Solaris SVR4 package tools

Note

The SVR4 packaging commands are legacy, superseded by IPS since Solaris 11, but still shipped and supported on Oracle Solaris 11.4, whose support runs through 2037.

ID

sun-tools

Home page

https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E86824_01/html/E54763/pkginfo-1.html

Platforms

⨂ Unix (Solaris only)

Operations

installed · remove

purl types

pkg:sun-tools

CLI name

pkginfo

Extra search paths

/usr/sbin

Issues and PRs

📦 manager: sun-tools

Source

meta_package_manager/managers/sun_tools.py

Solaris’ legacy System V Release 4 packaging tools.

Documentation:

The suite spans several binaries: pkginfo (the read-only query tool, used as the main CLI), pkgadd and pkgrm.

Note

SVR4 packages come from local media or datastream files, not a network repository: there is no catalog to search, refresh or diff against, and pkgadd installs a specific local artifact rather than resolving a name. Only installed and remove are therefore implemented; Solaris 11’s modern repository-based interface is IPS (pkg), a different manager.

What mpm adds to sun-tools

mpm reaches across every manager at once, not sun-tools alone: mpm installed and mpm outdated cover sun-tools alongside every other manager you run in one table, mpm upgrade --all updates them together, and mpm sbom exports the whole machine as one bill of materials.

Every mpm command also gains --dry-run and --plan previews, cross-scheme version comparison and purl identifiers. See manager augmentations for how each one is built.

Operations

Operation

Supported

installed

✓

outdated

orphans

search

install

upgrade

upgrade_all

remove

✓

sync

cleanup

doctor

Selecting and configuring sun-tools

Deselect sun-tools for a single run with --no-sun-tools, or persist the choice in your configuration:

[mpm]
sun-tools = false

Keep it enabled but tune how mpm drives it with a per-manager override:

[mpm.managers.sun-tools]
timeout = 900

mpm config-template sun-tools prints every overridable attribute as a ready-to-paste block.

Recipes

A few jobs you would otherwise script around sun-tools, one mpm command each:

  • Snapshot and clone a machine: mpm --sun-tools dump sun-tools.toml, then mpm restore sun-tools.toml on the next one.

  • Export a compliance SBOM: mpm --sun-tools sbom (CycloneDX by default, --spdx for SPDX).

Privilege escalation

System-wide manager: mpm wraps its privileged operations in sudo out of the box. Instead of letting the tool prompt mid-run, mpm primes the credential cache up-front, with a single branded password prompt at most. Turn escalation off for rootless setups with --no-sudo or the per-manager sudo override.

See privilege escalation for the full policy.

Cooldown

State of Solaris SVR4 package tools’s release-age gating, from the cooldown support table:

A cooldown only pays off where a compromised release can be withdrawn while the clock runs, and can only be emulated where the registry dates its releases. From the retraction table:

  • Registry: No registry of their own

  • Retraction: ➖ Not applicable: these managers either delegate to whichever manager they front (pkcon, topgrade) or wrap a retired project or a discontinued platform

Version probe

The version is probed by running:

$ uname -r
5.11

and extracted with:

r"(?P<version>[\d.]+)"

Reference traces

Raw native outputs captured in the manager source: the reference mpm’s parsers were written against. If you know Solaris SVR4 package tools well and a transcript below looks wrong, or a newer release changed its output format, report it.

$ pkginfo -l
  PKGINST:  SUNWcar
      NAME:  Core Architecture, (Root)
  CATEGORY:  system
      ARCH:  i386.i86pc
   VERSION:  11.10.0,REV=2005.01.21.16.34
   BASEDIR:  /
    VENDOR:  Oracle Corporation
    STATUS:  completely installed

Feed any of these through mpm and the raw output becomes one uniform table, the same shape for every manager: filter it, project columns, or export it (mpm --sun-tools installed --output json, or csv, toml, yaml), each package carrying a purl and a version comparable across managers.

Changelog

  • 7.2.0 (2026-07-09)

    • Add Solaris’ SVR4 package tools (pkginfo/pkgrm) with installed and remove support: SVR4 packages come from local media, so there is no repository to search, install from or upgrade against.