Upgrade stratagies
 

Im a comparatively new slackware user, since the beginning of June this year. The current version uptick is the first i have experienced with slackware and im wondering about upgrade options.

I have been running current and have been keeping up with the updates.

Im wondering if i can just keep upgrading through the version change or if i need to do a clean install.

I would prefer to just keep upgrading and not do a clean install, mostly because of various /etc/ directory files i have modified that would need to be backed up and restored but also because of various things like vlc, the dvd libraries, some webcam software etc that would need to be reinstalled if i took the other option.

So my question is, if i dont do a clean install of the new version, am i likely to run into trouble later?

Sure. You can keep upgrading through the version change, you do not need to do a clean install.

Hitest is sort of right, however, I should point out that the traditional way has always been a wipe and re-install: this way you guarantee to get rid of any old libraries or configs hanging around. The catch, of course, is having to reconfigure everything all over again: for one or two machines, this is no big deal, but if you're doing a whole bunch this is too much like Real Work(TM)! FWIW, though, nuking and re-installing is what I do, especially to add special flags to mke2fs since I'm running an SSD.

Mike

No, clean install isn't more recommended then upgrading. :|
I'm not sure, but if a library isn't present anymore in upgraded package, it just get deleted when you upgradepkg it.

Well, the UPGRADE.TXT should safely guide you; if you use slackpkg, you can follow the roadmap of the UPGRADE.TXT (in terms of file upgrade order) and you have the advantage of "slackpkg clean-system" and "slackpkg new-config" as tools to aid the process. I think there are even a few howtos floating around the 'net that can guide you through a slackpkg system upgrade.

I will almost certainly be upgrading my computers with slackpkg this time around.

There's no real need to do a clean install, but it won't hurt at all. Pat provides a nice UPGRADE.txt and CHANGES_AND_HINTS.txt file to help us with the upgrade if we don't watch -current. You can do a clean install if you want, but I only do that on CentOS for major version changes (e.g. 5 -> 6).

...from the slackpkg man page:

But, still follow the advice in the UPGRADE.TXT, so: drop down to single user mode, then upgrade glib shared libraries, then package tools and related packages, and then everything else.

i've been following UPGRADE.TXT since 10.2

for this time round, i'm gonna do
#slackpkg clean-system

and then start again with supposedly 'clean' system (90% clean i guess :p)

Hi all,

I've upgraded Slackware several times using a few different approaches:

1. Backup my /home and /root directories and reformat and repartition the hard drive prior to installing the new version.
2. Wipe out everything but the partitions with /root and /home on them and then do a clean installation of the new version.
3. Follow the UPGRADE.TXT instructions and do a simple upgrade.

In all cases, I keep my user data secure and available in the new installation. This preserves some very important configuration files. They are:

rc.keymap, .bashrc and .bash_profile for my users, my customized emacs keymap, my .emacs file and the .mozilla and .thunderbird directories (which hold my bookmarks and all my e-mail).

The backup also preserves all my other user data (most of which are in hidden directories and files in my /home/<user> directories) and the SBo packages I've compiled in the past.

I all cases, there are some important after-installation steps that need to happen.

For one thing, a whole bunch of the hidden files and directories (except for the ones noted above) used by applications can actually be moved to a temporary folder (or deleted). This forces this forces a clean start and default configuration for the programs.

NOTE: this is especially important with KDE. Newer versions of KDE can have problems when they use the settings from previous versions. I delete the .kde directory and .local directories before my first 'startx' into a new version of KDE.

Here are some other post-upgrade routine tasks:

• Use slackpkg to get the latest updates because I seldom upgrade immediate after a new release.
• Install Wicd on my laptop.
• Load my custom keymap for when I'm in the console.
• Setup the temperature, fan, and cpu sensors.
• Set up KDE to my liking. :)
• Install extra software -- usually Slackbuild.org packages.
• Set up the firewall.
• Fix the documentation of Coreutils; replace fileutils, sh-utils, and textutils to coreutils in the file, /usr/info/dir
• Setup the IBM scroll button on my laptop: create /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-thinkpad.conf
• Fix the problem in XFCE where it shows the default icon for files and folders.

Regards,

I took fogpipe's original post to mean that he wanted to keep following slackware-current after Slackware 14.0 is released (he is running slackware64-current right now), he can easily do that using slackpkg.
I will be keeping one of my boxes on -current, the rest will be clean installs of Slackware 14.0 (I have separate /home directories. You can also manually upgrade to 14.0 following the UPGRADE.txt.

I agree that using slackpkg is probably the easiest way to follow -current (or -stable patches for that matter :) ).

Clean installs really aren't necessary unless your OS is dirty (ie you've installed lots of un-packaged software or gunked up your libs). I haven't done a clean install on this box since Slackware 11.0. I upgrade following the same basic procedure each time- essentially use the UPGRADE.TXT and CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT.

Concisely:

• Backup files (just in case)
• Get Sources via mirror-slackware-current.sh
• Make a list of all non-Slackware packages (via slackpkg)
• Get rid of some non-Slackware packages (that I don't use anymore, etc)
• Use UPGRADE.TXT through the mass package upgrade
• Use slackpkg to remove obsolete Slackware packages
• Fix config files and other CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT fixes
• recreate the initrd for the kernel
• correct the lil.conf file and run lilo
• If you use a binary graphics driver, Reboot into the new kernel in runlevel 3 and Rebuild graphics driver
• Rebuild/remove broken 3rd party packages

More details on this process are in the upgrade links in my signature. I stopped making those HowTos because they are time consuming and usually say the same thing - use the UPGRADE.TXT and CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT

Thanks guys, i think i will follow current through the version change with the instructions from upgrade.txt. I appreciate the advice.

I was hoping to wait some time longer with 13.37 (hear me out before you stone me) because I am at home with 13.37 (honestly wished 14 came out a bit more later).
The thing is I have installed many things from source others from slackbuilds and some others in which I have tweeked the source code for myself and I do not wish to loose that. It is almost a years work and hours of trial and error and frustrations.
I plan to upgrade (atleast let us see how this goes) but I am not sure that all the compiled souce will work perfectly with the new gcc and glibc.
The only other way is to use the other partition and so I will dualboot with slackware 13.37 and slackware 14 - then I would be a serious slackware fanboy :)
Can anyone tell me for sure if all the applications I installed would work as they are working now after I upgrade?

This is what I do. I typically upgrade my other partition to -current around the time the first beta comes out. I clean it (slackpkg clean-system) so it is pretty much a vanilla install, and then I rebuild the apps I use the most for testing purposes, etc. I link some of my important files and folders to my /home partition that I use on my -stable partition, so after the rebuild process is done for the essentials I use the -current install instead of -stable. I note differences and resolve any config issues. After -current becomes -stable I upgrade my main partition and resume using it again.

They will surely not, depending on what you have. Anything built using the kernel libs (graphics drivers, etc), python, or hal will be broken, along with many others. If something is broken try using ldd to figure out the missing library. Many packages will still work, however. The more you upgrade, the more you will become familiar with what will be need to be rebuilt based upon the changes in the libraries, etc in -current.

Something that works for me (and may not be useful to anybody else) is that I partition drives on every server a standard way (well, my standard anyway).

I do separate partitions for root, /home, /usr/local, /opt, /var/lib/mysql, /var/lib/virtual, /spares and /var/lib/psql. /spares and /var/lib/virtual are for a bunch of (large) geographic information data sets and /var/lib/virtual is where all my virtual machines live (/spares got named that way about 12 years ago for no particularly good reason and I've just stuck with it, also for no particularly good reason).

I noticed a long time ago that during Slackware installation, when you're adding drive partitions, you have a choice of formatting or not formatting individual partitions. Hmm. So, /root gets formatted but none of the rest of them do -- so, they're just sitting there with all their data intact when the system boots when setup is finished.

Before I start a "clean install," I copy the content of /etc to /spares along with several font sets I own (I've had the Adobe Type Library for about 25 or so years) but almost nothing else.

If possible, I try to install SBo packages in /usr/local, I keep all my own and some source files there, I've used CVS for... dang... about 30 years and all that stuff sits there too. Things like OpenOffice and VirtualBox go in /opt (and usually need a re-do when a new release comes along) and I need to do a mass rebuild of SBo and tarball applications (not always, but can't hurt) but the entire install process takes about, oh, 30 minutes including smoke break and coffee run.

Might work for you, might not, but it does work for me.

Hope this helps some.