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Date:      Thu, 20 Dec 2007 14:34:35 +0100
From:      "Andrew Hotlab" <andrew.hotlab@hotmail.com>
To:        "freebsd-jail" <freebsd-jail@freebsd.org>
Subject:   RE: How to better update a jail host system
Message-ID:  <BAY138-DS1F782EFBC33924A07CFB6F65D0@phx.gbl>
In-Reply-To: <20071220083441.uo6hmypq84ssoowc@webmail.leidinger.net>
References:  <BAY102-W41E0DDC536BD8491761400F65C0@phx.gbl> <20071220083441.uo6hmypq84ssoowc@webmail.leidinger.net>

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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Alexander Leidinger [mailto:Alexander@Leidinger.net]
> Sent: Thursday, December 20, 2007 8:35 AM
> To: Andrew Hotlab
> Cc: FreeBSD-Jail
> Subject: Re: How to better update a jail host system
>=20
> > To track the security branch both on the host and the jails I'm
> > using the "update from source" method: I synchronize the source tree
> >  with csup(1), build and install the kernel, build and install the
> > userland for the host first and then for the jails (using the
> > ezjail-admin(1) "update -i" switch).
>=20
> You should maybe use "make delete-old DESTDIR=3D/path/to/basejail" =
(and
> delete-old-libs after making sure all ports which depend upon the old
> files (check-old-files lists the old files) are rebuild with the new
> ones) in the src directory. On a -stable branch there should be not
> much removed, but if you keep the system over several releases, it's
> handy.

That's a good point: I was missing it... I thought that all that would =
be done by "ezjail-admin upgrade" :)


> > All that is working fine now, but I wonder if I could speed up the
> > whole process, by switching to the binary update method. By using
> > the freebsd-update(8) utility on the host I think to maintain the
> > system cleaner (this utility only updates the installed
> > distributions) and to reduce the administrative effort (no
> > mergemaster(8) required, I'm right?).
>=20
> I don't know how freebsd-update handles the changes in /etc, but it
> can not do magic (for the update you have to update the basejail, and
> as such freebsd-update doesn't know about the etc directory of each
> jail), so something like mergemaster has to be done. I also don't know
> how it handles old (removed) files, maybe is doesn't touch them, to be
> on the safe side.

That's another aspect I wasn't thinking of. How important might be to =
update files in the /etc directory in the jails, when tracking the =
security branch?


> Regarding the distributions which you haven't installed: you can
> exclude parts from building/installation. If you have a 7.x system,
> you can do "man src.conf" for all the options
> =
(http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=3Dsrc.conf&apropos=3D0&sektion=3D=
0&
> manpath=3DFreeBSD+7.0-RELEASE&format=3Dhtml). 6.x has similar options, =
but
> IIRC you have to specify them in
> make.conf.

I definitely think I'll do that from now on, and I'll likely continue =
upgrading the host by building it from sources: I'll have to maintain =
the sources anyway, because of the ezjail update procedure, and there =
will be some kernel modifications that I'll need in the future to =
improve performance on the host system (for example, do you think it =
would be a nice idea to build nullfs support into the kernel?).

Thanks for your suggestions.


Andrew





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