smpatch update ALERT: Failed to install patch 121616-02
I am getting various Failed to install patch alerts when doing smpatch update. Many patches are aparently applied successfuly, but others are not. I do not have Sun Support since it is my personal X86 box. Are other people getting these failures? If so, what is done to investigate / fix the problems? If I had support what would Sun recommend be done to correct the problem? Should smpatch always run clean with no errors? Regards.
[439 byte] By [
_junkken] at [2007-11-26 9:37:53]
# 1
Hi _junkken,
Even I had a bad experience with smpatch on Solaris10 01/06.
I had selected all the patches for installation and apparently all of them (except some patches related to Sun Studio) were installed successfully. But after a reboot my system was left broken. I tried removing some patches but that did'nt help and I ended having to reinstalling the OS.
Now, I don't want to generalize based on one bad experience but I think smpatch is not foolproof and it's best to only install the patches that are really needed.
Also, it would be better if you post this issue on the patch manager forum:
http://forum.sun.com/jive/forum.jspa?forumID=316
Girish
# 2
I will post to the other forum as well, but I can't think of a more "general" Solaris discussion topic than how to / what to expect when applying patches. I am not sure I agree with your comment "it's best to only install the patches that are really needed". I thought smpatch update "decided" which patches are needed given the system it is run on.
Is your comment based upon best practices published somewhere? How do you as a sysAdmin decide which patches are really needed?
I would like to hear from the community how they patch their boxes and if smpatch is working for them, especially in a production environment. I have a stand alone system, but how are people in an environment with test systems patching? Are they using smpatch? In general, how are people keeping their systems updated, reliable, bug free and secure?
Regards,
# 3
Hi,
This is what I found on http://sunsolve.sun.com/pub-cgi/show.pl?target=patchpage
Changes to Patch Access and Anonymous FTP
http://sunsolve.sun.com/search/document.do?assetkey=1-9-83061-1
http://sunsolve.sun.com/search/document.do?assetkey=1-9-82023-1
I always had issues using smpatch to download / update patches. For Solaris 10, I would recommend using the Solaris Update Manager or downloading the Recommended and Security patch cluster from sunsolve.
