🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <IVAN.96Feb19134329@termite.sd.monash.edu.au>, Ivan Rayner wrote:
>>
>The main problem is that Slackware isn't very conducive to major
>upgrades.  I want to have a system where I can upgrade without causing
>problems to clients, and without having to practically wipe the system
>and rebuild it from backups every so often.
>
>How have others done this?  What do people suggest?  I would like to
>stay with slackware only because I am familiar with it (and the bosses
>round here don't like change), however I would consider another
>distribution (redhat?) if people really think it's worth switching
>over.
>

I agree with Nate.  RedHat is exactly what you need (I think I said
this to you before ;-)

Apart from the ability to upgrade on the fly without adversely
affecting the remote users too, much is the fact that you can get
notice of any security fixes and upgrade them immediately via ftp.
Tell this to Heinz and he should look more closely at RedHat.

The only real difference in RedHat that I have found is it uses System
V (I think) init scripts.  Ivan you are already familiar with the init
stuff on Solaris.  It is pretty much the same and works very well.

I have a question: How are you going to maintain accounts on the
machines?  Are you thinking of using NIS or whatever?

In theory each machine should only need a root file system.  /home and
/usr could be remote mounted.  The best solution would be to remote
boot the machines from the server, but don't know if Linux is up to
that yet.

Make sure each machine can create important files in /var, such as
formatted man files, TeX fonts etc.  This caused problems last time.

Glenn.

-- 
Glenn Maughan ---------------------------------------------------------------
Object Technology Group, PhD Student | Ph:    +613 90-32660
Department of Software Development   | Fax:   +613 90-32745
Monash University AUSTRALIA          | Email: glennm@insect.sd.monash.edu.au