Kernel upgrade possible?

[Anand Buddhdev]

Jeremiah Foster wrote:

> I too am thinking of upgrading. I am using Fedora Core 1. I use over the 
> network, running X on my local machine and then logging in with ssh -X. 
> I use the tools like gimp and sodipodi which need later versions of 
> certain libraries to be upgraded. What is the best approach for me? I 
> have downloaded the FC 3 cds but since I cannot access the installation 
> GUI (can't login over the network at boot time,) what approach shoud use?
> 
> Should I just upgrade the kernel and use apt-get to update various 
> libraries needed or does one need to re-install the entire operating 
> system from scratch?

The recommended way of upgrading a Fedora Core system is by using the 
CDs. The anaconda installer knows how to handle the various tasks 
required for a proper upgrade, including the conversion from a static 
/dev system to a dynamic /dev using udev.

Having said that, I have remotely upgraded several FC1 systems by 
logging in via SSH and using yum to upgrade the system. This method is 
not recommended, because it can result in a system that won't boot. On 
one of my systems I also had yum hang after it had upgraded all the 
packages, but not yet removed the old package names from the RPM 
database. So after a reboot, I had to manually find the duplicated 
package entries, and use "rpm --erase --justdb <exact package name and 
version>" to fix the RPM database.

Now that I've warned you enough, if you still want to do the yum 
upgrade, then you'll have to do the following:

1. First, install the kernel package from FC2 on your FC1 system. Yes, I 
said FC _two_ intentionally. This is a 2.6 kernel, and you need to be 
running a 2.6 kernel before attempting to upgrade to FC3. Once this FC2 
kernel is installed, edit your grub.conf file to boot this as the 
default, and reboot your system.

2. Now that you've got a 2.6 kernel running, modify your yum 
configuration to point to the FC3 repositories, and follow the advice 
given in the FC3 release notes, under the udev section, about doing a 
live upgrade with yum. You need to follow the steps very carefully, and 
as long as you do it carefully and don't miss any step, you will be able 
to go directly from FC1 to FC3, without having to use the CDs.

One other important thing I should mention, which is not in the release 
notes, is that you should make the system quiescent during the live 
upgrade! This means, you should stop all the services, except the 
essential ones. So, basically shut down everything except SSH, to avoid 
any issues while the upgrade is occuring.

As I said, I have used this method for several upgrades, and with the 
one exception where the RPM database was messed up, I had no problems.