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The best place to obtain information about a specific
patch is the patch's patch details page
on the ITRC. Patch Documentation | |
All patches have a patch details page, a patch text file, and readme information. The patch details page should be your first choice for obtaining
information because it contains the most up-to-date information available.
This is not always true for the patch text file or the patch readme. You can find the documentation at the following
resources:
The patch details page
and the patch text file contain the same fields and provide detailed
information about a patch. Table 3-2: “Subset of Fields in Patch Text File and Patch Details Page ” shows a subset of these fields.
Table 3-2 Subset of Fields in Patch Text File and Patch Details Page | Field | Description |
|---|
| Patch Name | The patch
ID. See “Patch Identification” for
more information about the format of patch IDs. | | Patch Description | A
terse description of the patch. | | Creation Date | The date
the patch was created. | | Post Date | The date
the patch was released for general distribution. | | Warning | If the patch
has an associated warning, this field shows the date the warning was
issued and provides information about the warning. This field is present
only if the patch has an associated warning. For more information,
see “Patch Warnings”. | | Hardware Platforms - OS Releases | The hardware platforms and HP-UX OS releases where you can
install the patch. | | Filesets | A listing
of the filesets that compose this patch. | | Automatic Reboot? | This
is set to Y if the installation of this patch
requires a reboot. | | Status | The support
status of the patch. For more information, see “Patch Status”. | | Critical | If this patch
is considered critical, or if it supersedes a critical patch, additional
information is provided. For more information, see “Critical and Noncritical Patches”. | | Category Tags | A listing
of the categories associated with this patch. For more information,
see “Category Tags”. | | Path Name | The location
of this patch on the HP FTP servers. See Chapter 7: “Using FTP as an Alternative Patch Source”. | | Symptoms | The symptoms
of the problem. | | Defect Description | A detailed description of the defect. | | Enhancement | This is
set to Y if the patch is an enhancement. | | Patch Dependencies | All patches that this patch depends upon for proper operation. You
must install the listed patches if you are installing this patch.
For more information, see “Patch Dependencies”. | | Hardware Dependencies | The specific system models to which this patch is applicable. | | Other Dependencies | The various dependencies that cannot be described in a simple manner.
For example, dependencies that are needed only under specific circumstances
will be listed here. For more information, see “Patch Dependencies”. | | Supersedes | A list of
all patches replaced, or superseded, by this patch. For more information,
see “Ancestors and Supersession”. | | Installation Instructions | The standard installation instructions common to all patches. | | Special Installation Instructions | Any special instructions not included in those mentioned
previously. This field occasionally includes dependency information. | | Patch Family Tree | The
patch family tree browser shows the lineage for a specified patch.
The root of the tree (the top-most patch) is the latest patch in the
patch chain. Its predecessors are shown beneath it, indented to the
right with an arrow symbol pointing to the succeeding patch. Patches
at the same indentation level that point to the same patch have the
same successor. |
Advanced Topic: The readme Attribute | |
Each patch has an SD-UX attribute called readme that you can view using the swlist command. See “Patch-Related Attributes” for more information about attributes. The readme attribute contains the patch's original text file. Be aware
that, although the readme attribute allows you to
quickly and conveniently access information about patches on the system,
this information is static. Because of this, the readme will not contain
more current information. For example, even if a patch has an associated
warning, the readme file won’t contain a Warning field. Because the command returns a large amount of text, you may
want to either redirect the output to a fileor pipe the output to
the more command, as follows: swlist -l product -a readme patch_id | more |
You can use other variations of the swlist command to obtain thereadme information for multiple
patches. For example, if you want to obtain the readme information
for all patches on the local system that have manual dependencies,
you can use the following command (output is redirected to the manual.txt file): swlist -l product -a readme *,c=manual_dependencies
> manual.txt |
Obtaining Information Using the ITRC | |
The ITRC's Patch Database is the best resource
for acquiring information about a specific patch. Consult Chapter 2: “Quick Start Guide for Patching HP-UX Systems” and Chapter 6: “Using the IT Resource Center” for more information
about using the Patch Database, including information about downloading
patches and satisfying dependencies. Accessing Information on the ITRCLog in to the ITRC at http://itrc.hp.com. Be sure
to log in to the appropriate site (Americas/Asia Pacific or European). Select maintenance
and support (hp products). Select find individual
patches. You are now in the Patch
Database. Select HP-UX to go to the search for patches page. To find instructions, select
the How would you like to search?, Search Criteria,, and read our usage guide links. Select the OS revision. From the drop-down list, select Search by Patch IDs. In the text box next to the
drop-down list, enter the patch ID for the patch you want to download.
Then click search. If it exists, the selected patch is displayed in the search
results page. Patches (possibly differing from the patch
you requested) are displayed in one to three columns.
You can display the patch details page for a specificpatch by selecting the patch ID. Unless a patch has a warning, the HP rating is represented
graphicallyby the number of asterisks (*, **,or *** ) displayed next
to a patch's ID. If a patch has a warning, the patch has a triangular
yellow icondisplayed beside it. If the patch searched for has a warning, available
replacement patches might be shown in the recommended and most recent columns. If you choose to use
a replacement and there is a patch shown in the recommended column, this is the patch you should use.
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