[K12OSN] updates

[Dale Sykora]

Will Hatch wrote:

> Hi All,
> 
> My k12ltsp (4.0.1) is working very well after an entire summer of slaving over a computer trying to figure it out.  Now, I point my mouse at the red exclamation point on my desktop and it tells me I have 75 updates!  I tried to do some a few weeks back; downloaded a critical kernal update.  I noticed when the server is rebooted, it has the old and new version of the OS.  What is the real deal with updates; which ones do I really need, can I avoid the updates for programs that I'm not even  familiar with?  Also, if I download a kernal update, am I essentially downloading another OS to my server HD, taking up storage room?  Things are running so well that I hate to mess  them up.  If someone has the time, what is the bottom line with doing updates for Fedora Core 1/k12ltsp 4.0.1?  Thanks!
Will,
	The kernel is only a part of the OS.  Think of the OS as a car and the 
kernel as the engine.  When you update the kernel, the old kernel is 
still installed but the bootloader points to the new kernel (although 
you may select the old one during boot).  This has some advantages.  It 
makes it easy to go back to the old kernel incase the new kernel doesn't 
work for whatever reason.  Also, you can switch back and forth to test 
something on both kernels.  You can manually remove the old kernel with 
rpm if you like.

Thanks,

Dale