[rhn-users] RHN: best practise kernel updates

[nathan r. hruby]

On Thu, 10 Feb 2005, Daryl Field wrote:


> We exclude kernel updates via /etc/sysconfig/rhn/up2date - which I assume to 
> be the default.
>

It is.

> One thing that bothers me - because we do this - every system listed on the 
> rhn web interface shows that updates are required, red excamation mark. This 
> means I have to check each group/system to see wether an actual package is 
> outdated or its just the kernel business. An inconvenience for sure.
>

Not really.  One would hope you're monitoring what patches are issued when
and you should sorta "know" what's pending for what.  If you need to
figure out what errata you still need to apply, the errata tab's 'Show
Relevant" option should give you a list of pending updates.  And how many
machine need them.

> So back to kernel updates - download the rpm manually, -ivh it, then check 
> grub and /boot seems to be the rh manual approach. I'd be very interested to 
> know how you all approach this.
>

manually login, up2date -fu and then reboot.  The -f switch is force,
which skips the ignore list and will do the kernels.  If you insist on
doing it manually, remember that there's kernel, kernel-sump, kernel-utils,
kernel-pcmcia-cs, and kernel-unsupported which all have deps on each other.
up2date will still resolve the deps for you in force mode.

HTH,

-n

-- 
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nathan hruby <nhruby at uga.edu>
uga enterprise information technology services
production systems support
metaphysically wrinkle-free
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