first time patch install

[newtounix]

Hello everyone. I am very new to unix and I am about to install my first patch. I have read many man pages regarding patches but them dont seem to make any sense to me at all. Does anyone have any procedure of how to install patches onto several servers. I have just downloaded about 10 patches and 9 of them require a re-boot. Right now, all my patches have .depot and .text as the extension. To install it on every server, do I need to put the .depot files on each server. When do I use the swpackage, swreg, swcopy, swinstall commands. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

[Michael Tully]

Hi,

There are a number of suggestions that have been
posted before into this, so I'll try and make it
simple for you so you can at least follow what
I'm saying and then make reference to the
various white papers etc that there are available.

First you need to copy the various depot files to
a designated directory and create a depot from
this so you can if possible install onto other
systems. The below procedure should take care
of some of this.

# mkdir /tmp/patches
# for i in PH*.depot
> do
> swcopy -s ${PWD}/$i\* @ /tmp/patches
> done
#

Please read this link so you understand it before
you attempt anything.
"How to Create a Software Depot to Update from
HP-UX 10.20 to 11.0"
http://www.docs.hp.com/hpux/onlinedocs/os/swdepot.pdf

HTH
Michael

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Hi New,

Michel gave you the main tip, install all the patches in a depot and install from there. You can usually 'mark' them all and then only one reboot will be required.

The good news is that you can usually do all the patches and set up the depot from SAM or run swcopy and swinstall interactively. Hopefully, you are running in a graphical environment, that makes things easier still.

I will make a few important comments:
1) Backup - if you have a good backup you won't need it (one of God's little rules).
2) Pay attention to the special installation instructions (if any)
3) Check for prerequisite/corequisite patches.

After you do a few of these, it will seem very simple.

Happy patching, Clay

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi:

...and I'll add to the suggestions already made.

You might want to utilize 'swinstall' interactively. As root, simple run 'swinstall' without other options. In a non X-Windows environment you will get a TUI. For X-window environments (emulated or otherwise) you will get a full GUI. Either interactive interface has built-in help to assist in making correct choices.

A nice feature of an interactive install is the ability to scroll through the logs of messages from the process and to verify disk utilization before committing to the install.

...JRF...