In a relatively recent Solaris 11.4 SRU a limit was increased in it’s default setting. In 11.4 (no SRU) the limit of of open file for a user was 256.

root@solaris:~# uname -a
SunOS solaris 5.11 11.4.0.15.0 i86pc i386 i86pc}
root@solaris:~# ulimit -n
256

Since a a few SRU this limit has now a different default.

root@solaris:~# uname -a
SunOS solaris 5.11 11.4.30.88.3 i86pc i386 i86pc
root@solaris:~# ulimit -n
4095
root@solaris:~# ulimit -a

Just in case you are wondering why some stuff suddenly works without further administrative intervention.

The system-wide limit was changed as well, it is now calculated based on the memory the system has.

Written by

Joerg Moellenkamp

Grey-haired, sometimes grey-bearded Windows dismissing Unix guy.