Two-Minute Drill

Understanding the Solaris Boot Process

q	When the system is first turned on, the OpenBoot PROM runs the power-on self test (POST) to check the hardware and the memory.
q	The phases of the boot process are Boot PROM, boot programs, kernel initialization, and the init, in the order given.
q	During the boot process, programs run in this order: POST, bootblk, ufsboot, kernel, and init.

Performing Boot and Shutdown Procedures

q	After POST, the Boot PROM command prompt ok is displayed if the auto-boot? variable is false; otherwise the system boots by using default values.
q	At the ok prompt, you can issue the boot command and some other commands such as test <device> to test a device.
q	The setenv command at the ok prompt is used to set the values of the NVRAM parameters, while the printenv command is used to display the values of the NVRAM parameters.

Understanding BIOS Settings and Configuration

q	Solaris always runs in one of the available run levels, which are represented by integers and letters: 0 to 6, and S (for single user).
q	The default run level is defined by the initdefault entry in the /etc/inittab file. However, in Solaris 10 the initdefault entry is used only if the milestone property for the svc.startd facility has not been defined, which is preferably used as the default run level.
q	Most of the services in Solaris 10 are managed by the Service Management Facility (SMF), but the run control (rc) scripts are started for backward compatibility.
q	You can use the init or the svcadm command to change the run levels, and the init or the shutdown command to shut down the system.

Configuring Devices

q	NVRAM parameters are the Boot configuration variables stored in the NVRAM chip.
q	You can use the printenv and setenv commands at the Boot prompt ok to display and change the NVRAM parameters, respectively, and you can use the eeprom command at the OS command line to do the same thing.
q	The set-defaults command at the ok prompt set the value of the NVRAM parameters to the factory default.
q	The devalias command is used to create a device alias that will not persist across power cycles, and the nvalias command is used to create a device alias that will persist across power cycles.

Service Management Facility and Run Levels

q	The svcadm command to change the run level has the syntax: svcadm milestone <milestone_FMRI>
q	The svcadm command to change the default run level has the syntax: svcadm milestone -d <milestone_FMRI>