Linux Update - Necessary??

Is it advisable to have a regular update in Linux?? or is it even advisable to update in Linux??

From the posts on this board it seems (if you're speaking about RedHat's update) that it usually breaks more items than it fixes. So if you're happy with the way your box is operating and nothing is broken... why fix / update it?

This is asked quite frequently. Most I feel update for two main reasons, they want the latest and greatest (also including new features in the software) that's out there and others who update cause of security issues/updates that are critical.

If your system works and there are no security updates, why update. I don't personally. I don't care about looks and never update cause it may have some neat little updated option or feature I might want. If its working, then I don't touch it really.
The only reason I will usually update is if there is some sort of security vulnerability in a program I might be using, etc.

Someone here has a cool signature with something like this

"If it's not broken, don't fix it"

God, I've learned so much with that

if its a security update/fix, then fix it, no point in having known security holes in your system. if you install rh 7.3 from CD, you will want to update stuff like openssl and such (i've seen a system with ssl slapper worm...horrible stuff).

I see... thnx for the replies....

I'm a wiser person...

I got boxed RH8 a few months ago. Installed it and for a month it ran fine. Then, I went to the RH Site and did the complementary upgrades they recommended. After that, had nothing but lockups, crashes and other problems. By dialup, the upgrades took a long time too.

I'm running RH 8.0 The only thing I did was uninstall all the kde programs and install the new kde 3.1.1 programs. I did use apt to do an update on one of my systems. After the update, wine no longer worked. On my second machine, I installed rh 9.0. Netscape hung up. No wine, no Reaplayer 8.0 and really no extra hardware support that I needed. I tried to upgrade back but it wouldn't. So I did a fresh Gnome workstation install of 8.0 original. Then I removed arts via
rpm. After that, I installed the updated kde. Now I can't be happier. Reliable as ever. Does everything I need.

BTW if you don't use wine Realplayer 8.0 or Netscape, there is no problem with going to RH 9.0. It just is a matter of choice.

steved123,

I think you misunderstood me, I wasn't talking about updating Red Hat to a newer version... I was talking about updating erratas and packages via RHN....

thnx anyways...

once i did do the update for a newer kernel and it kept panicing...i'd leave the house and come back and hear my digidoc 5 beeping (it does that when the 12V line reads over 12.5 volts...and that happens when stuff is going wrong). My kernel would panic every day. Lucky for me i keep my old kernels, i just kept using the old one until the 2.4.20 came out, so i guess i can see where it ican go wrong.

I see.... thnx for d info...