Hmm. We're just about at the point where I can no longer expect to be able to upgrade anything significant (using 'apt-get upgrade' or 'apt-get install <package>') without having to upgrade my C libraries first. But the last time I allowed apt-get upgrade to touch the C libraries, I had tons of problems. And that was when I still had a bootable LinuxPPC install that I could use to restore the older libraries.
I currently have the following C library-related packages installed (list based on the files apt tells me it wants to update): St Name Version Description ==-===============-==============-==================================== ii libc6 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: Shared libraries and hi libc6-dbg 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: Libraries with debug hi libc6-dev 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: Development librarie ii libc6-pic 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: PIC archive library ii libc6-prof 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: Profiling libraries. hi locales 2.1.2-0pre5 GNU C Library: National Language (l hi gconv-modules 2.1.1-12.3 GNU C Library: Codeset conversion m ii timezones 2.0.100-2 Time zone data files and utilities. These files date back to July, 1999 (when I initially installed my system). I still have the debs for all of these on CD-ROM (except for timezones, which seems to be the latest version available from the archives, and locales, which is an older version). That means that if something goes dramtically wrong, I should still be able to restore the system with 'dpkg --force-downgrade'. I would also, of course, do a complete backup before I started, and could restore from that. Either recovery strategy requires me to be able to reboot the system and mount a CD-ROM or an NFS file system, so the question becomes ``How can I do so?'' There's a ramdisk.image.gz file on the ``Debian GNU/Linux PowerPC PowerMac Page'' (<http://www.debian.org/ports/powerpc/inst/pmac>), but it's not at all clear to me that that file doesn't dump you into the general install process (the instructions on that page seem to imply that it would). The same seems to be true of RAM disk images from other PPC distributions. There's also a resc1440.bin disk image on that page, and perhaps creating a floppy using that disk image would be a better way to go? Would that disk image boot by itself, or require additional software to get started? (I have, and use, BootX with my kernel images living in a folder in the System Folder of my MacOS installation.) Finally, I'm also not even sure that the Web page I'm talking about even has the latest and greatest set of boot-floppy images -- are they? (And if not, why not, and where can I find images that would work?) The Web site seems to be woefully out of date on a lot of PowerPC-related subjects -- we should change that! (And, yes, I'm willing to help!) Yours in confusion and anticipation, C. +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ Behind the counter a boy with a shaven head stared vacantly into space, a dozen spikes of microsoft protruding from the socket behind his ear. +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ C.M. Connelly [EMAIL PROTECTED] SHC, DS +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
