Interesting upgrade problem

[bill davidsen]

No, this isn't a newbie "how do I update my XXX" problem.

I have a machine running what started life as a RH 7.2 install. I would
like to update the kernel to something more modern than the last build,
2.4.19-pre5-ac2, which has been running since that was state of the art.

The issue is that I would really like to avoid doing a kernel by hand
again, since time is an issue and the build tools are not on that
machine :-(

The rpm for the kernel whines about the iptables, which whine about the
kernel. It seems that each wants the other to be upgraded first, and
they won't play at the same time. I'm a tad hesitant to start forcing
things, since the machine is in a lockbox three timezones away. Getting
it too wrong to boot would be a real issue. Clearly Redhat didn't really
do an upgrade kernel for 7.2, they want a partial upgrade to 7.newer for
this to work. I'd like to avoid having it try to update my lilo.conf as
well, I know as an absolute fact it gets it wrong, it has on every local
machine so far.

Any suggestions other than to install all the development tools and
build a current iptables and kernel for scratch? I'd really like to
avoid that, I would. I am considering using rpm2cpio and unpacking
things by hand, at least that way I know I won't shoot too much in the
foot, but there may be a better way.

--
Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com> CTO, TMR Associates
As we enjoy great advantages from inventions of others, we should be
glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours; and
this we should do freely and generously.
-Benjamin Franklin (who would have liked open source)

[Nico Kadel-Garcia]

bill davidsen wrote:

> No, this isn't a newbie "how do I update my XXX" problem.
>
> I have a machine running what started life as a RH 7.2 install. I would
> like to update the kernel to something more modern than the last build,
> 2.4.19-pre5-ac2, which has been running since that was state of the art.
>
> The issue is that I would really like to avoid doing a kernel by hand
> again, since time is an issue and the build tools are not on that
> machine :-(
>
> The rpm for the kernel whines about the iptables, which whine about the
> kernel. It seems that each wants the other to be upgraded first, and
> they won't play at the same time. I'm a tad hesitant to start forcing
> things, since the machine is in a lockbox three timezones away. Getting
> it too wrong to boot would be a real issue. Clearly Redhat didn't really
> do an upgrade kernel for 7.2, they want a partial upgrade to 7.newer for
> this to work. I'd like to avoid having it try to update my lilo.conf as
> well, I know as an absolute fact it gets it wrong, it has on every local
> machine so far.

If your current kernel is not from an RPM, you can do an "rpm -U" on
both the new kernel and iptables at the same time. Alternatively, you
can use a "--nodeps" to force the kernel update, and then update the
iptables. But your new iptables may not operate correctly with your old
2.4.19 custom built kernel, so be prepared to lose iptables after the
update.

And yes, they did an upgrade kernel. iptables and the kernel depend on
each other to be of specific versions, so you really have to update both
at the same time.

And to get away from the lilo.conf problems, proceed to using grub ASAP.
Seriously: you gain nothing from using LILO and gain good update kernel
control by using grub.

> Any suggestions other than to install all the development tools and
> build a current iptables and kernel for scratch? I'd really like to
> avoid that, I would. I am considering using rpm2cpio and unpacking
> things by hand, at least that way I know I won't shoot too much in the
> foot, but there may be a better way.

Oh, for goodness sake, be prepared to do them both at the same time and
lose the iptables function while your old kernel is running. Trying to
replace that stuff by hand is asking to have your system crashed
unrecoverably.