How to cross-upgrade Fedora x86(32-bit) => x86_64(64-bit) using 'preupgrade'

Gerry Reno greno at verizon.net
Wed Apr 22 14:52:20 UTC 2009


Gerry Reno wrote:
> Mat Booth wrote:
>> On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 5:41 AM, Gerry Reno <greno at verizon.net> wrote:
>>  
>>> For the past couple months I've been working on finding a way to
>>> successfully upgrade Fedora x86(32-bit) to x86_64(64-bit).  I had 
>>> almost
>>> given up because nothing seemed to work despite dozens of different
>>> approaches.  Then a couple days ago I started a new set of 
>>> experiments and
>>> now I have successfully cross-upgraded three different systems using 
>>> this
>>> technique.  On the three machines that I used, all the configs that 
>>> I set up
>>> were still in place after the upgrade.  The machines behaved 
>>> normally and I
>>> have not found any sign of problems yet.  But, it would be difficult 
>>> to see
>>> how this technique could ever be fully automated because it requires a
>>> certain amount of manual inspection in a number of places.  And it's
>>> probably something that could not be officially supported.  But at 
>>> least it
>>> appears there may now be a technique to perform a successful 32-bit =>
>>> 64-bit upgrade.  And for those who have heavily configured machines 
>>> this may
>>> be worth a try.  Anyway, here's the technique:
>>>
>>>     
>>
>> You sir, are a hero. I wanted to do exactly this once F11 is released
>> and was disappointed to learn it wasn't possible in an earlier thread
>> on this list (that I can't immediately find the link to).
>>
>> I think I will give this a try (won't be until next month, though).
>> Worst case scenario is I just blat it away and reinstall from scratch,
>> which is what I was planning anyway.
>>
>>   
> Exactly.  That's how we looked at.  We had nothing to lose by trying 
> to do this because the alternative was a complete wipe of the system 
> anyhow.
>
>
And just a little tip for Rescue Mode.  You can put the technique 
document into your shell history like this:
history -r DOCUMENT

Where DOCUMENT is the full filepath to the technique document.  That way 
you can scroll to the command you want to execute without having to type 
the whole thing in by hand.

Regards,
Gerry





More information about the devel mailing list