Today I tried upgrading my Dell E5410 laptop from 14.1/x86_64 to 14.2/x86_64 it did not go smoothly, unlike all other upgrades over the past 5 years.

I read the CHANGELOG.TXT and followed UPGRADE.TXT step-by-step, except that I removed deprecated packages prior to the upgrade.

When the package upgrades finished I processed all *.new config files, modified the soft links in /boot to point to the generic-4.4.14 versions, built an initrd, edited /etc/lilo.conf, and ran /sbin/lilo prior rebooting.

During the boot process dozens or more 'failed to open /lib/udev/...' messages flash by on the screen. I removed the execute bit from /etc/rc.d/rc.udev (since it's been replace by eudev) but this makes no difference.

Other problems include gpm not working even when rc.gpm is explicitly started, no networking despite rc.inet1.conf being correct and rc.inet1 being explicitly started, and (when logged in as a user and running xfce4) not being able to load a virtual terminal from the xfce4 panel.

I'd greatly appreciate advice on how to fix all these issues. If the mouse worked I would have coppied the /lib/udev/ errors from dmesg to a text file, transferred that to the desktop workstation, and provided samples here.

I have three other hosts to upgrade so I want to learn how to avoid issues (the same or different) when I upgrade them.

TIA,

Rich

rshepard,
I noticed you said "modified the soft links in /boot".
That's one way of doing things, but I find it's much more foolproof to simply direct lilo.conf to the actual stuff, for example:
Also, it's worth double-checking your mkinitrd method/command for the name of the actual kernel you want to boot from, i.e.,
"4.4.14" vs "4.4.14-smp" makes all the difference.
Here's hoping your lilo is just getting half of what it needs because of a wayward softlink, and the fix is easy!

STDOUDBT,

The -smp kernels are apparently only in the 32-bit versions. I've been re-linking in /boot for years with no issues.

UPDATE:
I learned that /etc/rc.d/rc.udev needs to run during the boot process so I turned on the executable bits.

gpm is now running again.

The error messages I see during booting refer to freedesktop files in /lib/udev/socket/freedesktop. Perhaps this should not have been in the deprecated and removed process?

Still cannot invoke an urxvt terminal from the xfce4 panel and networking (which should use wicd, not networkmanager) is still not working.

Rich

Here are a few of the error messages seen while booting:

[ 77.307033] udevd[1470]: failed to execute '/lib/udev/socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event' 'socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event': No such file or directory
[ 77.307728] udevd[1471]: failed to execute '/lib/udev/socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event' 'socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event': No such file or directory
[ 77.308044] udevd[1466]: failed to execute '/lib/udev/socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event' 'socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event': No such file or directory
[ 77.308538] udevd[1468]: failed to execute '/lib/udev/socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event' 'socket:@/org/freedesktop/hal/udev_event': No such file or directory

Hope this helps!

Rich

HAL is no longer shipped in Slackware 14.2 so you must remove references to HAL as well

Willy,

I found the 32-bit compatibility package for hald from 13.37 still installed; apparently I had not upgraded the compatibility libraries. Removed that and the error messages during boot are gone.

Now I have to fix the xfce4 issues; deleted ~/.config/xfce4 and am starting from scratch but still cannot lauch a vt from the panel. I'll find an xfce4 component there and ask there. The latest version's settings are totally differenct from before.

Thanks for the pointer,

Rich