[pca] [OT] OpenSolaris / IPS support & patching

Tue Dec 15 20:27:44 CET 2009

We actually migrated from encapsulated root disks to SVM as a part of
live upgrade a few years ago.  It was not hard as long as you have a
well-documented procedure.  It is better to test the procedure on a test
environment.  I love live upgrade.  It is easy to roll back via booting
from original BE.  Of course, everything is easy after you become
comfortable with it.  I could see you migrating away from solaris form
budget point of view, but patch management should not be the reason.
Support will be better for solaris than open solaris/linux.

Thanks

Ying Xu <yxu at littonloan.com>
Unix Group
Office: 713-218-4508
BB: 832-671-6633
4828 Loop Central Dr. Houston TX 77081

-----Original Message-----
From: pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at
[mailto:pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at] On Behalf Of Jones, Dave
Sent: Tuesday, December 15, 2009 1:12 PM
To: PCA (Patch Check Advanced) Discussion
Subject: Re: [pca] [OT] OpenSolaris / IPS support & patching

Thanks for the reply Kevin.
That answered a few of my questions.

The root disk encapsulation is the big part of the problem with VxVM.
One of many poor choices on the part of the original design team.

I can roll-back the kernel (or any other) patches in Linux as well,
without snapshots at all.
In fact, rolling back a kernel patch is just a matter of rebooting into
one of several older kernels as you probably know.
Not that it makes Linux superior somehow but I was just pointing it out.

I think I will roll OpenSolaris out on some old hardware we have and let
some of the App & Dev teams play around with it to get their feedback.
Few better ways see how easy it is to break something that to give it to
the users.  ;-)

Thanks again,
Dave

-----Original Message-----
From: pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at
[mailto:pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at] On Behalf Of Bliss, Kevin L
Sent: Tuesday, December 15, 2009 12:40 PM
To: 'PCA (Patch Check Advanced) Discussion'
Subject: Re: [pca] [OT] OpenSolaris / IPS support & patching

See in line comments.

-----Original Message-----
From: pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at
[mailto:pca-bounces at lists.univie.ac.at] On Behalf Of Jones, Dave
Sent: Tuesday, December 15, 2009 10:24 AM
To: PCA (Patch Check Advanced) Discussion
Subject: [pca] [OT] OpenSolaris / IPS support & patching

Hi Team.

This is a bit off-topic but I have a few questions about OpenSolaris as
it regards to to support & patching.
I thought someone on the list (maybe even Don) might know the answers.

1) Do the Sun support subscriptions for OpenSolaris offer the same
levels and types of support as they do for Solaris?

<kb> Don't know

2) Is anyone on the list running OpenSolaris in th place of Solaris on
Test/Dev/Prod?  If so what are your experiences?

<kb> Just use it on workstations currently, very pleased with it and
can't wait until IPS move in Solaris!

3) Does IPS/OpenSolaris/Sun still "require" you perform patch installs
in Single User mode on OpenSolaris?

<kb> No, single user is not required. Patching is very much like linux.
As of the last time I patched you did have to reboot after kernel patch.

We are strongly considering migrating off of Sun if we cannot get out of
the 8 - 12 hour patch windows we currently need to patch some of our
systems.

<kb> Agreed, Sun needs to get moving on this issue.

Live Upgrade is not an option because of several factors in our
environment, including excapsulated root disks with VxVM and several
containers per host.

<kb> live upgrade is VxVM aware, this is not an issue.  If your
containers are on separate disk groups that are visible to more than one
server (SAN, NAS, etc), migrate the containers to another server (2 to
10 minutes for most containers) then patch the server, then migrate
back.  If you move to ZFS you save money and it is just as easy or
easier to migrate containers and lu is much easier.

We cannot justify staying on Solaris under these conditions when Linux
allows us to patch the whole box in minutes while still at run level 3.
In fact, with Ksplice we do not even need to reboot to change kernels in
Linux anymore.

<kb> That is nice, but in the event of a bad patch is there an easy roll
back.  ZFS on solaris allows for a snapshot to roll back to even if you
don't use LU. 

If OpenSolaris and IPS does meets our needs then we can move in that
direction.

Thanks,
Dave

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