production server upkeep question

[goku]

Hi all,
I have a question on production server upkeep.
In my supfile I am tracking freebsd 7 stable
*default tag=RELENG_7

Now here is my question. I’ve read that a safe method of updating the system’s binaries is using a utility called freebsd-update. I have read that it does not update –STABLE . It only tracks the release tag. So do I change the RELENG_7 to RELENG_7_0_0_RELEASE ? also when freebsd 7.1R becomes available and I decide not to upgrade. Will the freebsd-update still update the system’s binaries? Or do I have to upgrade to freebsd 7.1R and change the RELENG_7_0_0_RELEASE to RELENG_7_1_0_RELEASE

Another question. Since the server that I am learning on will become a production server. Is there a way to upgrade from freebsd 7 to 7.1(when it come available) without having the server go offline.

Thanks
goku

[cajunman4life]

Well unfortunately I can't answer much about freebsd-update as I do the "build from source" to update all my servers (yes, they are production).

As far was upgrading the system without going offline, unfortunately when going between versions like that you will need to reboot. Otherwise the "old system" will never stop running.

[scottro]

For an explanation of release names and all that, though the versions are one release behind
http://home.nyc.rr.com/computertaijutsu/release.html

freebsd-update only works with RELEASE and a GENERIC kernel. (At least, that was the case last time I looked into it.)

[Errinok]

to upgrade to a certain version you use the command
freebsd-update -r 7.0-RELEASE upgrade install
then follow the directions. replace 7.0-RELEASE with whichever major release you desire. note that this only works for the GENERIC kernel. if you want to rebuild a system this way and have a custom kernel expect to have to rebuild your kernel manually afterwards. this method also works for release candidates and betas (ex. when 7 was in beta 7.0-BETA2 or 7.0-RC1). you mentioned that this is a production server though so i advise you do not use betas, release candidates nor the -stable or -current branches as they are constantly changing. once u upgrade to a major release you then can run the command
freebsd-update fetch install
to get the latest binary patches for your system making it fully up to date with your desired release. once 7.1 has reached beta status you can expect to be able to upgrade via source or binaries although i do stress not to uses potentially unstable code on a production server.