Installing Other Optional Softwares on AIX Machine

How will you install optional software on a AIX machine?


Firstly, What is an optional software?
Optional softwares are those which are not pre-installed when you install an AIX machine.





Secondly, How will you identify the software product?
The OS software could be identified with the following format as:- 




versionnumber.releasenumber.modificationlevel.fixlevel


Versionnumber- it may be 1 to 2 digits.
Releasenumber- It may be 1 to 2 digits.
Modificationlevel- It can be from 1 to 4 digits.
Fixlevel- It can be from 1 to 4 digits.

How to remember this? vrmf


Eg:- 05.02.0000.0000
Eg2:- 5.3.0083.2233


This is useful when we need to find the level of the AIX OS using the #oslevel command




Now let us see some of the key words required to go further:-


1. Fileset- It is the smallest installable unit for the AIX OS, example of a completely installable unit is bos.net.uucp & example of a separately installable part of a product like bos.net.nfs.client


2. Packages- It is a group of separately installable filesets, which provides a set of related functions. Eg:- bos.net


3. Licensed Program Products(LPP)- They are a complete software product including all packages associated with that licensed program. Eg:- BOS


4. Bundles - They are a list of sofwares which contains filesets, packages, LPPs, that are used for a specified use. Bundles are the actual software. 


example:- Server bundle, network bundle, graphics bundle


5. PTFs- It stands for Program Temporary Fix. A temporary solution or by-pass of a problem diagnosed by IBM as resulting from a defect in a current unaltered release of the program. A report of a problem caused by a suspected defect in a current unaltered release of a program.


6. APAR - It stands for Authorized Program Analysis Report. A report of a problem caused by a suspected defect in a current unaltered release of a program. It is an emergency fix.


Now let's see how the software hierarchy in aix looks like:-

The Naming Conventions used for the fileset is :-

SOFTWARE STATES

As you can see from the above pic.. there are 2 states when you are installing any software.
Applied state and Committed state.

Lets say you already have a older version of a software available on your system. Now you want to install a newer version of the software. In this example, you can install this software in Applied mode. If you install a software in applied mode, it maintains the older version in un-available state (not removed) and the newer version will be in Applied mode and made available to you. That means both the old and the new version are there on your system. If you are convinced with the newer version you can commit the newer version. Once the newer version is committed, the older version which was maintained will be removed and if the newer version is rejected, then the older version is made available again and the newer version gets removed i.e. rejected.

Coming to the final part of the article, let us get into the business of installing a software.

The command used to install a software is:-

 #smit install

Now immediately the System Installation window pops up.

If you choose the first option ie Install and Update Software, you will again see submenus

Now we can see that the software is installed using SMIT in this way.

We can list the installed softwares using the command

#smit list_installed

            or

#lslpp -l bos.rte.*

>>Hope you enjoyed the knowledge in this post :)

Have a nice day :)