pkgadd - already installed files, impact?

UNIX Solaris
1

whenever i add a package i almost always get a message about how some files are already installed and most of the time they are attribute only changes with some marked indicating conflicts.

can someone explain the impact of this? is this something i dont really need to worry about? what attributes does it refer to? does it relate to file security?

just not really sure how to evaluate the info there.

Thanks

2

output please...

3

No big deal but on a production/sensitive system, you should check what the installer is precisely complaining of just in case there is a real security issue.

I usually go ahead and let the installer do its stuff.

This generally applies to common directories defined in different packages with differing access permissions and/or owners/groups. They are often associated with third party open source packages, especially those that insist installing in bogus shared directories like /usr/local. They can also be due to a stricter permission setting than the regular one (OS hardening) and it that case, you should reapply it after the package or patch installation.

4

Thanks Jlliagre,
here is the output i get.

used by another package:
  /usr/local/bin <attribute change only>
  /usr/local/doc <attribute change only>
* /usr/local/lib <attribute change only>
  /usr/local/share <attribute change only>
  /usr/local/share/man <attribute change only>
  /usr/local/share/man/man1 <attribute change only>

* - conflict with a file which does not belong to any package.

i would image the man stuff is no big deal but the attributes on bin lib and share are what im concerned about. especially lib because it says there is a conflict. how would i figure out what attribute changes its trying to make?

5

You can figure it by looking what the current permissions are (ls -ld xxx) and what the package is trying to do (Package pkgmap file) but as it is about /usr/local shared subdirectories, you'd rather just ignore the whole thing.

6

thanks jlliagre, I dont fully understand the pkgmap. i dont have a utility called 'pkgmap' and from what i can tell the other tools dont dump that either. digging around i found plenty of refrences to what a pkgmap is but not how to pull one out of a package. could i get some more details please?

Thanks

7

Each package contains a pkgmap file that states detailed information about every file/directory/link/... included in the package.

Your package can be in either a directory format inwhich case the pkgmap file is easy to locate by opening the package directory. It might also be in a single file format in which case you first need to convert it to the former format with something like:

pkgtrans somepackage.pkg .