Suse 10 Integrating Updates in to Installation Media!

Is there any way we can integrate new updates into Installation media? In
stead of downloading all the updates every time you install Suse.
For example on Windows you would do a slipstream to integrate the service
packs in to Installation data, this way you can have an image with current
updates in case you have to install.
Your help is greatly appreciated.

martin.morquecho@wdc.com wrote:
> Is there any way we can integrate new updates into Installation media? In
> stead of downloading all the updates every time you install Suse.
> For example on Windows you would do a slipstream to integrate the service
> packs in to Installation data, this way you can have an image with current
> updates in case you have to install.
> Your help is greatly appreciated.

Well, looking up slipstreaming -
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/sp1_slipstream.asp tells me it is
yet another MS bizarre name for updating a network install server.
Which for any other OS is keeping your network install repositories up
to date.

Is this what you meant by 'install media'?

SUN and IBM release updates to actual install media - with linux I guess
you could build your own. At least with the 'professional' or
'community' versions of, say, SuSE and RedHat the new versions are out
often enough to make this of questionable value. However, I would
expect they need to address that for the 'Enterprise' versions.

Just my .02.

Timothy J. Bogart wrote:
> Well, looking up slipstreaming -
> http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/sp1_slipstream.asp tells me it is
> yet another MS bizarre name for updating a network install server. Which
> for any other OS is keeping your network install repositories up to date.
>
> Is this what you meant by 'install media'?
>
> SUN and IBM release updates to actual install media - with linux I guess
> you could build your own. At least with the 'professional' or
> 'community' versions of, say, SuSE and RedHat the new versions are out
> often enough to make this of questionable value. However, I would
> expect they need to address that for the 'Enterprise' versions.
>
> Just my .02.

In other words, "no".

In any case, with a network installation it's not an issue. It can be
annoying if you have to download from the Internet over a slow link, but
if you have an installation repository sync'd nightly you can just
install that way. That's what I do every chance I get, for the
'Enterprise' versions.

> Is there any way we can integrate new updates into Installation media?
In
> stead of downloading all the updates every time you install Suse.
> For example on Windows you would do a slipstream to integrate the
service
> packs in to Installation data, this way you can have an image with
current
> updates in case you have to install.
> Your help is greatly appreciated.

No it doesn't work like that with most Linux distributions. The reason is
that Microsoft uses the same name for a package/file no matter what the
version is. With RPM based versions of Linux, like SuSE, a new version
means a new package name because the version number is part of the
filename. kernel.2.6.16-11.rpm becomes kernel.2.6.16-11.rpm. If you
replaced the file on the install media with a newer version, it would
break the installer script, which would be looking for the old filename.

SuSE, and perhaps other distros offer a feature that Microsoft does not.
They have differential patches. With differential patches, rather than
download and install 12MB of the newer kernel, SuSE can download and
install a 500Kb diff file that includes only the changes necessary to
update the original file. This saves bandwidth and speeds up the update
process considerably.

The other simple solution to your question is to have the updated RPMs on
a disk, you can slipstream that "update disk". Then # rpm -UF * updates
them all for you.

Now, one of the big reasons for slip steaming Windows install disks,
apart from having a single installation disk, is the need for fewer
reboots. But, with SuSE, you can do the install with one reboot and the
updates may or may not require another. Either way, you won't have more
than two reboots.


HTH

Peter