Installing, managing, and removing software

Modifying default installation parameters

In almost all cases, the installation parameters defined by the package developer enable you to successfully install the package on your system. Unless the following applies to you, you do not need to understand the concepts and tasks in this section:

You want to customize installation defaults (for example, on a per-system or per-LAN basis).
You want to enable non-interactive installation of a package which normally runs in interactive mode (contains prompts).

The commands to install and remove packages and sets, pkgadd(1M) and pkgrm(1M), check for errors during their execution. When a problem occurs, these commands refer to an installation administration (``admin'') file for instructions on how to proceed. This admin file defines values for parameters, each of which supplies a resolution for a potential problem.

The default admin file, default, specifies that no checking will be done, except to verify that there is enough room to install the package. (default causes the installation to proceed without prompting.) You can name an alternative admin file using the -a admin option to pkgadd or pkgrm, where admin is the name of the alternative admin file. For package installation, for example, you might choose to install interactively by specifying the check admin file as the argument to -a. (check causes a prompt to appear whenever a problem or conflict occurs.)

For set installation or removal, always use the default admin file. Both check and default are located in /var/sadm/install/admin.

If you want to assign different values for your installation default parameters, you can create your own admin file(s).

NOTE: Do not make changes to the system-supplied admin files default or check. If you want to define different parameter values, create a new admin file.

In some instances, non-interactive installation of a package or set requires a ``response file''. This file holds answers to questions for which the installation script would prompt you if you were installing the same package or set interactively.