Provisioning Firmware

Sun xVM Ops Center automates firmware provisioning at a single chassis or system level, and at data center level. The provisioning process is similar, regardless of the hardware, operating system, or underlying technology that you are deploying.

Firmware provisioning enables you to install firmware updates on a server by using firmware images and firmware profiles.

At a high level, provisioning firmware involves the following steps:

1. Creating Firmware Images by importing a firmware file with the associated meta data.
2. Creating Firmware Profiles based on one or more firmware images.
3. Updating Firmware based on the firmware profile and its associated firmware images.

The first two steps are typically one-time tasks for each collection of firmware that you want to update.

See the Supported Systems Matrix to determine the minimum firmware version and the recommended firmware version for the supported Sun systems.

Managing Firmware Images

A firmware image is a copy of a particular system firmware with associated metadata. The firmware image allows you to update the firmware in an automated way through the use of firmware profiles. The firmware metadata helps determine compatibility between a firmware image and a target system. The required metadata includes the firmware type, what system or systems the firmware is for, the version of the firmware, and any dependent firmware (other firmware that the firmware depends on).

This section describes how to create, edit, view, and delete firmware images as well as how to determine firmware metadata and locate the default image location on the Enterprise Controller.

Managing Firmware Profiles

A firmware profile is a collection of one or more firmware images and policies that defines how to update one or more firmware images on a system. A firmware profile can contain any set of unique firmware images. In addition, a firmware profile cannot contain different versions of the same firmware image. You can also use a firmware profile to generate compliance reports for a set of servers. This section describes how to create, edit, view, and delete firmware profiles.

Updating Firmware

Firmware profiles are used to update your firmware. See Creating Firmware Profiles for more information. Most firmware updates to the Service Processor require that the server be shut down prior to the firmware update. If the firmware image has the power off option selected, this is a hard shutdown of the system and you must gracefully bring down the OS prior to attempting updating the firmware.