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Subject: Solaris 2 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) 1.37 Newsgroups: comp.unix.solaris,comp.sys.sun.admin,comp.answers,news.answers From: casper@fwi.uva.nl (Casper H.S. Dik) Date: 13 Apr 1994 16:05:33 GMT Archive-name: Solaris2/FAQ Version: 1.37 Last-Modified: 1994/04/13 16:04:19 Maintained-by: Casper Dik <casper@fwi.uva.nl> The following is a list of questions that are frequently asked about Solaris 2.x. 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. Thanks! I've added an index of questions and marked changed(*) and added questions(+). The FAQ is being reorganised, 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 a Solaris anyway? 1.2) Why should I care? Why should I upgrade? 1.3) Should I move to Solaris 2.x now, or later, or never? 1.4) What is Solaris 2? Is it really SVR4 based? *1.5) What machines does Solaris 2.x run on? 1.6) Will my XXX applications from 4.1.x run on Solaris 2? 1.7) Will my XXX applications from SVR3 on the 386 run on Solaris 2/Intel? 1.8) Where has the XXX command gone now? 1.9) When I upgrade, should I use SunInstall "upgrade", or start over? *1.10) Is Solaris 2.x reliable/stable enough to use? *1.11) Why do some people dislike Solaris2? 1.12) Do some people *like* Solaris2? 2. MORE INFO *2.1) How can I RTFM when I don't have it anymore? 2.2) Why is "man -k" so confused? 2.3) What Software is available for Solaris 2.x? 2.4) What FTP sites do I need to know about? 2.5) What other FAQ's do I need to know about? 2.6) What mailing lists should I get? 2.7) What books should I read? 3. SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION 3.1) How much disk space do I need to install Solaris 2? 3.2) How can I convert all my local changes that I've made over the years 3.3) What are "packages"? 3.4) Why can't I write in /home? 3.5) Why can't I access CDs or floppies? 3.6) What is this junk mail about an error in the crontab entry? 3.7) Why are there no passwords in /etc/passwd? 3.8) Why can't I rlogin/telnet in as root? 3.9) How can I set up anonymous FTP? 3.10) How can I print from a Solaris 2 (or any System V Release 4) system to 3.11) What if I'd rather use the old familiar BSD-style line printer system? 3.12) What happened to /dev/MAKEDEV? How do I add devices? 3.13) What happened to /etc/rc and /etc/rc.local? 3.14) Speaking of that, why are there two versions of shutdown? 3.15) When will somebody publish a package of the BSD (4.3BSD Net2) "init", 3.16) What has happened to getty? What is pmadm and how do you use it? 3.17) How do I get the screen to blank when nobody's using it? 3.18) And what about screendump, screenload and clear_colormap? 3.19) Where did etherfind go? 3.20) Can I run SunOS4.1.x on my SPARC Classic or LX? 3.21) The "find" program complains that my root directory doesn't exist? 3.22) I'm having troubles with high-speed input on the Sparc serial ports. 3.23) How do I make ksh or csh be the login shell for root? 3.24) What is this message: "automount: No network locking on thathost, 3.25) How do I make Solaris2 use my Toshiba MK538FB drives? *3.26) How do I make Solaris2 use my old ADAPTEC ACB-4000 and Emulex MD-21 disks? *3.27) Why are there so many patches for Solaris 2.3? It's only been out a month! +3.28) What are the ``mandatory'' patches I keep hearing about? 3.29) Where do I get patches from? 3.30) Why does installing patches take so much space in /var/sadm? 3.31) Do I need to back out previous versions of a patch? +3.32) How can I have more than 48 pseudo-ttys? +3.33) I messed up /etc/system, now I can't boot. 4. NETWORKING *4.1) Can I use DNS with Solaris 2.x? 4.2) How do I use DNS w/o using NIS or NIS+? *4.3) Speaking of nsswitch.conf, what is it? 4.4) So what does [NOTFOUND=return] in nsswitch.conf mean, and where does it go? +4.5) Can I run a nis/yp server under Solaris 2.x? +4.6) Can I run NIS+ under Solaris 1 (SunOS 4.1.x) +4.7) With NIS+ how do I find out which machine a client is bound to? +4.8) Ypcat doesn't work on the netgroup table on a NIS+ server, why? +4.9) Why is rpc.nisd such a memory pig according to ps? 5. TROUBLE SHOOTING 5.1) Why can't I run Answerbook on a standalone machine? 5.2) Why can't I run filemgr, I get ``mknod: permission denied''? *5.3) Why do I get isinf undefined when linking with libdps? +5.4) I can't get PPP to work between Solaris 2.3 and other platforms. +5.5) Using compat mode for passwd doesn't work in 2.3? +5.6) Why do I get __builtin_va_alist or __builtin_va_arg_incr undefined? +5.7) My machine hangs during the boot process. It seems related to ps. 6. SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT 6.1) Where is the C compiler or where can I get one? 6.2) What about the linker, the assembler and make? 6.3) What do I need to compile X11R5? 6.4) What happened to NIT? What new mechanisms exist for low-level network access? 6.5) Where are all the functions gone that used to be in libc? 6.6) I'm still missing some functions: bcopy, bzero and friends. 6.7) Can I use the source compatibility package to postpone porting? 6.8) Why doesn't readdir work? 7. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 1. GENERAL 1.1) What's a 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 SunOS4.1.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 SunOS5.x, which is an SVR4-derived UNIX, along with OpenWindows 3.x, tooltalk, and other stuff. For more details, see the chart in the next-to-next question. 1.2) Why should I care? 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 many of Sun's add-on software is only available for Solaris 2. Solaris 2 is the only MP-capable SunOS on the SS10. Solaris 2 is required to run Wabi, Sun's exciting new MS-Windows emulator. Solaris 2.3 features 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). Solaris 2 is more standards-compliant than Solaris 1/SunOS 4. 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 er 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 are 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, is being dropped effective with 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 later comes 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 260/280 is not supported, so floating point will be SLOW, but it does work. A Solaris port for the PowerPC is underway. It is not expected to be completed this year. It is also unknown at this time what PowerPC hardware will be supported. Solaris 2.1 for x86 has 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 Coprocessor is no-longer required, though still recommended. All three buses are supported: ISA, EISA, MCA. To summarize all this, Jim Prescott gave this chart, which I've updated: 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? Downgrade Classic or LX from S2 to S1. 1.1.1 4.1.3_U1 3.0? 4.1.3 + fixes + Classic/LX support 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 (previously called OpenWin 4.0, recently renamed so as to track the OS minor release number) is X11R5 based: Display PostScript instead of NeWS, no SunView. It is still primarily OPEN LOOK. The Spring 1994 OpenWin will be Motif and COSE-based. 2.3 edition II SPARC Special Solaris 2.3 distribution for Voyager and SparcStation 5 2.4 SPARC/x86 Formerly known as 2.4, then known as 2.3.2, now again called 2.4. From this moment on, the SPARC and x86 releases will be in sync. Q3 '94 1.6) Will my XXX 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. Programs will only work if they were dynamically linked (statically linked binaries run in 2.3, but with some extra restrictions), and if they meet certain other criteria. Best bet: try it and see. Be aware, though, that Sun WILL 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. 1.7) Will my XXX applications from SVR3 on the 386 run on Solaris 2/Intel? As with SPARC, there is an emulation mode that should run the majority of well-behaved SVR3 and Xenix binaries. I've not had time to test it. 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. 1.8) 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 hostid /usr/ucb/hostid whoami /usr/ucb/whoami hostname /usr/ucb/hostname (or use uname -n) b. some old commands don't exist or have replacements 4.1.X Solaris 2.X 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 information can be found in the Solaris 2.x Transition Guide - Appendix A (commands), Appendix B (system calls), Appendix C (files). 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 adminstrative 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: opcom.sun.ca:/pub/AMToolkit-2.2a.* 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) 1.9) 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 2.1 to 2.2, or 2.2 to 2.3, ..., 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. The upgrade doesn't 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. 1.10) Is Solaris 2.x reliable/stable enough to use? The consensus seems to be that yes, it is, for many applications and most users. Your mileage may vary. 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 promises much more scalable multi-processing. 1.11) 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 relearning 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. Lot of public domain and third party stuff needed wasn't immediately available for Solaris. NIS+, buggy, resource hungry and instable replaced NIS in incompatible ways. 3) Missing functionality. When people migrate, they at first don't tend to notice new functionality. Instead, they stumble upon missing functionality such as screenblank, clear_colormap and the like. 4) Slow and buggy. The initial Solaris releases didn't perform at all well and were extremely instable. This is improving rapidly, but SuperSPARC MP machines need a heavily patched 2.3 to work reliably. 1.12) Do some people *like* Solaris2? Yes! There are improvements in Solaris 2.x. 1) OpenWindows 3.3 (in Solaris 2.3). Includes X11R5 and Display PostScript. 2) ANSI-C and POSIX development environment. 3) Multithreaded kernel and real threads. 4) True multi-processing. 5) Goodies: vold, admintool and Wabi. 2. MORE INFO 2.1) How can I RTFM when I don't have it anymore? "RTFM" is an old saying: Read The "Fine" Manual. Sun still sell 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 :-) CD-ROM 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 (2.3) split over 4 CDs Solaris 2.x CD: Solaris 2.x User AnswerBook Solaris 2.x administrator answerbook Solaris 2.x System Administrator AnswerBook Solaris 2.x on Sun Hardware AnswerBook Solaris 2.x Reference Manual AnswerBook Solaris 2.x Software Developer Kit All programming manuals. Solaris 2.x Driver Developer Kit Device driver developer manuals. 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. This changed in 2.3. 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. 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 cd <man-page-directory>; 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. You can obtain a list of official 3rd party porting commitments, maintained by Sun's "Solaris Demand Center" (whatever that is), by sending electronic mail to "solaris2apps@sun.com" -- this is an automatic reply server. The list shows what third party applications are currently available for Solaris, and lists expected dates for many more. 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@updike.sri.com (Richard Steinberger). Look for this: Subject: Solaris SW list. Monthly Post. If you can't wait, the list is also available via anonymous FTP from updike.sri.com. 2.4) What FTP sites do I need to know about? SunSite (sunsite.unc.edu) - Sun sponsors an FTP site at the University of North Carolina. Lots of good stuff here. ftp.x.org (or export.lcs.mit.edu) - the master X11 site ftp.uu.net - UuNet communication archives 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. prep.ai.mit.edu and the GNU mirrors pub/gnu/sparc-sun-solaris2 - recent gcc binaries for SPARC pub/gnu/i486-sun-solaris2 - recent gcc binaries for i486 2.5) What other FAQ's do I need to know about? All of them :-). But in particular you should see these FAQ's: 1) Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun.admin,comp.sys.sun.misc,comp.unix.solaris, comp.answers,news.answers Subject: FAQ: Sun Computer Administration Frequently Asked Questions 2) The "Solaris 2 Porting FAQ" from David Meyer in this newsgroup. For those developing or compiling software. Archive-name: Solaris2/Porting. 3) The "Solaris 2 x86 FAQ" from J. S. Caywood in this newsgroup. Deals with Intel-("x86")-specific issues on Solaris 2. Archive-name: Solaris2/x86 (proposed). 4) comp.windows.open-look - Anything related to OpenWindows or the OPEN LOOK Graphical User Interface. 5) The Sun-Managers mailing list (see below) has its own FAQ, maintained by John DiMarco <jdd@cdf.toronto.edu>. FTP from ra.mcs.anl.gov in the sun-managers directory. 6) 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 formation 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. Write to sun-managers-request@eecs.nwu.edu. 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). 3. SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION 3.1) How much disk space do I need to install Solaris 2? A full install of 2.2 is supposed to be 164 MB, but that doesn't include swap. Here is a net exchange between Casper Dik and Gil Tene: In article <1993Apr2.083549.19177@fwi.uva.nl>, Casper writes: |> >How much disc space does SOLARIS take up ? That is should we buy a |> >424Mb disc or get a 1Gb disc to put it on :-) |> |> Solaris 2.x takes about as much diskspace as SunOS 4.x: |> |> Partition/Slice Solaris SunOS |> / 10MB 8MB |> /usr 78MB 90MB |> /var 10MB 10MB |> /usr/openwin 83MB 83MB |> Gil replies: On my system, with a full Solaris installation (EVERYTHING selected) + gnu's binary stuff for solaris (off of the Catalyst CD) installed in /opt I see a similar situation to the above plus : 16852 /opt/SUNWabe 19 /opt/SUNWcg12 7968 /opt/SUNWdiag 721 /opt/SUNWgt 7740 /opt/SUNWits 14609 /opt/cygnus-sol2-1.0 (output from "du -k -s /du/*") - SUNWabe is the end user answerbook stuff. (vi, mail, Deskset tools etc, etc) - SUNWcg12 is (obviously) cg12 support. - SUNWdiag is obvious too. - SUNWgt is support for gt boards. - SUNWits is the xgl3.0 library (it has libPEX5.so.1 in there too). - cygnus-sol2-1.0 is the gcc2.0+tools stuff. I have gcc2.3.3 on another partition and that takes about the same space as 2.0 does. Another important note : The full Solaris 2.1 answerbook takes up 164MB on disk. I highly recommend installing it and not using it off the CDROM drive. It's much more usable (faster) this way. And it always stays around -- even when you have something else in the CDROm drive. 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 <pkg> - test for presents of package. pkgadd -d /<cdrom>/Solaris_2.3 <pkg ...> - add missing packages pkgrm <pkg ...> - remove packages. 3.4) Why can't I write in /home? This is a common one! SunOS 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/<username>. To kill it off for standalone or small networks, you can 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) or remove the file /etc/rc2.d/S73autofs (Solaris 2.3). You can allways relink that file with /etc/init.d/autofs if you change your mind. 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 introduces 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. 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" to get it noticed; then access /vol/dev/rfd0/unlabeled (e.g. "tar tvf /vol/dev/rfd0/unlabeled"). [Solaris 2.3: /vol/dev/rdiskette0/unlabeled, or /vol/dev/aliases/floppy0.] If you want the old behaviour, it's been suggested that you can comment out the vold startup in /etc/init.d/volmgt and then reboot; an easier way is # /etc/init.d/volmgt stop. 3.6) What is this junk mail about an error in the crontab entry? Solaris 2.1 (FCS on SPARC and OEM on Intel) shipped with a blank line at the end of root's crontab file. The result is that root gets mail at boot time and nightly thereafter, complaining about an error in the crontab file and that it has "ignored the entry". Pretty hard work ignoring that blank line, eh? If the messages bug you (they should), su to root and use "crontab -e" to edit root's crontab and delete the blank line at the end of the file. Fixed in FCS on Intel and 2.2 on SPARC. 3.7) 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 &c 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! 3.8) Why can't I rlogin/telnet in as root? >... when I try to rlogin as root ... 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= - direct root logins disallowed everywhere 3) #CONSOLE (or delete the line) - root logins allowed everywhere 3.9) How can I set up anonymous FTP? If you need help, ftp the file "solaris2-ftp" from ftp.cs.toronto.edu:/pub/darwin/solaris2. ftpd(1M) is nearly complete when it comes to setting up anonymous ftp. It only leaves out /etc/nsswitch.conf. [S2.3] 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? 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 # creates "printer" on "sol" # to be printed on "bertha" sol# accept printer # allow queueing 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. I did that. Why does it now complain about invalid content types? I said it was complicated! 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: lpadmin -I any -p printer Isn't there any easier way? The GUI-based Admintool has a Printer Manager that is supposed to be able to do all this and more. Try it; Sun hopes you'll like it. Now my jobs print but they stay in the queue after!? It's a known bug, and probably get fixed in 2.3. There's also a number of lpsched patches out for Solaris: 101025-xx (2.2) and 101317-xx (2.3). Make sure you install those. [Now you want to set up Solaris 2 as a print server? You're on your own.] 3.11) What if I'd rather use the old familiar BSD-style line printer system? The 4.3BSD-reno lpr system for Solaris 2, file lpr-sol2.tar.gz or lpr-sol2.tar.Z is available from the following FTP sites: sunok-wks.acs.ohio-state.edu:/pub/solaris2/src/lpr-sol2.tar.gz atlas.ce.washington.edu:/pub/lpr-sol2.tar.Z solomon.technet.sg:/pub/uploads/unix/lpr-sol2.tar.gz And don't despair. Someday the System V print spooler will be replaced by something new. (See the Solaris 2.3 Open Issues & Late Breaking News For System dministrators) 3.12) 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 to *r*ebuild the /devices and /dev directories. 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. # _DVFS_RECONFIG=YES; export _DVFS_RECONFIG # Solaris 2.1 _INIT_RECONFIG=YES; export _INIT_RECONFIG # Solaris 2.[23] /etc/init.d/drvconfig /etc/init.d/devlinks 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.) 3.13) 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 - starting point for init /sbin/rcS, /etc/rcS.d/* - booting stuff /sbin/rc2, /etc/rc2.d/*, /sbin/rc3, /etc/rc3.d/* - stuff for multi-user startup. Note that all files in /etc/rc*.d/* are hardlinked from /etc/init.d (with better names), so you should grep in there. There are many "run levels" to the System V init; the run level 3 is normally used for "multi user with networking." I can't understand that stuff; can't I have /etc/rc.local back? I just want to keep all my local changes in one place. 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. ----- Cut here ----- # /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 1>/dev/console 2>&1 fi echo "" ;; 'stop') echo "$0: Not stopping any service - use ucb shutdown for that." ;; *) echo "Usage: $0 { start | stop }" ;; esac ------ End of Cut Here ----- 3.14) Speaking of that, 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 rc?.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. Unfortunately, the UCB version does everything it should *except* actually halt or reboot in SunOS5.1 (and some other SVR4 implementations). This is fixed in Solaris 2.3. If you run a database (like oracle) or INN, you should install a special /etc/rc?.d/K* script and make sure you always shutdown the long way. 3.15) 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 portmonitor isn't everyones favourite. 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. 3.16) 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 Solaris2.3. 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 <PMSPECIFIC> 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". ady 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 <PMSPECIFIC> 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 the article: SUMMARY: Solaris modem/terminal how-to: Rev xx.xx.xx posted periodically to comp.unix.solaris by celeste@xs.com (Celeste Stokely). 3.17) 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 2.1. 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, but you'll have to use your own, since the xdm shipped with Solaris 2.1 doesn't work. The 4.1.x screenblank didn't work for me; I use Jef Poskanzer's freeware screenblank (FTP it from various archive sites, two of them listed in the next item). Because of a bug in Solaris 2.3, you'll need to change to use latest version of screenblank. 3.18) 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: netcom.com:pub/jef/raster-pixrect_30dec93.tar.Z 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. 3.19) 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. 3.20) Can I run SunOS4.1.x on my SPARC Classic or LX? Yes, because users wanted it (and because Clone makers were providing it), Sun has now released a version of Solaris 1 (SunOS 4.1.3) specifically for these machines. That version is called 4.1.3C or Solaris 1.1C. Recently, Sun released a new end-of-life release of SunOS 4.1.x, 4.1.3_U1 (Solaris 1.1.1). This release supports the LX and Classic as well. Suns newest models based on the MicroSPARC II will be supported in a SunOS 4.1.x release as well. 3.21) 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)). If it runs into problems traversing the tree, it gives up and incorrectly complains about the top level directory of the tree. [The submitter seems] to recall that the most common case which caused trouble was a directory somewhere in the directory hierarchy which was readable but not executable. With the fix it will just complain about the directory to which it couldn't chdir and skip descending that subtree. 3.22) 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. 3.23) 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: a) /usr may not be mounted initially, and then you're in deep (the shared libraries are in /usr!), and b) There is code in the startup scripts that assumes that everything critical is in /etc/lib, not /usr/lib. Approach with caution! 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 passwds at the same time. Third bet - in root's .profile, check if /usr is mounted and, if so, exec /bin/ksh or whatever. 3.24) What is this message: "automount: No network locking on thathost, 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 100075-xx 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. 3.25) How do I make Solaris2 use my Toshiba MK538FB drives? Append this line to /etc/system and reboot: set scsi_options=0x78 This turns off Command Queueing, which upsets the Toshiba and some other drives. If you have fast SCSI, you must use: set scsi_options=0x178 or you end up disabling fast SCSI as well. 3.26) How do I make Solaris2 use my old ADAPTEC ACB-4000 and Emulex MD-21 disks? 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 #11187521). 3.27) Why are there so many patches for Solaris 2.3? It's only been out a month! Solaris 2.x releases are essentially frozen TWO months before their general release date. During the early access/beta test period bugs are found both in the beta and in the previous release. That's why at the moment a new release comes out a number of patches is ready. Some of those are on the Solaris 2.3 CD. Others were released almost at the same time as 2.3. Solaris 2.3 is not a bug fix release. Although tons of bugs were fixed, a number of changes have been made and a number of new features were introduced: * OpenWin moved from NeWS based to X11R5+DPS based. (needs 101362-11) + PPP (needs 101425) + AutoFS (needs 101329-10 & 101500-02) + CacheFS + Easier NIS+ conversion + BCP for statically linked executables. And another user writes: Be thankful you don't have to use IBM's AIX. For that you get a new release and then about 100 patches per WEEK! 3.28) 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. 3.29) Where do I get patches from? thor.ece.uc.edu:/pub/sun-faq/Solaris2.[123]-patches. (SunOS 4.1.x patches in: /pub/sun-faq/SunOS4.1.x.Patches) ugle.unit.no:/pub/unix/sun-fixes Starting with SunSolve CD 2.1.2 ALL Sun patches are shipped on the SunSolve CD. Contract customers can get patches by ftp from Sun sites or via e-mail and query one of the online sunsolve-databases on the internet. 3.30) 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/<patch-id>/save so the patch can be backed out safely. You can remove the <patchdir>/save directory provided you also remove the <patchdir>/.oldfilessaved file. Alternatively, you can install a patch w/o saving the old files. 3.31) 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: /var/sadm/patch/<patch-id>/backoutpatch <patch-id> Backoutpatch can take an awful long time, especially when the patch contained a lot of files. 3.32) How can I have more than 48 pseudo-ttys? Edit /etc/system and add the following line: * System V pseudo terminals set pt_cnt = <num> * BSD pseudo ttys set npty = <num> Halt the system and boot -r. 3.33) I messed up /etc/system, now I can't boot. Boot with -as. The kernel will ask you all sorts of questions, including the name of the system file. Use the previous /etc/system file or specify /dev/null. 4. NETWORKING 4.1) Can I use DNS with Solaris 2.x? It seems that the in.named included in the Solaris 2.1 distribution is terribly unstable. The easiest solution for now I have discovered is to use the OLD (SunOS 4.1.2 in my case) in binary compatibility mode. This works just fine. If it's slower I can't tell. There's also a patch (100902-01) available now for 2.1. It works in Solaris 2.2 and later. 4.2) 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 using switch.so. (It does from the factory.) 4.3) Speaking of nsswitch.conf, what is it? 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). 4.4) So what does [NOTFOUND=return] in nsswitch.conf mean, and where does it go? 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). 4.5) Can I run a nis/yp server under Solaris 2.x? Yes, you need the Solaris network transition kit available from Sun. However, his kit does not include the securenets patch. 4.6) Can I run NIS+ under Solaris 1 (SunOS 4.1.x) Sort of, with the NIS+ server implementation for Solaris 1.x that comes on the Solaris 2.x CD. This is a server side only implementation and requires NIS+ to run in YP compatibility mode. 4.7) 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. 4.8) 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. 4.9) 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. 5. TROUBLE SHOOTING 5.1) Why can't I run Answerbook on a standalone machine? This is a bug in openwindows. Using xhost + or starting openwin -noauth works around this problem. This is only recommended for stand-alone machines with no dial-in users. 5.2) Why can't I run filemgr, I get ``mknod: permission denied''? This is a symptom of a bug in filemgr. Either apply patch #101514 or run the following commands at system start-up: d a+rwxt /tmp/.removable 5.3) Why do I get isinf undefined when linking with libdps? That's a bug in libdps. Sun compiles and links its software with its own compilers. The isinf() function is shipped with the SunPRO compilers, but not defined in any Solaris 2.x library. A workaround exists, and consists of adding the following to your program: int isinf(double x) { return !finite(x); } This isn't 100% correct, as this doesn't account for NaNs. 5.4) I can't get PPP to work between Solaris 2.3 and other platforms. The PPP shipped with Solaris 2.3 doesn't interoperate with other PPP implementations. Patch #101425 fixes this. 5.5) Using compat mode for passwd doesn't work in 2.3? You need patch #101448. 5.6) Why do I get __builtin_va_alist or __builtin_va_arg_incr undefined? You're using gcc without properly installing the gcc fixed include files. Or you ran fixincludes after installing gcc w/o moving the gcc supplied varargs.h and stdarg.h files out of the way and moving them back again later. This often happens when people install gcc from a binary distribution. If there's a tmp directory in gcc's include directory, fixincludes didn't complete. This can happen when you run fixincludes in the background w/o redirecting I/O. Another possible cause is using ``gcc -I/usr/include.'' 5.7) My machine hangs during the boot process. It seems related to ps. When the system boots, the first invocation of ps will try to recreate /tmp/ps_data. To this end ps scans the /dev tree. Under some circumstances, a loop exists in /dev and ps will run forever. Most of the time this loop is caused by the symbolic link /dev/bd.off. While this link usually points to /dev/term/b, it sometimes get truncated and points to /dev instead. Fix: rm -f /dev/bd.off; ln -s /dev/term/b /dev/bd.off Use truss(1) to determine whether this is real the cause of your problem. 6. SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT 6.1) Where is the C compiler or where can I get one? Where have you been? :-) Sun has dropped their old K&R C compiler, supposedly to create a market for multiple compiler suppliers to provide better performance and features. Here are some of the contenders: 1) SunPro C: SunPro, SMCC, and various distributors sell a new ANSI-standard C compiler on the unbundled (extra cost) SPARCcompiler/SPARCworks CD-ROM. There are some other nice tools there too, like a "make tool" and a visual idiff (interactive diff). You have to license and pay per user. Here's what seems to be their current (June 93) prices per user, in various quantities: SunPro: Q1 Q2 Q5 Q10 Q20 Q25 Q50 Q100 C, no supp 995 995 950 750 700 680 640 600 1yr C & supp 1355 1355 1310 1110 1080 1040 1000 960 2yr C & supp 1835 1835 1790 1590 1560 1520 1480 1440 3yr C & supp 2315 2315 2270 2070 2040 2000 1960 1920 (The "no support" price actually includes three months of support under warrantee. One catch with Sun support is that to get *any* support, you have to pay for support for *all* the users at your site. The quantity prices are only available in fixed size chunks. You don't actually buy multiple years up front, but renew each year if desired.) One misfeature is that these tools use a floating license manager, so your whole staff can't use them without paying large sums of money. Not only that, but as shipped, the tools enforce a 15-minute minimum usage time, to "encourage" you to buy a "floating" license for each and every actual user. This caused so much screaming and tearing of hair that Sun was forced to fix it. New compiler releases after May 1993 have a default 5 minute setting, changeable all the way to zero by having the sysadmin edit the "options file". However, if you set it to zero, the compiler slows down, since it has to talk to the license daemon for every file you compile. Old compilers have a patch available from SunPro to eliminate the 15 minute limit; patch numbers: C: 100966-0x; C++: 100967-0x; Fortran: 100968-0x; Pascal: 100969-0x. These patches are bulky and are not available at many anonymous ftp sites. If you have support, you can get them from Sun. 2) Cygnus GCC: Cygnus Support and the Free Software Foundation make the GNU C compiler for Solaris, a free software product. Source code and ready-to-run binaries are available by FTP from ftp.uu.net:/vendor/cygnus, or can be installed from the CDware CD (Volume 4 or 5). Like all GNU software, there are no restrictions on who can use it, how many people can use it at a time, what machines it can be run on, or how many copies you can install, run, give away, or sell. Cygnus sells technical support for these tools, under annual support contracts. Price per user (June 93): Cygnus: Q1 Q2 Q5 Q10 Q20 Q25 Q50 Q100 C, no supp 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1yr C & supp 1400 700 580 540 ... 504 2yr C & supp 2800 1400 1160 1080 ... 1008 3yr C & supp 4200 2100 1740 1620 ... 1512 (If you get the compiler from one of the free distribution sites, there is no cost but no warrantee. Cygnus lets you buy support for any number of users, at $500/user after the first two users at $1400. You don't actually buy multiple years up front, but renew each year if desired.) The Cygnus distribution includes: gcc (ansi C compiler), gdb (good debugger), byacc (yacc repl), flex (lex repl), gprof, makeinfo, texindex, info, patch, cc (a link to gcc) The Cygnus compiler on uunet is starting to show its age a bit. If you want to compile X11R5, you can get the latest version of GCC in source code, from the usual places (prep.ai.mit.edu or one of the many mirrored copies of it). Build and install that compiler using the Cygnus gcc binaries. Or get tech support from Cygnus; they produce a new version for their customers every three months, and will fix any bug you find. 3) Gcc. Gcc is available from the GNU archives in source and binary form. Look in a directory called sparc-sun-solaris2 for binaries. You need gcc 2.3.3 or later. You should not use GNU as or GNU ld. Make sure you run just-fixinc if you use a binary distribution. Better is to get a binary version and use that to bootstrap gcc from source. 4) Info on Apogee, Lucid C, etc will be added if you send us some. 6.2) What about the linker, the assembler and make? Solaris ships with everything you need, except for the compiler. All this stuff lives in /usr/ccs/bin and /usr/ccs/lib. If you still can't find it, make sure you have the following packages installed on your system: for tools (sccs, lex, yacc, make, nm, truss, ld, as): SUNWbtool, SUNWsprot, SUNWtoo for libraries & headers: SUNWhea, SUNWarc, SUNWlibm, SUNWlibms for ucb compat: SUNWsra, SUNWsrh 6.3) What do I need to compile X11R5? There are several "patch kits" for X11R5 under Solaris 2.1. Most of them require gcc 2.3.3 and you must have run "fixincludes" when you install the gcc software. The recommended patchkit is R5.SunOS5.patch.tar.Z available from ftp.x.org:/contrib. It works with gcc (2.3.3 or later) and SunPRO C. 6.4) What happened to NIT? What new mechanisms exist for low-level network access? See man page DLPI(7). Try NFSWATCH 4.0 for sample code using DLPI. FTP from harbor.ecn.purdue.edu (128.46.128.76, 128.46.154.76): pub/davy/nfswatch4.0.tar.Z or gatekeeper.dec.com (16.1.0.2): pub/net/ip/nfs/nfswatch4.0.tar.Z Better yet, FTP the paper "How to Use DLPI in Solaris 2.x" by Neal Nuckolls of Sun Internet Engineering. Look in these FTP sites: opcom.sun.ca:/pub/drivers/dlpi/dlpi-spec.ps.gz opcom.sun.ca:/pub/drivers/dlpi/dltest.tar.gz opcom.sun.ca:/pub/drivers/dlpi/howtouseDLPI.ps.gz ftp.ui.org:/pub/osi/dlpi.ps ftp.ui.org:/pub/osi/npi.ps ftp.ui.org:/pub/osi/tpi.ps ll the functions gone that used to be in libc? The C library has exploded. The manual page may give an indication where to find a specific function. Those libraries are essentially split over two directories: /usr/lib /usr/ccs/lib. Important libraries: /usr/lib: libsocket - socket functions libnsl - network services library /usr/ccs/lib: libgen - regular expression functions libcurses - the SysVR4 curses/terminfo library. See Intro(3) for more details. 6.6) I'm still missing some functions: bcopy, bzero and friends. They are in /usr/ucblib/libucb.so. The b* functions are replaced with the ANSI-C equivalents. Look in the Solaris porting FAQ for more details. 6.7) Can I use the source compatibility package to postpone porting? Not really. The Source code compatibility package is compatible with BSD 4.2, not SunOS 4.1.x. The consensus is that the library is broken beyond usability. 6.8) Why doesn't readdir work? You're probably linking with libucb and didn't read the previous question. (The readdir in libucb.so wants you to include sys/dir.h, many SunOS 4.1.x programs included <dirent.h>, consequently, you're mixing native <dirent.h> struct dirent with libucb readdir(). 7. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Most of this material is either written by me or sent to me directly. Some of it is cribbed shamelessly from USENET postings in several groups. Thanks to all people who contributed to this FAQ, you know who you are. The list is too long to be included in this FAQ. --- End of Solaris 2.x FAQ -- Maintained by Casper Dik <casper@fwi.uva.nl> ---