Hi all,

After reading the responses to my first thread I posted on a different subject I decided I'd like to convert my Fedora Core 4 box into a CentOs 5 box.

The trick is... how can this be accomplished when the box in question is in a live production environment?

My box is colocated...

Is there a way to install CentOs via sshd and also without a boot disc?

My main concern is preserve all data in the /home/* directories and so forth...

Please advise.

-Thanks in advance!

Chris

You need to test first ...

- build up a test server
- configure the same applications as you are currently using (expect changes!)
- copy in your prod data
- test everything thoroughly

To perform the actual install you'll need console access (not ssh)

- arrange an outage
- come up with a test plan
- arrange a tester ( end user ?)
- back up the whole server
- back up the user data
- perform the installation
- configure the applications as you did on the test server
- restore the user data
- ask the tester to execute the test plan
- if testing fails, decide whether to keep trying or roll back to the previous version

There is no simple answer for that but of course it can be done with any linux environment. There is no point in using a boot disk to accomplish that, just make sure you modify correctly the settings of the bootloader (kernel path) before running CentOS. Perhaps it is just a matter of changing repositories.

PS:// If you are thinking about switching from Fedora, openSUSE is IMHO much better than CentOS (though a matter of choice)

kbp is correct for a prod server. There is no shortcut. Note that the test server does not have to be as powerful as the prod server, unless you want to do volume testing. Ideally you'd want exactly the same HW in order to check for potential HW driver issues.
Either that or build & test new prod server and then use that in prod and retire old server as emergency backup. You'd still need to test that HW later with the new setup.