Solaris 11.4 SRU 90: Stricter Name Service Validation
I recently upgrading to Solaris 11.4 SRU 90 and found a new service SMF service in a degraded state: svc:/system/check/name-services, which didn't like my DNS client options "timeout:1 attempts:5"The svc:/system/check/name-services uses the new "/usr/sbin/nscfg check" option to ensure the correct syntax.
# Failed service
$ svcs svc:/system/check/name-services:default
STATE STIME FMRI
degraded 2026-03-04T06:25:11 svc:/system/check/name-services:default
# Checked FMRI name-service logs
$ tail -4 /var/svc/log/system-check-name-services:default.log
[ 2026 Mar 4 06:25:10 Executing start method ("/lib/svc/method/check-naming"). ]
[ 2026 Mar 4 06:25:11 check-naming: One naming service configuration issue detected: ]
Error: issue in svc:/network/dns/client: bad value in property config/options = timeout:1 attempts:5
[ 2026 Mar 4 06:25:11 Method "start" exited with status 103. ]
[ 2026 Mar 4 06:25:11 "start" method requested degraded state: "One naming service configuration issue detected."
This confused me initially as the legacy /etc/resolv.conf file looked perfectly fine.
# resolv.conf looks correct
$ grep options /etc/resolv.conf
options timeout:1 attempts:5
# Manual check of SMF Name Service syntax
$ /usr/sbin/nscfg check
Error: issue in svc:/network/dns/client: bad value in property config/options = timeout:1 attempts:5
The new validation requires multiple options to be defined as a proper astring array. To clear the degraded state, update your configuration using the following syntax:
# Correctly format the options as an array
$ svccfg -s svc:/network/dns/client setprop config/options = astring: \("timeout:1" "attempts:5"\)
# Apply the changes
$ svcadm refresh dns/client
Once updated, svc:/system/check/name-services should return to online.
