I’m trying to find information on upgrading my home server openSuse 11.0 to a current one.
I’m also trying to see possible problems, most things are installed via yast, or are one off things like rkhunter and denyhost. But I do have webmin and truecrypt, can’t remember anything else. But I’m mostly concerned over because of the 4tb software raid5 I have setup. I’m not seeing much in docs, but It’s looking like 11.0 -> 11.1 -> 11.3.
So what is the desired way to upgrade from 11.0, And is there a list of possible problems/conflicts? Would there be issues from the software raid? What can can I do to help insure the raid comes up in the new OS?
Thanks guys!
Guph
Just to give you heads up server is
opensuse 11.0, no X
intel celeron 600mhz with 512 ram
NIC: intel pro GT 10/100/1000
3ware 8506-8 sata raid jbod mode(it only supports up to 2gb for hardware raid5)
4x 1TB SATA drives - software raid5 - ext3
1x 250gb SATA drive - Backup some data from the raid5 - reiserfs
1x 40gb IDE drive - OS - / ext3, /home ext3
Guph, I am not seeing anyone else jump in here with a suggestion and I don’t think that going from 11.0 to 11.1 and then 11.2 and perhaps 11.3 does anything but confuse the situation. The basic problem with upgrades is that some packages don’t get upgraded as they should, some settings change how and where they work, some things get removed and so on.
Normally, with a GUI setup, a standard user can get the best of both worlds by doing a clean install, but maintaining a separate /home area that does not get formatted and thus retains personnel settings. In the case of a server, not sure where the settings files are at you would want to maintain. I don’t run a “home” server, so I would not be an expert on trying to keep those settings. Of all of the choices you mention, if I was going to try an upgrade, I would go straight to openSUSE 11.2 and stay there if successful, backing up everything first if possible.
In fact, I might even buy a new hard drive, move my working system to it and then try to upgrade the new drive, while not doing anything to the old, but that is just my thoughts. By the way, have you considered doing just a kernel update? That is possible, but of course using openSUSE 11.0, updates have already stop being supported.
I remember reading a lot of RAID 5 upgrade and new installation issues with solutions in the forums here; so I suggest doing a search to get a better idea with that issue. As far as your server settings; I also do not run a home server but you could research through there websites or Google to see where the config files a stored and back them up. Keep in mind though that with a big jump in versions the config files may have changed with the newer versions of the software; so you mave have to tweak them a bit.
On 2010-11-16 00:36, Guph wrote:
>
> I’m trying to find information on upgrading my home server openSuse 11.0
> to a current one.
>
> I’m also trying to see possible problems, most things are installed via
> yast, or are one off things like rkhunter and denyhost. But I do have
> webmin and truecrypt, can’t remember anything else. But I’m mostly
> concerned over because of the 4tb software raid5 I have setup. I’m not
> seeing much in docs, but It’s looking like 11.0 -> 11.1 -> 11.3.
I would upgrade the system leaving aside the data - but first I would try a
fresh install on a separate partition to learn if everything works. If the
data is important I would do a backup or at least disable the data disks
for some time.
Upgrades are doable but tricky. It is possible to go from 11.0 to 11.2 in
one step (I did). 11.3 is a bit more scary to me, but if it works for you,
try the migration in one step. I think the “book” has a chapter on known
gotchas for each version. At least years ago they did. If you have never
done it, try on another machine - or even a virtual machine, to learn how
it is done.
I always do upgrades, but I recogn they need some… expertise?
It is impossible to tell here how many things you should know about an
upgrade: you have to try yourself.
The system will generate a list of configuration files that you need to
adjust manually after the upgrade.
One thing: Have a full backup ready, at least of the system. If the upgrade
fails completely, you can go back.
Another method is to install the target (final) OS version on a different
partition, boot it, migrate every service step by step to it. If something
fails, you still have the old partition intact. Data is supposed to be on a
different set of partitions. Then, a year or two ahead you migrate the
“old” partition to the whatever new version is then.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)
