I have just obtained a CD of a slack 9 beta with Gnome 2 and stuff, so I'm going to put it on my laptop, which is already running slack 8.1. Thing is, I want to be able to upgrade without having to completely reinstall the box - I have lots of stuff in /usr/local which I have installed and of course my home area is full of files... So what's the easiest way to manage this upgrade?

I realise my layout is bad, cos I have everything under my root partition, which will probably make life more awkware... here's a cat of my fstab.

/dev/hda5 / ext2 defaults 1 1
/dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom iso9660 noauto,owner,ro 0 0
/dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy auto noauto,user 0 0
none /dev/pts devpts gid=5,mode=620 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0

so where do I begin?

thanks,
Christo

You use the upgradepkg feature.

Mount the CD ('mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom') and cd to the mounted CD.

1. Upgrade your glibc shared libraries. This is important, or things
will go haywire during the first part of the upgrade:

upgradepkg /mnt/cdrom/a/glibc-solibs-*.tgz

2. Upgrade your package utilities (the package utilities are likely to be the same version as the one you already use with 8.1):

upgradepkg /mnt/cdrom/a/pkgtools-*.tgz

3. Install everything else:

upgradepkg /mnt/cdrom/*/*.tgz

That upgrades all of the packages already on your system to the packages on the CD. Now you pretty much need to use installpkg on everything on the CD so you make sure you don't miss any necessary packages. Do that with this command:

installpkg /mnt/cdrom/*/*.tgz

Now I am assuming you want everything on your CD installed on your system (unlikely but oh well). Of course you can manually go through each directory on the CD and manually installpkg/upgradepkg that way. There should be a file called UPGRADE.TXT somewhere on the CD (most likely in /mnt/cdrom/slackware/) so make sure you read that first. there may be additional/changed information that you should follow instead.

It wouldn't hurt to back up your system before you all that, too.

Also, it's usually a good idea to keep up with new/upgraded packages that are available at the various Slackware distribution sites (http://www.slackware.com/getslack/). You can also check out http://www.linuxpackages.net/ which is a site that has tons of Slackware packages that you can download and use.

You must have lots of ram and little going on not to
have a swap partition :)

Cheers,
Tink

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm a bit perplexed as to how I managed to install this box without including a swap partition. I have 196mb, and haven't yet suffered any memory probs...

And since I made this post, a colleague has run off with my slackware disk, so I'm gonna have to wait before I try anything.. and then I'll post back in time

thanks

christo

Well you know you can get packages off the net..

Hope you don't mind another thought regarding a swap file. I haven't run a swap file for years. Memory has been too cheap and the Linux kernel does not require a swap file to operate. A simple guideline that I follow: for a file server (console mode only) on a small network then install at least 64 MByte RAM. If X will be in use, then install at least 128 MByte RAM. The requirements go up depending on the apps and the number of apps in use at the same time.

On a 2.4.18 kernel, the uptime has a lot to do with RAM as well because of memory issues not releasing file cache memory. On a notebook, use is generally brief durations and it is shutdown. A workstation is more likely to run 24x7 and have more memory issues killing apps without a swap file. The 2.4.19 kernel manages memory considerably better during extended running periods. For a 24x7 X workstation then I suggest 256 to 512 should be more than adequate with the 2.4.19 kernel. Personally, my stations have only a mere 384 MBytes.

Just to list some real memory hogs I have run;
OpenOffice.org (60~100 MBytes)
Acrobat Reader with large page count pdf (10~75 MBytes)
CUPS printing photo quality 8x10 (60~80 MBytes)
Opera (30~40 MBytes)
XMMS (10~30 MBytes)

The rule of thumb in the past has been to allocate swap at least twice your system RAM. So 32 MB system should have a 64 MByte swap. Sounds very reasonable. How about 64 MByte RAM, then 128 MByte swap. Hmm, still reasonable. How about 256 MByte RAM, now 512 MByte swap. But wait, the more RAM installed should reduce the amount of swap required. We go on. 512 MByte RAM, then 1 GByte swap space. 2 GByte RAM, then 4 GByte swap space. When would the swap space ever be used? Much less even require twice the system RAM. Would you really want to run a programs that used 4 GByte of swap space on a 2 GByte system?

Consider that today we have more RAM installed on video adapters than systems had when this rule of thumb was coined. The RAM on my video adapter (32 MBytes) is 50% larger than my first hard disk (20 MBytes)!

Of course if one is running an antique computer, (only takes about 6 months today), then swap space should be highly considered as mandatory. Current systems of today have little use for swap space. Even under extreme RAM requirements, performance degrades to the point that the system appears locked up when swap is utilized. Better just to install more RAM, replace the computer, or reduce the requirements.

So you got an old program that you love that refuses to run without swap. Then create an 8 MByte swap file or something and mount it before running the program. It can be deleted afterwards.

Conclusion: Don't waste the hard disk space and/or partition on swap.

Excalibur,

you have really put this issue into a totally different light for me. Thanks - that was a great reply!

In the meantime, I have got my slack 9 CD back, but there is now a big fat scratch in it I don't know if it'll work, but I'll give it a go at the weekend

thanks again

christo