On Tue, Sep 02, 2008 at 05:07:03PM +0100, Steve Blinkhorn wrote: > > I have several NetBSD systems running - everything from 1.6.2 to 3.1 - > and think it would be sensible now to bring everything up to 4.0. > Given NetBSD's elegance (any takers for flattery?) I would have thought > there ought to be a simple upgrade route that didn't involve booting > from removable media. Actually I'm sure there is, because when I had > some problems with colo servers a couple of years back people on this > list helped me greatly. > > BUT, there are, IIRC, a few gotchas on the way: making sure /etc/pam.d > is there, using the right options when unpacking sets and so forth. > The installation documentation rather assumes the kind of familiarity > with 'the usual issues' that goes with being constantly engaged in OS > matters - I'm a (very contented) user and spend most of my computing > hours in userland. Other things like needing to add users and groups > by hand: does it matter how they are numbered? where should I look for > this information? The installation documentation on use of > postinstall also strikes me as less tightly written than would give me > most comfort. > > This message is partly prompted by problems I'm having creating a > bootable CD-R that can be read on one particular machine that has no > floppy drive - but I have a whole bunch of networked machines > available, with a CD image mounted and visible over NFS. > > The trouble is, I know that when I am up to speed with these things > everything is straightforward really, it's just not cleanly and simply > documented anywhere I know to look. Wouldn't it be generally useful > if it were? Contributions are welcome :) My usual path: 1. boot new kernel 2. unpack all sets but etc.tgz 3a. run etcupdate -s etc.tgz 3b. take any action still required by postinstall (run by etcupdate) 4. update packages 5. reboot to make sure all running code is up to date It's not always all that way (especially the 4th step), but at least that's how I handled my servers at my previous job, where I had a host to build the systems and all the packages my NetBSD server needed, so I could deploy everything in binary form easily. I don't know if we document that path well or at all--I never had to search for that, but I agree that's something that should be documented properly. Just looking at it, the "Upgrading" chapter of the guide could definitely use... well, an upgrade. -- Quentin Garnier - cube%cubidou.net@localhost - cube%NetBSD.org@localhost "See the look on my face from staying too long in one place [...] every time the morning breaks I know I'm closer to falling" KT Tunstall, Saving My Face, Drastic Fantastic, 2007.
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