Live Upgrade quickstart

This page only applies to systems with ZFS root!!! (That is ms4, but not ms1.)

Live Upgrade is used to upgrade Solaris without taking the system offline. The current root filesystem is copied to an alternate root, then upgraded, then the system is rebooted into the new root. Each alternate root is called a boot environment.

List current BEs:

#lustatus
Boot Environment           Is       Active Active    Can    Copy      
Name                       Complete Now    On Reboot Delete Status    
-------------------------- -------- ------ --------- ------ ----------
be2                        yes      no     no        yes    -         
be0                        yes      yes    yes       no     -   

Create a new BE as a copy of the current one:

#lucreate -n be3

Mount the Solaris ISO at /mnt2:

#lofiadm -a $PWD/sol-10-u7-ga-x86-dvd.iso
/dev/lofi/1
#mount -Fhsfs /dev/lofi/1 /mnt2

Upgrade the new BE "be3" with the Solaris media:

#luupgrade -u -n be3 -s /mnt2

This takes about an hour.

After upgrading, apply any missing patches:

#lumount be3
(list the required patches)
#pca -l -R /.alt.be3
(install them)
#/opt/ts/bin/pca -ai -R /.alt.be3
#luumount be3

Then activate the new BE and reboot:

#luactivate be3
#shutdown -i6 -g0 -y