system-upgrade & third-party-repos: serious risk may break the whole system

English Install/Boot/Login
1

hello dear Opensuse-Friends, good day dear Gentlemen,

running opensuse 12.2 on a notebook - now i want to do an update to 12.3

Note: there are only a very very few third-party things on the machine - such as:

  • clipcrab
  • amarok and some more

Well if i follow the steps for Upgrade that are written down here: SDB:System upgrade - openSUSE
i think that there are no risks in following the steps. But wait: There is** a serious waring: **

see here: SDB:System upgrade - openSUSE

Warning: Use with caution. Using third-party repositories may break your system or cause instabilities.

zypper addrepo --name <name> <url> <alias>

Or, if you have URL of a .repo file:
zypper ar <url.repo>

After upgrade, reboot is recommended to start new kernel and newer versions of everything.
In addition, zypper up can be run from time to time to ensure you have the latest available packages from
the various repositories that you have enabled. YOU (Yast Online Update) only addresses security updates
from the official repositories.

Well - what do you say - should i follow the steps with the Third-Pary things or should i leave all that stuff “as_is”?
in other words: is it a risk to do the steps in upgrading the third-party stuff and (!!) should i leave all that stuff as is?!
How would you go on here?

Note; if these questions are Noob-questions - dont bear with me. I am not so experienced.

love to hear from you

greetings

2

You can follow the guide you have linked OK. Clipgrab and Amarok are both included in the Packman Repository for openSUSE 12.3 and can be upgraded with this repository after the openSUSE copy has been upgraded. Get rid of all old repositories before you begin if not expressly mentioned in the upgrade procedure. Read the procedure from top to bottom before you begin. No matter what you do, I suggest you startup the YaST Partitioner and make a record (or even print a screen capture) of what Partition is mounted where (folder). If you have done any unusual things like having a separate boot partition, installed grub into an Extended Partition, have encrypted partitions, use efi boot on a GPT disk or anything different from having three openSUSE partitions of root /, /home & swap and have only loaded grub into a standard partition of 1, 2, 3 or 4 or have loaded grub into the MBR, you may wish to reconsider the upgrade until further review has been made.

Thank You,

3

hello James

many many thanks for all the hints and tipps.
Great to hear from you!

Get rid of all old repositories before you begin if not expressly mentioned in the upgrade procedure.

Hmm - You mean that i should “erase” them or select them and “switch” them off? Or something like that!?

This is a great tipp:

I suggest you startup the YaST Partitioner and make a record (or even print a screen capture) of what Partition is mounted where (folder).

i will do so!! I will make a list with all the partitions i have on the lappy. This list will be created before i start with the upgrade-process.

4

On 2013-05-11 20:06, dilbertone wrote:
>
> hello dear Opensuse-Friends, good day dear Gentlemen,
>
> running opensuse 12.2 on a notebook - now i want to do an update to
> 12.3

System Upgrade, not update. Yes, I’m picky on this terminology :slight_smile:

> see here: ‘SDB:System upgrade - openSUSE’
> (http://en.opensuse.org/SDB:System_upgrade)
>
>>
>> Warning: Use with caution. Using third-party repositories may break
>> your system or cause instabilities.

The warning is absolutely true. :expressionless:

Remove all repos, use only the official ones, upgrade, then re-add your
extra repos and applications. More work, yes, less problems. No kidding.

A “zypper dup” gives you no control at all from where each package is
downloaded. It is all automatic, which may not be what is best. In some
situations you arrive at incompatible mixtures that produce very
difficult to track and solve problems.

An alternative system upgrade method is documented here:

Offline upgrade
method. And you also should read this:
Chapter 16. Upgrading the System and System Changes

Using this procedure it may be possible to add some repositories during
the upgrade. However, the functionality is uncharted, and the times I
tried it in the past failed, or I had to go back and disable. You have
more control of what is upgraded and from where, though.

The last time I tried the problem was that it wanted to upgraded things
from the online repos that were already in the DVD, which means hours
with my connection, during which hours the system is vulnerable (power
failure, internet outage - bang!).

One more detail: backup everything before upgrading. And I mean everything.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 12.1 x86_64 “Asparagus” at Telcontar)

5

On 2013-05-11 20:46, dilbertone wrote:
>
> hello James

>> Get rid of all old repositories before you begin if not expressly
>> mentioned in the upgrade procedure.
>
> Hmm - You mean that i should “erase” them or select them and “switch”
> them off? Or something like that!?

Switch off is enough. And disable refresh to speed things up.

> This is a great tipp:
>
>>
>> I suggest you startup the YaST Partitioner and make a record (or even
>> print a screen capture) of what Partition is mounted where (folder).
>>
>
> i will do so!! I will make a list with all the partitions i have on the
> lappy. This list will be created before i start with the
> upgrade-process.

It is useful to have a printed copy of the partition table, fstab, grub
config… and nowdays, also the list of equivalences between labels,
uids, sdX of the partitions.

Also information about the boot sequence, what boots what. Not only for
upgrades, but for emergency repairs.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 12.1 x86_64 “Asparagus” at Telcontar)

6

hello dear Robin good evening,

many thanks for the hints. Great to hear from you!

well you have got very good arguments.

If i choose the offline-method - by using the DVD (which i allready have prepared [see the other thread where you have helped me]):
should i also remove all the extra (that mean: non-official and third-party- repos and applications?

Remove all repos, use only the official ones, upgrade, then re-add your
extra repos and applications. More work, yes, less problems. No kidding.

well - the very best thing is start with some steps of documentation: that means before i start to do anything, i will make a list that contains

  • all partitons
  • all repos

With that list i come back here and show you all the stuff that is on the lappy.
So - since i am not at home at the moment, this will take some time. I will be back in some hours - and show you all the above mentioned things… and stuff.

untill soon.

greetings

by the way: how (!!) to create the list of all used Repositories and Applications that are on the lappy?

can i do this like so:

OpenSUSE: Find all Packages without a repository - Unix & Linux Stack Exchange

rpm -qa --qf '%-30{DISTRIBUTION} %{NAME}
'| sort

can i use this code above - to get the list!?

7

On 2013-05-11 21:26, dilbertone wrote:

> many thanks for the hints. Great to hear from you!

Welcome

> well you have got very good arguments.
>
> If i choose the offline-method - by using the DVD (which i allready
> have prepared [see the other thread where you have helped me]):
> should i also remove all the extra (that mean: non-official and
> third-party- repos and applications?

It does it automatically and does not ask :-p

> by the way: how (!!) to create the list of all used Repositories and
> Applications that are on the lappy?


zypper lr --details

But it is also in “/etc/zypp/repos.d/”. You can make a backup of those
files, and later restore them, editing them so that they point to the
correct URL after the version upgrade.

can i do this like so:

‘OpenSUSE: Find all Packages without a repository - Unix & Linux Stack
Exchange’ (OpenSUSE: Find all Packages without a repository - Unix & Linux Stack Exchange)

PHP code:

rpm -qa --qf '%-30{DISTRIBUTION} %{NAME}

'| sort

can i use this code above - to get the list!?

Ah, you want to get a list of packages! So to restore them later.

I do it this way:


rpm -q -a --queryformat "%{INSTALLTIME}	%{INSTALLTIME:day} \
%{BUILDTIME:day} %-30{NAME}	%15{VERSION}-%-7{RELEASE}	%{arch} \
%25{VENDOR}%25{PACKAGER}
" | sort | cut --fields="2-" | less -S

However, and I think this is in the documentation, when you do an
offline upgrade, the packages that have no replacement in the DVD can
be: a) removed b) left alone.

I mean, suppose you have “fancypackage” installed. It is not in the DVD,
so it is not upgraded. So you run “zypper up” after the procedure and
then it is upgraded.

This is in the documentation, but perhaps incomplete. That wiki is a
“work in progress” and I have not found the moment to complete it.

I can not tell you what happens in the same case with a “zypper dup”
upgrade, it is not a procedure I like to use. I assume the package is
left alone.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 12.1 x86_64 “Asparagus” at Telcontar)

8

To list repositories from terminal:

zypper repos

To list applications you can do this:

rpm -q --all | sort

But this list can be real long, so you can use this to save the list:

rpm -q --all | sort > my_app.txt

Thank You,

9

hello Dear James hello dear Robin

i ve collected some data. Are they enough?

i eagerly look forward to do the upgrade.

do i need to collect more data - or do i have to do some preliminary works - eg. erase some partitons … ?!

look fowrard to hear from you

just give me the permission to start the upgrade;-):wink:

greetings

rpm -q --all | sort


linux-ale9:/home/martin # LANG="en_US"
linux-ale9:/home/martin # LANGUAGE="en_US:en"
linux-ale9:/home/martin # 
linux-ale9:/home/martin # fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders, total 625142448 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xdf16504f

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *        2048      321535      159744   83  Linux
/dev/sda2         4208640    46153727    20972544   8e  Linux LVM
/dev/sda3        46153728   625141759   289494016   8e  Linux LVM
/dev/sda4          321536     4208639     1943552   8e  Linux LVM

Partition table entries are not in disk order

Disk /dev/mapper/system-home: 26.8 GB, 26843545600 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 3263 cylinders, total 52428800 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disk /dev/mapper/system-root: 21.5 GB, 21474836480 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2610 cylinders, total 41943040 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disk /dev/mapper/system-swap: 2147 MB, 2147483648 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 261 cylinders, total 4194304 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

cccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc

linux-ale9:/home/martin # fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 Köpfe, 63 Sektoren/Spur, 38913 Zylinder, zusammen 625142448 Sektoren
Einheiten = Sektoren von 1 × 512 = 512 Bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xdf16504f

   Gerät  boot.     Anfang        Ende     Blöcke   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *        2048      321535      159744   83  Linux
/dev/sda2         4208640    46153727    20972544   8e  Linux LVM
/dev/sda3        46153728   625141759   289494016   8e  Linux LVM
/dev/sda4          321536     4208639     1943552   8e  Linux LVM




martin@linux-ale9:~> zypper repos
#  | Alias                     | Name                               | Aktiviert | Aktualisieren
---+---------------------------+------------------------------------+-----------+--------------
 1 | nVidia Graphics Drivers   | nVidia Graphics Drivers            | Ja        | Ja           
 2 | openSUSE-12.2-1.6         | openSUSE-12.2-1.6                  | Ja        | Nein         
 3 | packman                   | packman                            | Ja        | Ja           
 4 | perl                      | perl                               | Ja        | Ja           
 5 | repo-debug                | openSUSE-12.2-Debug                | Nein      | Ja           
 6 | repo-debug-update         | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Debug         | Nein      | Ja           
 7 | repo-debug-update-non-oss | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Debug-Non-Oss | Nein      | Ja           
 8 | repo-non-oss              | openSUSE-12.2-Non-Oss              | Ja        | Ja           
 9 | repo-oss                  | openSUSE-12.2-Oss                  | Ja        | Ja           
10 | repo-source               | openSUSE-12.2-Source               | Nein      | Ja           
11 | repo-update               | openSUSE-12.2-Update               | Ja        | Ja           
12 | repo-update-non-oss       | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Non-Oss       | Ja        | Ja           
martin@linux-ale9:~> 




martin@linux-ale9:~> zypper lr --details
#  | Alias                     | Name                               | Aktiviert | Aktualisieren | Priorität | Typ    | URI                                                                             | Dienst
---+---------------------------+------------------------------------+-----------+---------------+-----------+--------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-------
 1 | nVidia Graphics Drivers   | nVidia Graphics Drivers            | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | rpm-md | ftp://download.nvidia.com/opensuse/12.2/                                        |       
 2 | openSUSE-12.2-1.6         | openSUSE-12.2-1.6                  | Ja        | Nein          |   99      | yast2  | cd:///?devices=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-TEAC-DV-W28S-R,/dev/sr0                      |       
 3 | packman                   | packman                            | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | rpm-md | http://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/packman/suse/12.2/                                 |       
 4 | perl                      | perl                               | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/devel:/languages:/perl/openSUSE_12.2/ |       
 5 | repo-debug                | openSUSE-12.2-Debug                | Nein      | Ja            |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/debug/distribution/12.2/repo/oss/                  |       
 6 | repo-debug-update         | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Debug         | Nein      | Ja            |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/debug/update/12.2/                                 |       
 7 | repo-debug-update-non-oss | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Debug-Non-Oss | Nein      | Ja            |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/debug/update/12.2-non-oss/                         |       
 8 | repo-non-oss              | openSUSE-12.2-Non-Oss              | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | yast2  | http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/12.2/repo/non-oss/                    |       
 9 | repo-oss                  | openSUSE-12.2-Oss                  | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | yast2  | http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/12.2/repo/oss/                        |       
10 | repo-source               | openSUSE-12.2-Source               | Nein      | Ja            |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/source/distribution/12.2/repo/oss/                 |       
11 | repo-update               | openSUSE-12.2-Update               | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/update/12.2/                                       |       
12 | repo-update-non-oss       | openSUSE-12.2-Update-Non-Oss       | Ja        | Ja            |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/update/12.2-non-oss/                               |       
martin@linux-ale9:~>

do i have to collect more data!?

10

So you should have all of this info at least printed out. The command “rpm -q --all | sort” did not seem to produce anything in your examples. Its only useful if you need to remember ever last file you have installed while I am more into a specific application as opposed to the dependencies it installs, but such info can still be useful. I do suggest a backup of irreplaceable data to an external hard drive or thumb drive, just in case. If the data is not extensive, a basic file copy can work good enough.

Thank You,

11

On 2013-05-12 18:26, dilbertone wrote:
>
> hello Dear James hello dear Robin
>
>
> i ve collected some data. Are they enough?

I think so, yes.

> i eagerly look forward to do the upgrade.
>
> do i need to collect more data - or do i have to do some preliminary
> works - eg. erase some partitons … ?!

If you are doing to do an upgrade, you certainly do not want to erase
any partition. The point of upgrades is that precisely, to keep as much
as possible from the previous system.

> look fowrard to hear from you
>
> just give me the permission to start the upgrade;-):wink:

Heh!

It is in the documentation, but let me say it again: make sure you have
a backup as complete as possible.

Typically, the entire /home should be backed up, because that is where
your personal files are. You should know how important they are to you.
Maybe they are not important at all.

Then, it as a minimum, backup the entire /etc/ directory, because the
system configs are there.

If you have services like databases, web server, ftp server, mail
server… you must back them up entirely.

Me, I do an absolutely complete backup, I image the partitions. Thus, if
the upgrade fails, I can learn what failed, recover from the backup, and
try again. Or I can instead install fresh, knowing that I have a backup
of every single file that was there and can rebuild any service or
config I need.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 12.1 x86_64 “Asparagus” at Telcontar)