Upgrading from RHEL 6.6 to 7.x

Hello,

I am a newbie to Linux and would like to upgrade my existing OS from rhel 6.6 to rhel 7.x. From all the forum i have read is to do a clean installation and proceed to install data from the backup. My question is if i were to mount an iso of rhel .x on my rhel 6.6 machine and do a yum/rpm upgrade, what may be the outcome? I believe the OS will see that all packages installed need to be upgraded along with the kernel and will perform the migration directly. So why not we do this migration?Am i missing something here?

Thanks!!

Originally Posted by mani_mss Hello, I am a newbie to Linux and would like to upgrade my existing OS from rhel 6.6 to rhel 7.x. From all the forum i have read is to do a clean installation and proceed to install data from the backup. My question is if i were to mount an iso of rhel .x on my rhel 6.6 machine and do a yum/rpm upgrade, what may be the outcome? I believe the OS will see that all packages installed need to be upgraded along with the kernel and will perform the migration directly. So why not we do this migration?Am i missing something here?

You seem to be missing things, yes. You say yourself that you've read the best thing to do is a clean installation and restore from backups....then say you'd like to mount the ISO image and run an upgrade. You can't do both. If you 'believe' that the OS will do it all correctly, then do as you wish. Upgrades CAN work, but they often leave behind things that may cause problems later.

As said, do a clean installation, but don't upgrade to 7.x, since 8.x is the latest. And why are you using RHEL if you're a 'newbie to Linux'?? RHEL (and CentOS) are designed for servers, and really should only be used if you're paying for it...are you PAYING FOR RHEL?? What is your goal/need for RHEL?

Thanks for the reply. I found that your response to be very hellful. However, to clarify my question to the point, what issues may I face if this upgrade is done? To answer your question, i am playing up with RHEL to get the feel of it and yes I am paying for it.

Thanks.


P.S
Spelling don't matter, answer's do.

Just my opinion but if you are paying for RHEL support, I would ask their advice on the upgrading vice a clean install. They can most probably give you the best course of action for your plan.

There is no "upgrade" path from 6.6 to 7.X (or 8.x, tho I've not gone there yet) The only way to accomplish that is with a new installation.
I had to migrate from 5.11 to 7.7, and there are differences in several aspects, not the least of which is the difference between SysV and SystemD. Several apache web server directives had been deprecated, for example.

Given that one must do a fresh install anyway, I, too, would encourage you to move to ver 8.x

You should probably also consult with Red Hat Support about this. That's why they get the big bucks.

Originally Posted by mani_mss Thanks for the reply. I found that your response to be very hellful. However, to clarify my question to the point, what issues may I face if this upgrade is done?

Again, you say you've read on the forums to not to do this; did you not read the replies where everyone answers this? There are a host of issues that can come up, from multiple version of libraries, missing packages, etc., etc.

To answer your question, i am playing up with RHEL to get the feel of it and yes I am paying for it.

No, that doesn't answer the question; WHY are you using RHEL as a 'newbie'?? Again, it's mostly for servers, and using it won't get you anything more than any other distro will. Things like Mint and Ubuntu are more friendly to new users, and have better 'consumer' hardware support. And if you are paying for RHEL, then why didn't you use the RHEL support that you're paying for, and ask them about the upgrade path and problems?

P.S Spelling don't matter, answer's do.

Spelling DOES matter; if you know you misspell things and don't correct them, that just means you're too lazy to do so.

As one who used RH/CentOS for many years, I would always advise reinstalling a new version. Updating from x.2 to x.3 is fine, but completely new versions are — well, completely new. When you consider how many thousand files there are, I always find it a minor miracle that any update works!

Saying RH is a server distro would not please RH — they want to sell as many licences as they can. But if you want to learn RH, why not use CentOS and save your money? And if you are prepared to pay, why not get them to work for your money?