Did You Know Oracle Solaris Includes Ksplice?

Look what we have here:

-bash-5.0$ pkg list ksplice
NAME (PUBLISHER)     VERSION                    IFO
system/ksplice       11.4-11.4.29.0.1.82.3      i--


Ksplice supports online Kernel Updates.

Oracle Support delivers in rare cases of Kernel issues
an IDR which are installed online using ksplice.

For a Solaris Admin such an IDR is handled like other IDRs.
It can be installed as usual with the pkg command.


Here a sample:

# pkg info -g ./idr4712.1.p5p idr4712
          Name: idr4712
       Summary: To back out This IDR : # /usr/bin/pkg uninstall -r idr4712
   Description: sparc IDR built for release : Solaris 11.4 SRU # 29.82.3
         State: Not installed
     Publisher: solaris
       Version: 1
        Branch: None
Packaging Date: February 12, 2021 at 10:22:38 AM
          Size: 4.08 kB
          FMRI: pkg://solaris/idr4712@1:20210212T102238Z


-bash-5.0$ pkg list -g ./idr4712.1.p5p -af
NAME (PUBLISHER)         VERSION                      IFO
idr4712                  1                            ---
system/kernel/platform   11.4-11.4.29.0.1.82.3.4712.1 ---
system/ksplice           11.4-11.4.29.0.1.82.3.4712.1 ---
system/osnet-splice      11.4-11.4.29.0.1.82.3.4712.1 ---


# pkg set-publisher -g file:///var/tmp/idr4712.1.p5p solaris

# pkg install idr4712
          Packages to install:   2
            Packages to update:   2
            Services to change:   3
       Create boot environment:  No
Create backup boot environment: Yes
..
..
..


Using spliceadm you can verify the installed splices.

# spliceadm
ID        STATE        CVE             BUGID
471201    applied      N/A             32407818


in case of a problem you can even revert the fix

# spliceadm reverse 471201
Splice 471201 reversed successfully on Fri Apr 23 13:15:20.

# spliceadm status
ID        STATE        CVE             BUGID
471201    not-applied  N/A             32407818


Another powerful and easy to use Solaris Feature