dav_y2k: For root running bash, you want to create a /.bash_profile with the commands to add the directory to your path; this will look something like:

export PATH=$PATH:/opt/sfw/bin

It is considered as a bad practice by many Solaris developers and support guys because it is known to break upward compatibility of some legacy shells and applications that assume root's directory is / and root's shell is the old bourne shell.
To avoid support issues, Sun has never accepted the numerous requests to have this modified, despite the large and increasing number of people wanting it.

Actually, what is even more a bad practice is simply beeing logged in as root. So in my opinion, anything that ease the situation of being logged in as root is to be avoided.