite
	    Solstice AutoClient 2.0 AnswerBook
	    Solstice AdminSuite 2.2 AnswerBook

	Solstice Online Disksuite
	    DiskSuite 4.0 AnswerBook

	Solstice Backup
	    Solstice Backup 4.2 AnswerBook

	Solaris 2.x Software Developer Kit
	    All programming manuals.

	Solaris 2.x Driver Developer Kit
	    Device driver developer manuals.

Only the first two CDs ship with the desktop edition, the third is SPARC specific. The last two CDs are part of two separate products; the SDK and DDK. The rest is server only, though the reference manuals are available in nroff source form.

There is some overlap between CDs.

As distributed with 2.1 and 2.2, the Answerbook search engine runs only with the OpenWindows ("xnews") server, not with MIT X11.

In Solaris 2.3 through 2.5.1 answerbook uses X extension DPS. If you are using the MIT server instead of what Sun provides, you'll have to use one of several "answerbook workaround" scripts that are in circulation. The AnswerBook distributed with 2.3 and later runs with the OW3.3 X11R5+DPS server, so it should display on any X11+DPS server, such as on DEC, IBM and SGI workstations.

In Solaris 2.6, answerbooks are distributed in SGML format; they are presented through a special web server which is also able to convert old Postscript answerbooks to HTML on the fly. Sun has a site on the web that has many of the answerbooks available.

You should buy (or print from within Answerbook) at least the reference manual and the System and Network Administration books, because if your system becomes disabled you won't be able to run the Answerbook to find out how to fix it...

2.2) Why is "man -k" so confused?

Solaris man uses a manual page index file called "windex" in place of the old "whatis" file. You can build this index with

	      catman -w -M 

But, in 2.1, this will result in numerous "line too long" messages and a bogus windex file in /usr/share/man, and a core dump in /usr/openwin/man. (In 2.2, catman works in /usr/share/man, but says "line too long" in /usr/openwin/man). To add injury to insult, "man" normally won't show you a man page if it can't find the windex entry, even though the man page exists.

There's a "makewhatis" script in /usr/openwin/man that works better than catman. But watch it - by default it searches files in /usr/man, not in openwin, and it only looks in some predefined man subdirectories. Try changing its "for ..." command to "for i in man*", then use it like this: cd /usr/share/man; /usr/openwin/man/makewhatis . cd /usr/openwin/man; /usr/openwin/man/makewhatis .

Still (!), the openwin windex file is somewhat hosed (try "man answerbook" :-( ). You can always delete the bogus lines manually... or, you can alias man to "man -F", forcing it to look for the bloody file like you asked.

But wait, there's more! To see the read(2) man page, you can't just type "man 2 read" anymore - it has to be "man -s 2 read". Or, alias man to this little script:

	    #!/bin/sh
	    if [ $# -gt 1 -a "$1" -gt "0" ]; then
		    /bin/man -F -s $*
	    else
		    /bin/man -F $*
	    fi

2.3) What Software is available for Solaris 2.x?

Most commercial software that ran on 4.x either will run in BCP mode, or is available for Solaris 2.x, or is being ported now. Solaris 2.3 BCP mode finally supports statically-linked executables. Solaris 2.5 BCP mode supports mixed mode (part static, part dynamic) executables too.

Sun's web pages contain a searchable index of commercial software and a link to an outside contractor who gathers free and public domain programs. Sun's own software is also prominently featured at www.sun.com.

A list of freeware (some "public domain", but mostly copyright- but-freely-distributable) [as well as commercial software??] that has been ported to Solaris 2.x is posted monthly to the newsgroup comp.unix.solaris by ric@coronacorp.com (Richard Steinberger). Look for this:

Subject: Solaris SW list. Monthly Post.

Some software that invariably needs minor tweaking after an OS upgrade is included here specially. It's almost always necessary to recompile it after an OS upgrade, but if that still doesn't give a working version, make sure you check the archives for the latest version:

SymbEL/SE performance monitor Top - a process monitor Site carrying the latest version of Top

Lsof - list open files

Identd - a daemon that implements RFC1413

scsiinfo - a program that lists SCSI devices.

sysinfo - a system hardware information program.

If you use gcc (versions prior to 2.8 or versions build on Solaris 2.4 and earlier), it is important to remember that you must re-run fixincludes or re-install gcc after an OS upgrade, or you'll be compiling with the old include files which will essentially give you the above programs as if compiled for a previous OS release.

2.4) What FTP/WWW sites do I need to know about?

www.sun.com Sun's own WWW site, contains pointers to Sunsites, patches and has lots of info, press releases etc, etc.

www.sun.com/downloads/ Solaris software catalogue, pointers to free software, downloadable software from Sun, etc, etc.

Solaris transition home page Sun's Solaris 2.x migration support

Solaris 2.x binaries

The Unofficial Guide to Solaris

Solaris 2.x/SPARC binaries in pkgadd format

Solaris 2.x/x86 binaries in pkgadd format

SunSites - Sun sponsored sites. Lots of good stuff there.

Sun SITE AskERIC at Syracuse University - Syracuse
Sun SITE Australia at Australian National University - Canberra
Sun SITE Central Europe at RWTH-Aachen - Germany
Sun SITE Chile at Universidad de Chile - Santiago
Sun SITE Czech Republic at Charles University - Prague
Sun SITE Denmark at Aalborg University - Aalborg
Sun SITE Digital Library at University of California at Berkeley
Sun SITE France at Conservatoire National des Arts-et-Metiers - Paris
Sun SITE Hong Kong at University of Science and Tech. - Hong Kong
Sun SITE Hungary at Lajos Kossuth University, Debrecen - Hungary
Sun SITE Italy at University of Milan - Milan
Sun SITE Israel at Hebrew University of Jerusalem - Jerusalem
Sun SITE Japan at Science University - Tokyo
Sun SITE Korea at Seoul National University - Seoul
Sun SITE Mexico at Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico - Mexico
Sun SITE Nordic at Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan - Stockholm
Sun SITE Northern Europe at Imperial College - London
Sun SITE People's Republic of China at Tsinghua University - Beijing
Sun SITE Poland at Warsaw University - Warsaw
Sun SITE Russia at Moscow State University - Moscow
Sun SITE Thailand at Assumption University - Bangkok
Sun SITE Spain at Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, RedIRIS - Madrid
Sun SITE Singapore at National University of Singapore - Singapore
Sun SITE South Africa at University of the Witwatersrand - Johannesburg
Sun SITE USA at University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill

Solaris at UMBC - Solaris tips & tricks by Vijay Gill

ftp.x.org - the master X11 site

ftp.quintus.com:/pub/GNU - GNU binaries

ftp.uu.net - UuNet communication archives
(mirrors abovementioned GNU binaries in systems/gnu/solaris2.3)

OpCom. (opcom.sun.ca) - run by Sun Microsystems' OpCom group - lots of stuff. Here is some of the stuff that's online:

pub/AMToolkit.*

- the Administration Migration (4.1.x to Solaris 2) Toolkit

pub/binaries

- binaries/man pages for Solaris 2.0 native binaries.

pub/newsletter

- issues of the monthly OpCom newsletter.

pub/docs

- assorted documentation, papers, and other information.

- all of the RFCs

pub/drivers

- information related to device driver writing under under Solaris 2.0 as well as a skeleton SCSI driver.

ls-lR.Z

- compressed recursive listing of files available on the server.

pub/tars

- compressed tars.

pub/tmp

- place for uploading things to the server.

pub/R5

- the unadultered MIT x11r5 distribution.

pub/x11r5

- port of X11r5 to Solaris 2.0, binaries, libraries and headers. A compressed tar of this tree can be found in tars.

Joe Shamblin's x86 site at Duke

server.berkeley.edu:/pub/x86solaris - x86 stuff

ftp.wins.uva.nl

pub/solaris

- where the Solaris FAQ is kept, including an html version.

pub/solaris/auto-install

- fully automated auto-install scripts, including an explanation of exactly what a machine needs when booting the installation, automated patch installation and even post-install updates from your install tree, which gives you an easy way to keep all your Solaris machines in sync.

2.5) What other FAQ's do I need to know about?

1) Stokely Consulting's list of Sun FAQs
2) The Solaris for Intel FAQ
3) Obsolete, SunOS 4.x only: Sun Computer Administration Frequently Asked Questions

4) The "Solaris 2 Porting FAQ"

5) comp.windows.open-look - Anything related to OpenWindows or the OPEN LOOK Graphical User Interface.

6) The Sun-Managers mailing list FAQ maintained by John DiMarco .

7) See also the "Solaris SW list. Monthly Post" above and the "whatlist" file.

2.6) What mailing lists should I get?

First, read all the USENET newsgroups with "sun" in their name :-)

1) The Florida SunFlash is a "closed" mailing list for Sun owners. It contains mostly press releases from Sun and third-party vendors. This list contains information on conferences such as the Solaris Developer's Conference as well. It is normally distributed regionally - to find out about a mail point in your area, or for other information send mail to info-sunflash@Sun.COM.

Subscription requests should be sent to sunflash-request@Sun.COM. Archives are on solar.nova.edu, ftp.uu.net, sunsite.unc.edu, src.doc.ic.ac.uk and ftp.adelaide.edu.au

2) The Sun Managers list is an unmoderated mailing list for emergency-only requests. Subscribe and listen for a while, and read the regularly-posted Policy statement BEFORE sending mail to it, and to get a feel for what kinds of traffic it carries. Send a message with "subscribe sun-managers" in the body to majordomo@sunmanagers.ececs.uc.edu to subscribe.

3) The solaris x86 list. Subscribe/unsubscribe by sending a message with subscribe/unsubscribe in the BODY of the message to solaris-x86-request@mlist.eis.com. A digested version of the list is also available. To subscribe send an email message to solaris-x86-digest-request@mlist.eis.com. There's also an archive of this list.

4) The Sun Security Bulletin announcement mailing list. Low volume, announcement only list. Subscribe by mailing security-alert@sun.com with subject "SUBSCRIBE cws user@some.host"

2.7) What books should I read?

O'Reilly & Associates specializes in UNIX books. Their "UNIX In A Nutshell" has been updated for SVR4 and Solaris 2.0. Get their catalog by calling 800-998-9938 (1-707-829-0515) 7AM to 5PM PST.

SunSoft Press carries books specific to Solaris 2. Look for the inset with your End User Media Kit that lists the most relevant ones.

Prentice-Hall has reprints of much of the AT&T documentation. I'm not sure how much of this you need - a lot of the same material is in the Answerbook (see above).

2.8) What hardware is supported by Solaris 2.x for Intel?

The complete and often updated list Solaris x86 hardware options can be obtained by sending an email message without subject/body to:

	    x86hcl@sun.com	(ascii)
	    x86hcl.ps@sun.com	(postscript)

or

	    x86-hwconfig@Cypress.West.Sun.Com

There's also an online version of all the lists.

2.9) What is Wabi?

Wabi is Sun's MS-Windows-under-unix emulator. The Wabi faqs can be obtained by sending an empty message to:

	    wabi-questions@East.Sun.com

The list of current Wabi apps can be obtained by mailing:

	    wabi-apps@East.Sun.COM

Applications that execute a lot of x86 code, run fastest on Solaris 2.x_86, as no x86 emulation needs to be done. Applications that are more windows intensive will run better on machines with faster graphics hardware.

The currently shipping version of Wabi is Wabi 2.2, which ships with Solaris 2.5.1.

Wabi only supports MS Windows 3.1 applications. Plans to support Windows 95 have been shelved.

Wabi is no longer supported under Solaris 7

Wabi will not be made available for SunOS 4.1.x.

Reports indicate that Wabi support will be dropped by Sun and replaced by some other PC on Sun product.

2.10) I'm running into some limits of SunOS 4.x, will upgrading to Solaris 2.x help?

The answer depends on the limit you run into.

Solaris 2.x supports filesystems upto 1TB, SunOS 4.x requires ODS 1.0 to support filesystems over 2GB. Solaris 2.6 and later support files > 2GB.

Swap partitions and files are still limited to 2GB a piece as long as you run a 32 bit kernel, but you can have multiple 2GB swap partitions/files.

Solaris 2.x supports a virtually unlimited number of open filedescriptors, SunOS 4.x only supports 256 (default) or 1024 (with Sun DBE 1.x).

Solaris 2.x supports an unlimited number of pseudo terminals. SunOS 4.x supports at most 256.

Solaris 2.x supports more SCSI disks.

Solaris 2.x limits can be tuned in /etc/system, requiring just a reboot. SunOS 4.x limits need to be tweaked in the config file and a new kernel needs to be build and installed.

Solaris 7 and later in 64 bit mode support > 4GB of address space per processes.

64 bit processes in Solaris 7 and later can open more than 256 files using stdio.

NOTE: when the above says "unlimited", it just means that there is no "hard" limit, but performance may degrade over certain values. E.g., setting the number of available fds very high, will cause programs that loop closing all fds to be very slow in starting.

3. SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION

3.1) How much disk space do I need to install Solaris 2?

The FAQ maintainer's preference is for a merged root, /usr and /opt, especially on smaller systems. But here's a table of sizes for multiple partitionings.

Solaris 2.5.1 with root and usr only.
Install type     root      /usr
------------     ----      ----
Core             15        21
EndUser          28        99
Developer        30        192
Entire           72        217

Solaris 2.6 with root and usr only.
Install type     root      /usr
------------     ----      ----
Core             21        25
EndUser          33        181
Developer        38        398
Entire           44        448

Solaris 2.6 with root, var, opt and usr.
Install type     root      /var      /opt      /usr
------------     ----      ----      ----      ----
Core             21        3         1         25
EndUser          22        6         9         181
Developer        22        9         9         398
Entire           23        10        13        448

The following table is based on teaching and system administration
experience.

Solaris 2.6 Recommended minimum partition sizes, real world.
Install type     root      /var*     /opt**    /usr***
------------     ----      ----      ----      ----
Core             50        150       200       200
EndUser          50        150       200       300
Developer        50        150       200       500
Entire           50        150       200       600

(**) /opt holds all non-OS application software. Sizing is total of all current application software plus size of known future application software plus 20-30%.

(***) /usr should be relatively unchanging, except on a developer system. Still, to make it too small will require later balancing acts, therefore the numbers reflect approximately 150MB of extra space.

3.2) How can I convert all my local changes that I've made over the years into their corresponding forms on Solaris 2?

1) Do it by hand. You did document every single change and check it into RCS, didn't you?

2) Automate it, using the AMToolkit (Administration Migration Toolkit) from the OpCom FTP server (q.v.)!

3.3) What are "packages"?

A SVR4 mechanism for "standardizing" the installation of optional software. Most vendors are expected to use this format for distributing add-on software for Solaris 2.x.

Packages can be installed/deinstalled with pkgadd/pkgrm which are standard SVR4 items, or with swm (CRT) or swmtool (GUI-based) which are provided only in Solaris 2.

Note that the "pkg" system keeps lots of files in /var/sadm/install, and in particular the file "contents", which is hundreds of KB, and that there are two copies of it while pkgadd is running, so you needs lots of free space where /var is, typically the root. This file must be kept around if you want, for example, to use pkgrm to remove a package, or pkgchk to verify months later that all of a a package's files are still intact.

Summary of pkg* commands:

	    pkginfo    - test for presence of package.
	    pkgadd -d //Solaris_2.3 
			    - add missing packages
	    pkgrm  - remove packages.
	    pkgchk -q  - test for existence of package
	    pkgchk  [pkg] - check installed packages for
	    integrity.

3.4) Why can't I write in/mount over /home?

SunOS 5.x is delivered with the "automounter" enabled. The automounter is designed for NFS sites, to simplify maintenance of the list of filesystems that need mounting. However it is a burden for standalone sites.

The automounter takes over /home and in effect becomes the NFS server for it, so it no longer behaves like a normal directory. This is normally a Good Thing as it simplifies administration if everybody's home directory is /home/, regardless of their physical location.

If you want to continue to use the automounter, edit /etc/auto_master and comment out the line starting with "/home". Then run the "automount" command which will cause automountd to reload the maps.

To kill it off for standalone or small networks running Solaris 2.3 or later, you can stop automountd by running "/etc/init.d/autofs stop". Prevent it from starting at boot time by renaming the file /etc/rc2.d/SXXautofs to /etc/rc2.d/sXXautofs, where XX are two digits depending on the OS release. (If you change your mind, just rename it back)

In Solaris 2.2, the procedure is different. You need to comment out the three lines in /etc/init.d/nfs.client that start "if" (from the if to the fi!!), and reboot (Solaris 2.2)

To learn about it, read the O'Reilly book "Managing NFS and NIS", or ftp the white paper 'The Art of Automounting". from sunsite.unc.edu in the directory /pub/sun-info/white-papers.

3.5) Why can't I access CDs or floppies?

Solaris 2.2 introduced a new scheme for automatically mounting removable media. It consists of a program "vold" (volume daemon) which sits around watching for insertions of floppies and CD's, handles ejects, talks to the file manager, and invokes a second program called "rmmount" (removable media mounter) to mount the disk.

Note that on most SPARCstations, you must run "volcheck" whenever you insert a floppy, as the floppy hardware doesn't tell SunOS that a floppy was inserted and polling the drive would wear it out pretty quickly.

Advantages of this scheme:

- no longer need root; users can mount and unmount at will.
- can do neat tricks like automagically start "workman" or
  other Audio CD player when audio CD inserted.
- extensible - developers can write their own actions.

Drawbacks:

- can no longer access /dev/rfd0 to get at floppy; must use
  longer name like /vol/dev/rdsk/floppy0
- similarly, CD's get mounted on /cdrom/VOLNAME/SLICE, e.g.,
  /cdrom/solaris_2_2/s0 is slice 0 of the Solaris 2 CD
  (nice that it does mount all the partitions, though!).

To read or write a non-filesystem floppy (tar, cpio, etc), put in the diskette and run "volcheck" from the commandline or click "Check for Floppy" in the filemgr to get it noticed; then access /vol/dev/rfd0/unlabeled (e.g. "tar tvf /vol/dev/rfd0/unlabeled").

[Solaris 2.3 and later: /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unlabeled, or /vol/dev/aliases/floppy0.]

If you want the old behavior, remove the /etc/rc2.d/S*volmgt link, and reboot.

3.6) Why are there no passwords in /etc/passwd?

System V Release 4 includes a feature called "shadow passwords". The encrypted passwords are moved out into a shadow password file (called /etc/shadow in this release) that is NOT publicly readable. The passwd file has always been readable so that, for example, ls -l could figure out who owns what. But having the passwd encryptions readable is a security risk (they can't be decrypted but the bad guy can encrypt common words and names etc. and compare them with the encryptions).

The Shadow Password feature is mostly transparent, but if you do any passwd hacking you have to know about it! And DO make sure that /etc/shadow is not publicly readable!

3.7) Why can't I rlogin/telnet in as root?

>... when I try to rlogin as root ... >it gives me the message "Not on system console >Connection closed.". What have I left out?

Solaris 2 comes out of the box a heck of a lot more secure than Solaris 1. There is no '+' in the hosts.equiv. root logins are not allowed anywhere except the console. All accounts require passwords. In order to allow root logins over the net, you need to edit the /etc/default/login file and comment out or otherwise change the CONSOLE= line.

This file's CONSOLE entry can actually be used in a variety of ways:

1) CONSOLE=/dev/console (default) - direct root logins only on console
2) CONSOLE=/dev/ttya - direct root logins only on /dev/ttya
3) CONSOLE= - direct root logins disallowed everywhere
4) #CONSOLE (or delete the line) - root logins allowed everywhere

/etc/hosts.equiv is still supported, but there is no default.

3.8) How can I have a user without a password?

In addition to removing the password from /etc/shadow, you need to take one of the following steps:

Edit /etc/default/login and comment out PASSREQ=YES or change it to PASSREQ=NO. This allows all users to remove their password!

The second way is to give a particular user no password with the following entry in /etc/shadow:

user::9092:9999:9999::::

3.9) How can I set up anonymous FTP?

If you need help, ftp the file "ftp.anon" from ftp://ftp.math.fsu.edu/pub/solaris/ftp.anon.

ftpd(1M) is nearly complete when it comes to setting up anonymous ftp. It only leaves out /etc/nsswitch.conf. [S2.3]

Additionally, you must make sure that the filesystem ~ftp resides on is not mounted with the nosuid option. This is because the nosuid option also disables the kernel honoring device files which are required in the chroot environment for ~ftp.

For security reasons, it is important that no files under ~ftp are owned by ftp. If they are, anonymous users can modify them.

In Solaris 2.5 and later, you will need to copy /usr/lib/libmp.so.* as well as provide a /dev/ticlts (for wu-ftpd).

3.10) How can I print from a Solaris 2 (or any System V Release 4) system to a SunOS4.x (or any other BSD) system?

The easiest way would be using the GUI-based Admintool which has a Printer Manager that is supposed to be able to do all this and more.

Hmmm, the lp system is totally different than what you're used to. The System V Line Printer System is a lot more, well, flexible. A cynic might say "complicated". Here's a very quick guide -- see the man pages for each of these commands for the details.

Let's say your Solaris2 workstation is called "sol" and the 4.1.x server is called "bertha" and you want the printer name to be "printer" (imaginative, eh?).

sol# lpsystem -t bsd bertha             # says bertha is a bsd system
sol# lpadmin -p printer -s bertha -T unknown -I any
					    # creates "printer" on "sol"
					    # to be printed on "bertha"
# The following two commands are no longer needed in 2.6 and later:
sol# accept printer                     # allow queuing
sol# enable printer                     # allow printing
sol# lpstat -t                          # check the status

Finally, if that's your only printer, make it the default:

sol# lpadmin -d printer

On some systems you may have to turn on the port monitor.

3.11) How can I print to a non-Postscript/non-ascii printer?

The cheapest way to do this is using a printer setup based on Ghostscript.

When installing Ghostscript, make sure that it supports your printer and make sure that you include support for your specific printer in Ghostscript.

Then go to "Setting up a GS printer under Solaris", and follow the instructions there.

3.12) How can I print to a networked printer?

Before Solaris 2.6, you either needed special software like JetAdmin or get a printer that supported the BSD print protocol and set your system up as a BSD client.

Starting with Solaris 2.6, there's a new lp "model" script, "netstandard". This script allows you to print to remote BSD type printers as well as over raw TCP/IP connections. It's used like this:

# Raw TCP
lpadmin -p  -m netstandard -o protocol=tcp -o dest=host:port \
	-v /dev/null
# BSD
lpadmin -p  -m netstandard -o protocol=bsd -o dest=host \
	-v /dev/null

Enable/accept and you're all set.

When using netstandard, all filtering is done locally. When configured as a BSD print client, filtering isn't done locally as only print servers should filter jobs.

3.13) Why does lp complain about invalid content types?

For better or for worse, you need to know about printer content types. See the man page for "lpadmin".

To get transparent mode, try this:

sol# lpadmin -I any -p printer

3.14) My jobs stay in the queue after printing.

It's a known bug, and looks fixed in 2.5. There's also a number of lpsched patches out for Solaris: 101025-xx (2.2), 101317-xx (2.3), 101959-xx (2.4) and 101960-xx (2.4/x86). Make sure you install those.

Regardless of what other patches you apply, if you have a printer connected to your system running Solaris 2.4 or later, and if that printer uses NeWSprint software, you must apply patch 102113-xx. This patch is included on the Solaris CD in 2.4 and later releases. This patch is also required if you are running Solaris 2.3 with kernel jumbo patch 101318-55 or later. Note that this is a NeWSprint patch, not a Solaris patch, and hence it will never be integrated into any Solaris release.

"lpstat" on the clients on a regular basis, for some reason this clears the old files from the queue directories.

3.15) Are there any alternatives to the system V spooler?

Sun has a new printing product available, "SunSoft Print Client". It is the standard 2.6 print system and co-shipped with 2.5.

It has many new features, including printcap-like printer configurations that can be shared via NIS, and currently the ability to be configured so that lpsched does not have to be run anymore on client-only systems (although you still need to run lpsched in order for admintool to work.)

Alternatively, you can get a Solaris port of the BSD lpr system from the following FTP site (get lpr-sol2-*.tar.gz):

ftp.eng.auburn.edu:/pub/doug

or LPRng

3.16) What happened to /dev/MAKEDEV? How do I add devices?

Device drivers are linked in dynamically. When you add new devices, just shutdown the system and do

	    boot -r # use drive spec if not default disk

If you're just adding a SCSI disk, you don't need to reboot. Run the following script (as root):

#!/bin/sh
#
# add-disk
#
#       Runs the commands to make Solaris locate a new disk that
#       has been plugged in after the system was booted.
#

/usr/sbin/drvconfig
/usr/sbin/devlinks
/usr/sbin/disks                 # or /usr/sbin/tapes for tapes
/usr/ucb/ucblinks               # Compatibility links

exit 0

Note that this only works if you already have at least one SCSI disk on the system. (This is because the above just makes symbolic links and things, it does not load up the SCSI driver kernel modules, etc.)

3.17) Why isn't my tape/cd player or new disk/device recognized?

Devices must be turned on and present when you configure the system. After adding devices you must boot -r with all the devices turned on. See also 3.16

3.18) What happened to /etc/rc and /etc/rc.local?

They're now fragmented into 12 million tiny little pieces. Look in the following files to get oriented:

	    /etc/inittab - defines which programs init starts and when.
	    /sbin/rcS, /etc/rcS.d/* - booting stuff
	    /sbin/rc2, /etc/rc2.d/*,
		    /sbin/rc3, /etc/rc3.d/* - stuff for multi-user startup.

There are many "run levels" to the System V init; the run level 3 is normally used for "multi user with networking."

When executing the scripts in an /etc/rc?.d directory, the K* scripts are executed first, followed by the S* scripts. Scripts ending in .sh are executed in the same shell and can be used to set environment variables used further on in the same directory.

A basic startup script looks like this:

#!/bin/sh
# Sample init.d script.
# Install a copy under /etc/init.d/your-daemon
# make links to /etc/rc2.d/Sxxyour-daemon (or rc3.d)
# and /etc/rc[01].d/Kxxyour-daemon.
# Scripts ending in .sh are executed with the sh "." command.
# Scripts not ending in .sh are executed as "sh script"

case "$1" in
start)
	    #... commands to start daemon ....
	    ;;
stop)
	    #... commands to stop daemon ....
	    ;;
esac

3.19) Can't I have /etc/rc.local back?

No. You can never have rc.local back the way it was. But then, it never really was purely a "local" rc file. To have a real "local" rc file with just your changes in it, copy this file into /etc/init.d/rc.local, and ln it to /etc/rc3.d/S99rc.local. Put your startup stuff in the "start" section.

#!/sbin/sh
# /etc/init.d/rc.local - to be linked into /etc/rc3.d as
# S99rc.local -- a place to hang local startup stuff.
# started after everything else when going multi-user.

# Ian Darwin, Toronto, November, 1992
# As with all system changes, use at own risk!

case "$1" in
'start')
	    echo "Starting local services...\c"

	    if [ -f /usr/sbin/mydaemon ]; then
		    /usr/sbin/mydaemon
	    fi
	    echo ""
	    ;;
'stop')
	    echo "$0: Not stopping any services."
	    ;;
*)
	    echo "Usage: $0 { start | stop }"
	    ;;
esac

3.20) Why are there two versions of shutdown?

SVR4 (hence SunOS 5.x) tries to make everybody happy. The traditional (slow) System V "shutdown" runs all the rc0.d/* shell scripts with "stop" as the argument; many of them run ps(!) to look for processes to kill. The UCB "shutdown" tells init to kill all non-single-user processes, which is about two orders of magnitude faster. In old versions of Solaris (2.2 and before) the UCB version did everything it should except actually halt or reboot.

If you run a database (like Oracle) or INN, you should install a special /etc/rc0.d/K* script and make sure you always shutdown the long way.

3.21) When will somebody publish a package of the BSD (4.3BSD Net2) "init", "getty", and "rc/rc.local", so we can go back to life in the good old days?

Getty should be easy and was reportedly done at a number of sites. The port monitor isn't everyones favorite. But given that you can do much more with the SVR4 init, why would you want to change back? It would be much more trouble than it's worth.

3.22) What has happened to getty? What is pmadm and how do you use it?

I was hoping you wouldn't ask. PMadm stands for Port Monitor Admin, and it's part of a ridiculously complicated bit of software over-engineering that is destined to make everybody an expert.

Best advice for workstations: don't touch it! It works out of the box. For servers, you'll have to read the manual. This should be in admintool in Solaris 2.3 and later. For now, here are some basic instructions from Davy Curry.

"Not guaranteed, but they worked for me."

To add a terminal to a Solaris system:

1. Do a "pmadm -l" to see what's running. The serial ports on the CPU board are probably already being monitored by "zsmon".

PMTAG          PMTYPE         SVCTAG         FLGS ID       
zsmon          ttymon         ttya           u    root     \
	    /dev/term/a I - /usr/bin/login - 9600 ldterm,ttcompat ttya \
	    login:  - tvi925 y  #

2. If the port you want is not being monitored, you need to create a new port monitor with the command

	    sacadm -a -p PMTAG -t ttymon -c /usr/lib/saf/ttymon -v VERSION

where PMTAG is the name of the port monitor, e.g. "zsmon" or "alm1mon", and VERSION is the output of "ttyadm -V".

3. If the port you want is already being monitored, and you want to change something, you need to delete the current instance of the port monitor. To do this, use the command

	    pmadm -r -p PMTAG -s SVCTAG

where PMTAG and SVCTAG are as given in the output from "pmadm -l". Note that if the "I" is present in the field (as it is above), you need to get rid of it.

4. Now, to create a specific instance of ttymon for a port, issue the command:

pmadm -a -p PMTAG -s SVCTAG -i root -fu -v 1 -m \
	    "`ttyadm -m ldterm,ttcompat -p 'PROMPT' -S YORN -T TERMTYPE \
	    -d DEVICE -l TTYID -s /usr/bin/login`"

Note the assorted quotes; Bourne shell (sh) and Korn (ksh) users leave off the second backslash!

In the above:

PMTAG is the port monitor name you made with "sacadm", e.g. "zsmon".

SVCTAG is the service tag, which can be the name of the port, e.g., "ttya" or "tty21".

PROMPT is the prompt you want to print, e.g. "login: ".

YORN is "y" to turn software carrier on (you want this for directly connected terminals" and "n" to leave it off (you want this for modems).

TERMTYPE is the value you want in $TERM.

DEVICE is the name of the device, e.g. "/dev/term/a" or "/dev/term/21".

TTYID is the line you want from /etc/ttydefs that sets the baud rate and stuff. I suggest you use one of the "contty" ones for directly connected terminals.

5. To disable ("turn off") a terminal, run

	    pmadm -d -p PMTAG -s SVCTAG

To enable ("turn on") a terminal, run

	    pmadm -e -p PMTAG -s SVCTAG

Ports are enabled by default when you "create" them as above.

For more details, see: Celeste's Tutorial on Solaris 2.x Modems & Terminals

3.23) How do I get the screen to blank when nobody's using it?

Under 4.1.x you invoke screenblank in /etc/rc.local, but there's no screenblank in Solaris 2.x. Sun recommends that you have everybody put `xset s on' in their .xinitrc, but this may be hard to police, and in any event it won't work when nobody is logged in. The simplest workaround is to copy /usr/bin/screenblank from 4.1.x and run it in binary compatibility mode. See ``What happened to /etc/rc and /etc/rc.local?'' for how to invoke it.

Another possibility is to use xdm or dtlogin. That way the X server will continue to run and the screen will be blanked by it.

The 4.1.x screenblank didn't work for us. We use Jef Poskanzer's freeware screenblank.

Because of a bug in Solaris 2.3, you'll may to specify -DHAVE_POLL=0 when compiling this version.

Solaris 2.4 comes with power management software for those systems with a soft-switchable power supply. That may suit your needs better than screenblank. In Solaris 2.5 the software can remove the sync signal from your monitor causing newer monitors to go in energy saving standby mode. The Solaris 2.4 version had problems reenabling the monitor or graphics card.

The power-management software is on the SMCC Updates CD [2.4 2.5]

The power-management software can be used to switch off just the screen, by putting the following in the power.conf file:

# Name                  Threshold(s)     Logical Dependent(s)
/dev/kbd                600
/dev/mouse              600
/dev/fb                 0 0             /dev/kbd /dev/mouse

Make sure you mark the "autoshutdown" line with "noshutdown" if you want keep your machine running.

The /usr/openwin/bin/dtpower utility can change these settings for you. (Solaris 2.5)

3.24) And what about screendump, screenload and clear_colormap?

You can FTP Jef's screenload, screendump, etc., if you need that functionality, and for free you get a pixrect (clone) library. Get one of these: http://www.acme.com/software/raster-pixrect/
ee.lbl.gov:/raster-pixrect_30dec93.tar.Z

The 4.1.x versions of these programs will not run under Solaris 2.2 or later. The pixrect BCP library is no longer supported.

3.25) Where did etherfind go?

There is a replacement for etherfind, but it has changed name; in fact it's a whole new program. It IS better. To find it, though, you would have to realize that network snooping is not really Ethernet-specific. To end the suspense :-), here it is:

% man -k snoop
snoop   snoop (1m)      - capture network packets and inspect them
%

It works differently - it has an immediate mode, a capture-to-disk mode, and a playback-from-disk mode. Read the man page for details.

The capture file format is described in RFC 1761.

3.26) Can I run SunOS 4.1.x on my SPARC Classic, LX, SS5, SS4, SS20, Voyager, SS1000, SC2000, CS6400, Ultra?

The Classic, LX and the single processor models of the SS20 are still supported under some version of SunOS 4.1.x. A lot of people wanted these machines but only if they ran SunOS 4.1.x. When the Classic/LX came out, clone manufacturers were able to provide SunOS 4.1.x with it, Sun came out with SunOS 4.1.3C some time later.

The Classic, LX, SS4, SS5 and SS20 are supported in the most recent Solaris 1.x release, SunOS 4.1.4 (Solaris 1.1.2). The Classic and LX are supported since 4.1.3C (release for LX & Classic only), the SS20/SS5 since release 4.1.3_U1 rev B (Solaris 1.1.1B). The SS4 and SS20 with HyperSPARC since 4.1.4. Note that none of these OS versions support SuperSPARC MP or any of the new graphics hardware (ZX, TZX, SX, S24). The TCX adapter is only supported as a cgthree, and SunOS 4.x doesn't use all its acceleration features.

The Voyager is not supported under SunOS 4.1.x, too many new device drivers have been added plus the suspend resume feature.

The XDbus machines SS1000/SC2000 are also not supported under SunOS 4.1.x. Support for their kernel architecture and XDBus is missing in 4.x.

The UltraSPARC based machines are not supported under SunOS 4.1.x. The new supervisor mode instructions, the new MMU, buses and devices are not supported under 4.1.x.

Sun acquired the Business Systems Division of Cray Research and now supports the Cray CS6400, a 64 SuperSPARC machine that runs a modified version of Solaris 2.x, known as "Cray Solaris".

The largest Solaris 2.x machine you can currently buy from Sun is the Sun Enterprise 10000, a machine that supports upto 64 UltraSPARC cpus, 64 I/O channels and 64 GB of memory at the same time.

Fujitsu sells an even larger machine, the AP-3000, a system with upto 2048 UltraSPARC cpus @300MHz.

3.27) The "find" program complains that my root directory doesn't exist?

Yes! Actually, messages like

find : cannot open /: No such file or directory.

are due to a bug in the tree walking function (nftw(3)).

Fixed in 2.4 and in the 2.3 kernel jumbo patch 101318 (-41 or later)

3.28) I'm having troubles with high-speed input on the Sparc serial ports. What should I do?

Try using UUCP. The Solaris 2.x sparc serial driver has trouble receiving data at or above 9600 bps. Symptoms include sluggish response, `NOTICE: zs0: silo overflow' console messages, sending spurious control-Gs to the serial port, and applications that cannot be killed even with `kill -9'. This problem surfaces in many applications, including Kermit and tip. UUCP seems immune, though, because its protocol throttles input sufficiently.

People have reported success in later releases of Solaris (2.3+).

Solaris 2.5 supports much higher baudrates and hardware flowcontrol in two directions. The latter is also available as a patch for 2.3 (102028) and 2.4 (102845, note that this patch conflicts with patch 102062-08, which should be installed first if at all). The zs device can be set to 38400bps in 2.4 and earlier and 76800 in 2.5 and later.

The latest UltraSPARC systems with PCI have a newer serial chip, with the "se" device driver. It can sustain speeds of upto 400k bps.

3.29) How do I make ksh or csh be the login shell for root?

Root's shell is /sbin/sh, which is statically linked. Don't just insert a 'c' before "sh" as previously, as that would look for /sbin/csh, which doesn't exist. Don't just change it to /bin/csh, since that's really /usr/bin/csh, which is dynamically linked, because:
1) /usr may not be mounted initially, and then you're in deep (the shared libraries are in /usr!), and
2) There is code in the startup scripts that assumes that everything critical is in /etc/lib, not /usr/lib. Approach with caution!

Whenever you change root's shell, make sure you do it using vipw or "passwd -e". Both programs will check for a valid (in the sense of /etc/shells) file.

Safer bet - have an alternate root account, like "rootcsh", with uid 0, and /bin/csh as its shell. Put it after root's entry in the passwd file. Only drawback: you now have to remember to change all of root's passwords at the same time.

Third bet - in root's .profile, check if /usr is mounted and, if so, exec /bin/ksh or whatever.

An even better bet - leave root's shell alone, and use the sudo command for doing things as root.

3.30) What is this message: "automount: No network locking on host, contact administrator to install server change."?

The other machine (an NFS server) is running 4.1.x and needs a patch from Sun to update its network lock daemon (lockd). If you don't install the patch on the server, file locking will not work on files mounted from "thathost". The lockd jumbo patch fixes a bunch of other lock manager problems, so it may be a Good Thing To Get; however, it may also cause the machine on which the patch is installed to have trouble talking to servers with no patch or older patches, so Be Warned.

The lockd patches are: 100988 (4.1.3), 101817 (4.1-4.1.2) 101784 (4.1.3_U1), 102264 (4.1.4) and 100518 (for Online: Disksuite).

Make sure you install the latest version of those patches.

3.31) I have all kinds of problems with SCSI disks/RAIDs under Solaris 2.x They worked fine under SunOS 4.x.

For a quick fix, append this line to /etc/system and reboot:

	set scsi_options & ~0x80

This turns off Tagged Command Queuing, a SCSI feature that is improperly implemented in many older drives and can cause problems between Suns and some RAID implementations (for a special note on RAID, see the end of this question)

NOTE: this will seriously degrade performance on disks that do properly support tagged command queuing. Setting the SCSI options per broken target is therefor the preferred solution.

In Solaris 2.4 and later you can set those options per SCSI bus. See isp(7) and esp(7).

For some disks, all you need to do is decrease the maximum number of queued commands:

	set sd:sd_max_throttle=10

In later Solaris releases you can specify scsi_options per (broken) target or per SCSI bus. See esp(7d), isp(7d), from which this example /kernel/drv/esp.conf file is derived:

     name="esp" parent="/iommu@f,e0000000/sbus@f,e0001000/espdma@f,400000"
	 reg=0xf,0x800000,0x40
	 target1-scsi-options=0x58
	 scsi-options=0x178;

Certain hardware RAIDs support a number of different LUNs (logical disks) but share a common set of I/O buffers between them. This can cause SCSI QFULL conditions on devices without any commands queued. Since the algorithm is to retry the command when a previous command is completed, Solaris doesn't handle this situation very well.

The workaround is to decrease sd_max_throttle such that there's always at least 1 slot available for each LUN. E.g., if you have 3 LUNs and your RAID supports upto 64 outstanding commands, sd_max_throttle must be at most 31. (Any two LUNs can get 31 requests and you still have two slots over for number 3)

Decreasing sd_max_throttle was seen to improve performance due to better load balancing among LUNs on some hardware RAIDs.

3.32) How do I make Solaris2 use my old ADAPTEC ACB-4000 and Emulex MD-21 disk controllers?

As with any hardware addition, first try the obvious (boot -r after installing and power-cycling everything).

The adaptec is no longer supported; man -s7 sd no longer even lists it! So I guess they go over the cliff. Either that, or take the drives out and put them on a PC, where ST506 MFM drives are still supported.

The MD21 should work, though some people report that SCSI doesn't work in 4/260 boxes (bug-id #1118752), but that's fixed in 2.3 and later.

3.33) Should I wait installing the latest Solaris release until there are enough patches?

Several things have been done differently during the development of Solaris 2.5 and later. Many internal users run versions of the Solaris release under development no more than one or two weeks old. A number of large customers runs beta releases on production systems, in exchange for virtually unlimited engineering support for those machine.

Coupled with some other development policies this has resulted in a release of very high quality that doesn't come with 36 patches on the first release CD, although there are always things found when the release is closed. Patches for older unbundled products are needed for each Solaris release.

Recent Solaris releases run most everything without requiring patches.

3.34) Why are there so many patches for Solaris 2.x?

Patches are released for three reasons: bug fixes, new hardware support (sometimes also requires new packages) and new features. As releases stay out in the field longer, more bugs are discovered. Many bugs are fixed during the development cycle and are "fixed in the next release". However, for many customers an upgrade is out of the question, so more and more patches get released.

In the early Solaris days, patches were often combined into "jumbo" patches. This reduced the number of patches somewhat, but made maintenance more difficult as it would require re-cutting a patch consisting of 50 modules when you fix just one bug in one module. Patches are now only merged if there is a two-way dependency.

3.35) What are the ``mandatory'' patches I keep hearing about?

The mandatory patches weren't mandatory, so they've been relabeled. They're now called ``recommended'' patches.

The recommended patches are those patches Sun recommends for trouble free system operation. With those patches installed, your chances on trouble free operation are higher. That doesn't mean you will run into trouble without them.

These recommended patches can be anonymously ftp'ed from official Sun ftp sites.

3.36) Which patches should I apply?

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it." In general you should only apply patches for security related problems. For each and every other patch you must consider two things: have I encountered this bug or am I very likely to encounter this bug in the near future. If neither is true, it is often best not to apply the patch. If you have a working system, why patch it? Patches do occasionally introduce new bugs and not applying patches is the best way to avoid those new bugs.

You should, however, install all patches that come with the Solaris 2.x CDs. Those patches have been tested together and supplement the base OS to the supported level. Some systems won't even boot if those patches aren't installed first.

Y2000, security and even recommended patches should also be installed and updated on a regular basis.

The latest Solaris releases come with packages "pre-patched" as well as a "Maintenance Update" CD. The "MU" CDs are meant to be used on systems with older HW releases; the patches on the MU CDs are already incorporated in the HW releases themselves.

PatchDiag from Sun (contract customers only) helps you keep track of them.

Joe Shamblin's excellent PatchReport allows for easy patch diagnostics, downloads and installation.

Casper Dik's fastpatch allows for lightning speed patch installation.

3.37) Where do I get patches from?

Sites not sponsored by Sun, accessible for all:

ugle.unit.no:/pub/unix/sun-fixes
ftp.luth.se:/pub/unix/sun/all_patches

SunSites (carry recommended and security patches):

sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/sun-info/sun-patches
sunsite.sut.ac.jp:/pub/sun-info/sun-us/sun-patches
sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk:/sun/sunsite-sun-info/sun-patches

Sunsolve:

sunsolve.sun.com:/pub/patches
http://sunsolve.sun.com/

These are Sun's own sites, they has the recommended patches up for anonymous ftp, packaged as one huge 2.x_Recommended.tar.Z file and as individual patches.

Starting with Solaris 7, all patches are delivered .zip files, including the 7_Recommended.zip file.

Starting with SunSolve CD 2.1.2 ALL Sun patches are shipped on the SunSolve CD.

Contract customers can get all patches by ftp from Sunsolve or via e-mail and query one of the online sunsolve-databases on the Internet.

3.38) Where can I obtain Solaris 2/x86 driver updates?

The Solaris x86 driver updates can be obtained by HTTP from:

http://access1.sun.com/drivers/driverMain.html
http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/sun-info/solaris-x86/sunsoft-drivers

The Solaris x86 driver updates can be obtained by anonymous ftp from:

ftp.uu.net:/vendor/sun/solaris/
sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/sun-info/solaris-x86/sunsoft-drivers

3.39) Why does installing patches take so much space in /var/sadm?

All the files that are replaced by a patch are stored under /var/sadm/patch//save so the patch can be safely backed out. Newer patches will save the old files under /var/sadm/pkg//save//undo.Z, for each package patches.

You can remove the /save directory provided you also remove the /.oldfilessaved file. Newer patches will not install a .oldfilessaved file.

Alternatively, you can install a patch w/o saving the old files by using the "-d" flag to installpatch.

3.40) Do I need to back out previous versions of a patch?

No, unless otherwise stated in the patch README. If the previous patch installation saved the old files, you may want to reclaim that space.

Patches can be backed out with (Solaris 2.6+):

	    patchrm 

or in earlier releases:

	    /var/sadm/patch//backoutpatch 

Backoutpatch can take an awful long time, especially when the patch contained a lot of files. This is fixed in later versions of backoutpatch.

3.41) How can I have more than 48 pseudo-ttys?

Edit /etc/system and add the following line:

	* System V pseudo terminals

	set pt_cnt = 

Halt the system and boot -r.

You can essentially have as many as you like, but you'll probably run into some other limit somewhere. More than 3000 are supported. Solaris 2.6 and earlier have telnet/rlogin daemons that do not support more than 3844 sessions each. That restriction is lifted in Solaris 7.

Some die-hard system administrator myths as well as some Sun documentation claim that you have to increased "sad_cnt", "sadcnt" or "nautopush" when adding ptys. There is no truth in this.

In the unlikely event that you run out of BSD-style ptys, you can increase them as well. The maximum here is currently 176 for pty[p-z][0-9a-f]. This is somewhat less that the BSD maximum of 256 limited by 8 bit device minor numbers.

BSD ttys are awkward to use and all programs I found support SYSV ptys without trouble.

	* You don't need this.  Increasing this value too much usually
	* just wastes memory.
	* BSD applications never support more than 256 ptys.
	* Solaris 2.x supports no more than 176 BSD ptys.

	set npty = 

But you're not there yet, you also need to edit /etc/iu.ap and substitute the new value of "npty-1" for the "47" on the following line, in case you do increase the number of BSD style ptys.

		ptsl    0       47      ldterm ttcompat

Halt the system and boot -r.

3.42) How can I have normal users chown their files?

Add the following to /etc/system:

	set rstchown  = 0

This will defeat the quota system and may compromise the security of your system.

3.43) How can I get ps to print %MEM and %CPU?

Prior to Solaris 2.4, the OS didn't do the bookkeeping necessary to obtain these values. In Solaris 2.4 the code was added to kernel and /usr/ucb/ps can now show these values.

Under Solaris 2.3 and earlier your only recourse is using the public domain utility top (See 2.3).

3.44) How can I get the DOS and Unix clock to agree on Solaris/x86?

After installation, run the command /usr/sbin/rtc -z $TZ, where $TZ is your timezone. The default root crontab runs /usr/sbin/rtc -c once every day.

That way your clock will give the proper time whether you boot Solaris or DOS/Windows.

3.45) How can I increase the number of file descriptors per process?

In 2.3 in earlier this requires poking the kernel. In Solaris 2.4+, this can be accomplished by adding the following lines to /etc/system:

	* set hard limit on file descriptors
	set rlim_fd_max = 4096
	* set soft limit on file descriptors
	set rlim_fd_cur = 1024

Raising the soft limit past 256 may confuse certain applications, especially BCP applications. Raising the limit past 1024 may confuse applications that use select(). Select() cannot use more than 1024 file descriptors at this time prior to Solaris 7. In Solaris 2.6, the RPC code was rewritten to use poll(), which does work with many more fds than select(). Prior to 2.6, all RPC servers will likely crash and burn if you increase the fd soft limit past 1024.

Solaris 7 allows upto 65536 fds passed to select; this does require recompiling with a larger value for FD_SETSIZE.

Programs using stdio or even library calls that use stdio may break when they have more than 256 files open as that is the stdio limit. Programs using many filedescriptors should try and reserve a number of low numbered file descriptors for use by stdio.

The stdio limit is removed for 64 bit applications in Solaris 7; if you really need more than 256 FILE * in and you can't use Solaris 7+ or need to run in 32 bits, you can use SFIO from AT&T.

3.46) Can I install both SunOS and Solaris on the same machine, and choose between them at boot time?

Yes, that is possible. All partitions other than the system partitions (typically /, /usr, /var and /opt) can be shared by the two OSes. All partitions, including the system partitions, can be mounted and accessed by either OS.

The easiest way to set this up is to do separate suninstalls on two different disks. Then just choose the appropriate disk at boot time with the PROM's "boot" command.

Setting up both OSes on one disk is a little harder, but not much. You need to partition the disk to allow for both OSes. Almost any partition layout is possible, but one common setup might be:

 a: / for Solaris 2
 b: swap (shared)
 c: The usual (whole disk)
 d: / for Solaris 1
 e: /usr for Solaris 1
 g: /usr for Solaris 2

Again, it's most reliable to use suninstall to do the installations. If for some reason you choose not to use suninstall, make sure you run installboot for both bootable partitions.

With this setup, you choose between the two OSes in the PROM's "boot" command as follows:

To boot Solaris 2: boot To boot Solaris 1: boot disk:d

NOTE: In boot PROM versions <= 2.5, the "disk:d" syntax is not supported, and the PROM cannot boot from root partitions that begin or end beyond 1GB.

3.47) How do I disable banner pages under Solaris?

As root, go to directory /etc/lp/interfaces. Edit the file that corresponds to the printer name. Change the line that reads 'nobanner="no"' to 'nobanner="yes"'.

To effect this change on future printers, edit the scripts in /usr/lib/lp/model. That directory contains the template scripts copied over to /etc/lp/interfaces.

3.48) How do I change my hostname?

The supported way to change your hostname is:

	# /usr/sbin/sys-unconfig

The system will halt and on subsequent boot will ask for its name and other networking parameters again.

You may wish to save a copy of /etc/nsswitch.conf beforehand as that file is overwritten by the configuration process.

Note that sys-unconfig is not supported on diskless or dataless workstations. On those, you'll need to edit files by hand. See the sys-unconfig(1M) for a list of the files that need changing.

3.49) Can I run multiple terminals on the console of Solaris x86 like those supported on Interactive Unix and SCO?

Yes. In Solaris x86 2.1, these worked 'out of the box'.

In Solaris x86 2.4, they are no longer configured during the installation, but they still work if configured afterwards by hand. Sun apparently disabled them in this way because they are no longer officially supported, but fortunately, they did not actually remove them from the kernel, so you can configure them back in yourself as follows.

First verify the device's major number with grep:

	# grep -i chanmux /etc/name_to_major
	chanmux 

Add the /dev entries, substituting whatever you found with grep for :

	mknod /dev/vt01 c  1
	mknod /dev/vt02 c  2
	etc...

add the following to /etc/inittab (after the co entry):

	v1:234:respawn:/usr/lib/saf/ttymon -g -h -p "VT1 Login: " -T AT386 -d /dev/vt01 -l console
	v2:234:respawn:/usr/lib/saf/ttymon -g -h -p "VT2 Login: " -T AT386 -d /dev/vt02 -l console
	etc...

To get init to reread inittab, either reboot, or issue the command:

	/usr/sbin/init q

Now, Alt-PrintScreen F1 switches to VT1, Alt-PrintScreen F2 switches to VT2, etc, Alt-PrintScreen P switches to previous screen in cyclic sequence, Alt-PrintScreen N switches to next screen in cyclic sequence. Alt-PrintScreen H switches to console screen (and not Alt-PrintScreen F8 as on Interactive Unix)

3.50) How can I prevent daemons from creating mode 666 files?

By default, all daemons inherit the umask 0 from init. This is most problematic for a service like ftp, which in a standard configuration leaves all uploaded files with mode 666.

To get daemons to use another umask execute the following commands in /bin/sh and reboot:

umask 022  # make sure umask.sh gets created with the proper mode
echo "umask 022" > /etc/init.d/umask.sh
for d in /etc/rc?.d
do
	ln /etc/init.d/umask.sh $d/S00umask.sh
done

Note: the trailing ".sh" of the scriptname is important, if you don't specify it, the script will will be executed in a sub-shell, not in the main shell that executes all other scripts.

In Solaris 2.6 and later, in.ftpd(1M) allows setting its umask in /etc/default/ftpd.

3.51) How do I change the terminal type for /dev/console?

Change the "-T sun" in the following line in /etc/inittab to "-T ":

	co:234:respawn:/usr/lib/saf/ttymon -g -h \
		-p "`uname -n` console login: " -T sun \
		-d /dev/console -l console -m ldterm,ttcompat

(Line broken for readability)

3.52) If I login over the network, my terminal type is set to "sun"/"AT386" How can I change that? In SunOS 4.x the type would have been "network"

If no terminal type is specified in the network (telnet/rlogin) protocol, the standard startup scripts (/etc/profile, /etc/.login) will set the terminal type to the default console type (sun for SPARCs, AT386 for x86).

To get the SunOS 4.x. behaviour back, all you need to do is set the type to "network", if not previously set.

3.53) How can I change the SYSV IPC parameters?

The following parameters can be used to change the number of semaphores, the amount of shared memory and the number of IPC messages. They're set in /etc/system, as usual.

set semsys:seminfo_semusz = 
set semsys:seminfo_semopm = 
set semsys:seminfo_semume = 
set semsys:seminfo_semaem = 
set semsys:seminfo_semmap = 
set semsys:seminfo_semvmx = 
set semsys:seminfo_semmsl = 
set semsys:seminfo_semmni = 
set semsys:seminfo_semmns = 
set semsys:seminfo_semmnu = 

set shmsys:shminfo_shmmin = 
set shmsys:shminfo_shmseg = 
set shmsys:shminfo_shmmax = 
set shmsys:shminfo_shmmni = 

set msgsys:msginfo_msgseg = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgssz = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgtql = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgmap = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgmax = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgmnb = 
set msgsys:msginfo_msgmni = 

3.54) How do I enable/disable dtlogin?

Whether dtlogin is started or not is settable with /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig As dtlogin itself explain when invoked without arguments:

	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -d        (disable auto-start)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -e        (enable auto-start)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -kill     (kill dtlogin)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -reset    (reset dtlogin)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -p        (printer action update)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -inetd    (inetd.conf /usr/dt daemons)
	    /usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -inetd.ow (inetd.conf /usr/openwin daemons)

3.55) How do I configure dtlogin?

The standard CDE configuration files live in /usr/dt/config. You're not supposed to edit them there, but copy the files you want to modify to /etc/dt/config and edit them there. The /etc/dt directory does not exist, you must create it.

Customizing dtgreet, the login widget, is done through /etc/dt/config/C/Xresources; near the end you'll find the following:

!!  To disable options in dtgreet window, uncomment the appropriate
!!  line below.

!Dtlogin*options_noWindows*sensitive:     False
!Dtlogin*remote_host_menu*sensitive:      False
!Dtlogin*options_languages*sensitive:     False
!Dtlogin*session_menus*sensitive:         False
!Dtlogin*options_restartServer*sensitive: False

!! To disable options under remote login option menu, uncomment the
!! appropriate line below.

!Dtlogin*remote_login_host*sensitive:   False
!Dtlogin*choose_login_host*sensitive:   False

By removing the ! in front of the !Dtlogin you can disable the following menu items, respectively:

1) Command Line Login
2) Remote Login
3) Language choice
4) Session choice
5) Reset Login Screen
6) Under the "Remote Login" menu, "Enter Hostname ..."
7) Under the "Remote Login" menu, "Choose Host From List ..."

Two undocumented options, "options_failsafe" and "options_last_dt", can be used to disable the Failsafe and Last Session choices, though the default will continue to be "Last Session".

By commenting out the following lines by prepending them with a exclamation mark (!), you can disable the CDE environment login (and force users to use the other choices)

Dtlogin*altDts:         1

Dtlogin*altDtName1:     Common Desktop Environment (CDE)
Dtlogin*altDtKey1:      /usr/dt/bin/dtwm
Dtlogin*altDtStart1:    /usr/dt/bin/Xsession
Dtlogin*altDtLogo1:     Dtlogo

The OpenWindows Desktop can be disable by creating an empty "/etc/dt/config/C/Xresources.d/Xresources.ow" file. Other desktops can be added by creating files like Xresources.ow in the Xresources.d directory.

3.56) How can I configure a second monitor or change X server options?

First, you simply plug in the second framebuffer; plug in the monitor, make sure you have the correct device drivers installed and do a reconfiguration boot.

The X server is started through the dt/config Xservers file; you'll need to modify it when you change your X server configuration:

# Never edit the /usr/dt/config files in place
mkdir -m 755 -p /etc/dt/config
cp /usr/dt/config/Xservers /etc/dt/config

Edit the Xservers file and change the line with "local_uid@console" to suit your needs; the Xsun(1) describes what arguments to pass.

Here are some examples (lines split for clarity):

# FFB as left monitor, PGX (m64) to the right (two ways)
:0   Local local_uid@console root /usr/openwin/bin/Xsun :0 -nobanner \
		-dev /dev/fbs/ffb0 -dev /dev/fbs/m640
:0   Local local_uid@console root /usr/openwin/bin/Xsun :0 -nobanner \
		-dev /dev/fbs/m640 -dev /dev/fbs/ffb0 left

# FFB, PGX (m64) underneath
:0   Local local_uid@console root /usr/openwin/bin/Xsun :0 -nobanner \
		-dev /dev/fbs/m640 -dev /dev/fbs/ffb0 top

# 2x FFB, using a default 24 bit visual instead of the standard 8
:0   Local local_uid@console root /usr/openwin/bin/Xsun :0 -nobanner \
		-dev /dev/fbs/ffb0 defdepth 24 -dev /dev/fbs/ffb1 defdepth 24

3.57) How can I restrict remote access through dtlogin?

Copy to /usr/dt/config/Xaccess file to /etc/dt/config.

Comment out the following lines if you want to fully restrict access:

 *                     # grant service to all remote displays
 *               CHOOSER BROADCAST       #any indirect host can get a chooser

The dtlogin(1x) manual page explains how to have more fine grained control.

3.58) How do I disable the 2.6+ configuration assistant?

In the file /platform/i86pc/boot/solaris/bootenv.rc, set the property "auto-boot-timeout" to -1 and the configuration assistant will be disabled.

If you need to change your hardware, you need to undo that change before installing the hardware and rebooting.

3.59) How do I convert SunOS 4.x style /etc/passwd to Solaris passwd & shadow.

Add the entries you want to copy to the Solaris /etc/passwd file. Then run "pwconv" which will split out the /etc/shadow fields.

3.60) How can I obtain the PROM level without halting my SPARC?

prtconf -V

3.61) How can I use Solaris 2.6+ formatted disks on SunOS 4.x?

Solaris 2.6 increased the default maxcontig parameter, so mounting 2.6 disks on 4.1.x no longer works. You can change this with tunefs, without rerunning newfs:

	tunefs -a 7 

3.62) Can I use soft mounts with NFS?

Technically, you can, but it's like saying: "please set fire to my server and take the backups with you too; I don't care about my data at all."

So, DON'T.

3.63) How can I boot a 32 bit kernel when a 64 bit kernel is installed?

From the "ok" prompt, type "boot kernel/unix".

Setting the "boot-file" in the EEPROM to "kernel/unix" makes it the default kernel. Alternatively, you can move away the sparcv9/unix file in which case the boot loader will fall back to the 32 bit kernel. Patch installation may restore that file, though.

Beware: when specifying "boot -s", or any boot command with flag arguments, the standard default kernel/sparcv9/unix kernel will be booted; you need to specify "boot kernel/unix -s".

3.64) How can I tell whether I'm running a 32 or 64 bit kernel?

The command "isainfo" was provided for precisely that reason;

64% isainfo -kv
64-bit sparcv9 kernel modules

32% isainfo -kv
32-bit sparc kernel modules

3.65) How do I get rid of the Solregis pop-up?

Some people are annoyed by the Solregis pop-up, especially if you do not want all users to register.

Create /etc/default/solregis and put the following in it:

DISABLE=1

This prevents the solregis program from starting.

The manual lists a method to disable it on a per-user basis.

4. NETWORKING

4.1) How do I use DNS w/o using NIS or NIS+?

Under SunOS 4.1 it was next to impossible to run DNS name resolution without either a kludge fix or the NIS (V2 I guess). Under Solaris 2.1 it is incredibly simple, but you must ignore what the manual (SunOS 5.1 Administering NIS+ and DNS) says (the manual is fixed in Solaris 2.2). All that is required to make a non-NIS host use the DNS for name resolution is to change the host: line in the /etc/nsswitch.conf file to the following:

hosts:  files dns

(i.e., when looking for hosts, look in /etc/hosts first, if not found there, try DNS, if still not found then give up) and set up a correct version of /etc/resolv.conf to tell the resolver routines (like gethostbyname) how to contact the DNS nameserver. You must have the names of machines which are somehow contacted during boot in the files in /etc and files must appear first in the hosts: line, otherwise the machine will hang during boot (at least ours did). Make sure that /etc/netconfig is as it was shipped. (In Solaris 2.3 and earlier, it will use "switch.so,tcpip.so" for ip, in Solaris 2.4 it just uses "-")

4.2) What is /etc/nsswitch.conf?

An idea whose time has come (it came to Ultrix a few years ago). You can control which of the "resolver" services are read from NIS (formerly YP), which from NIS+, which from the files in /etc, and which are from DNS (but only "hosts" can come from DNS).

A common example would be:

hosts: nis files

which means ask NIS for host info and, if it's not found, try the local machine's host table as a fallback.

Advice: if you're not using NIS or DNS, SunInstall probably put the right version in. If you are, ensure that hosts and passwd come from the network. However, many of the other services seldom if ever change. When was that last time you added a line in /etc/protocols? If your workstation has a local disk, it may be better to have programs on your machine look up these services locally, so use "files".

Terminology: Sun worried over the term "resolver", which technically means any "get info" routine (getpwent(3), gethostbyname(3), etc), but is also specifically attached to the DNS resolver. Therefore they used the term "source" to mean the things after the colon (files/DNS/NIS/NIS+) and "database" to mean the thing before the colon (passwd/group/hosts/services/netgroup etc).

A complete discussion can be found in nsswitch.conf(4).

4.3) What does [NOTFOUND=return] in nsswitch.conf mean?

Type "man nsswitch.conf" for more info. There is too much detail to summarize here. Briefly, [NOTFOUND=return] means that the name service whose entry it follows should be considered authoritative (so that if it's up and it says such a name doesn't exist, believe it and return instead of continuing to hunt for an answer).

4.4) Can I run a nis/yp server under Solaris 2.x?

A number of options have been made available over time for running ypserv on Solaris:

1) NSkit 1.0. A version of SunOS 4.x NIS executables made to work on Solaris 2.x. Fully included in patch 101363-08.
2) NSkit 1.1. Native, available from OPcom, but never left beta stage. Didn't do DNS lookups well (the entire server hangs until a DNS request is answered).
3) NSkit 1.2. Native. Freely available from the Solaris 2.x migration initiative home page. Supports multi-homed hosts, async DNS lookups and shadow password maps. Also shipped with the 2.5 server kit.
4) SUNWypr/SUNWypu native Solaris packages. Shipped with Solaris 2.6 and later as part of the base OS CD.

NSkit 1.2 is available for SPARC and x86.

4.5) Can I run NIS+ under Solaris 1 (SunOS 4.1.x)

Sort of, with the NIS+ server implementation for Solaris 1.x that used to come on the Solaris 2.x CD, upto Solaris 2.3. This is a server side only implementation and requires NIS+ to run in YP compatibility mode.

This server doesn't seem to be supported anymore.

4.6) With NIS+ how do I find out which machine a client is bound to?

NIS+ clients do not hard bind to nis+ servers in the same way that NIS clients bind to NIS servers. The clients have a list of NIS+ servers within the cold-start file. When they need to do a lookup they do a type of broadcast called a "manycast" and talk to the first server that responds. This way they can be sure to use the lightest loaded server for the request.

4.7) Ypcat doesn't work on the netgroup table on a NIS+ server, why?

Yes, that is a known problem. The only operations allowed from a NIS client side on the netgroup table are the ypmatches, but not ypcat (i.e. no support for yp_first(), yp_next() or yp_all() calls). The netgroup table is kind of unique in this. The reason for this is that the netgroup table format changed quite significantly in NIS+ and the NIS+ server would take a big performance hit in converting the netgroups table to YP (key-value) format.

4.8) Why is rpc.nisd such a memory pig according to ps?

The good news is that it's not memory OR swap space you're being shown by 'ps'. Instead it's showing you the process ADDRESS space which includes 256 MB of address space reserved for the NIS+ transaction log. Given the cost of moving things around in memory and the fact that we have 4 GB of address space to play with it, this is a good idea. You've just got to stop thinking small. THINK BIG. It's only 1/16th of the total process address space being used. And if you ever exceed the 256 MB size of the transaction log you're doing something VERY wrong.

4.9) How do I tell my NIS+ server to service DNS requests from 4.x clients?

Start rpc.nisd with the -B switch. This can be done editing the server's /etc/init.d/rpc file and change 'EMULYP="-Y"' to

	    EMULYP="-Y -B"

4.10) How can I have multiple addresses per interface?

Solaris 2.x provides a feature in ifconfig that allows having more than one IP address per interfaces. Undocumented but existing prior to 2.5, documented in 2.5 and later.

Syntax:

	ifconfig IF:N ip-address up

where "IF" is an interface (e.g., le0) and N is a number between 1 and . Removing the pseudo interface and associated address is done with "ifconfig IF:N 0.0.0.0 down".

As with physical interfaces, all you need to do is make the appropriate /etc/hostname.IF:X file.

The maximum number of virtual interfaces, above, is 255 in Solaris releases prior to 2.6. Solaris 2.6 and Solaris 2.5.1 with the Solaris Internet Server Supplement (SISS) allow you to set this value with ndd, upto a hard maximum of 8192.

/usr/sbin/ndd -set /dev/ip ip_addrs_per_if 4000

There's no limit inspired by the code; so if you bring out adb you can increase the maximum even further.

4.11) Solaris 2.x supports filesystem sizes up to 1TB. Will this give interoperability problems with NFS?

No, you can share those filesystems with SunOS 4.x and other machines just fine. The NFS protocol rarely transmits the size of the underlying filesystems. The only programs on SunOS 4 clients that may give trouble are du and df, but normal filesystem use is just fine.

4.12) Where can I get an SNMP agent for Solaris?

There are several agents available, including one from Sun.

ftp.ece.ucdavis.edu:/pub/snmp

Solstice Enterprise Agents, hit the "software download" icon

Sun SNMP agents

Solaris 2.6 ships with an SNMP agent.

4.13) How can I use full-duplex ethernet?

Sun's hme fast ethernet adaptor