On Wed, 4 Apr 2007, Peter Fraser wrote:
> I use an approach to upgrading that I have not seen written
> anywhere. It does need additional space in the root partition
> but with disks these days that is not normally a problem.
>
> First copy away the "important parts" of the root partition
> onto another partition. What is the "important parts" is up to
> you, but should include any changes that you have made to
> the root partition. I use the ROOTBACKUP code in /etc/daily
> which copies the root partition to another partition on
> a separate disk, so that is done automatically.
>
> Now do an install of OpenBSD, but using only one partition
> (plus the swap partition). Do not change your disk partitioning
> in any manner, Do not use the install to mount any other partitions.
> All of OpenBSD will now reside in one partition. Which is why
> you need more disk space in the root partition. Note that all
> the other partitions will be untouched by the install.
>
> Once the new system comes up, you can now mount the partition
> that you saved away your "important parts", If you
> saved them previous under say /home mount what was /home
> under a different name. Merge your changes to "/etc" and others
> into the new root partition.
>
> Mount each of the old partitions that would have contained
> information set by an install (such as /usr) under a different
> name. Merge the new files from what is now in the root partition
> just installed into the correct place in the old partition.
>
> Merging what was in the old /etc into the new /etc, will
> of course update /etc/fstab which when the system is booted
> will end up mounting the old partitions into their correct places.
>
> Boot the system. The updated /etc/fstab will now mount the
> partitions in their correct places. The /usr and /home and
> other from the install are now inaccessible and have been
> replaced by ones defined in /etc/fstab.
>
> Packages can be installed at any time during this process,
> you just have to make sure that if you add packages while
> you are operation in the one partition that files added by
> the packages are also copied to the right place in the
> old partitions.
>
>
Can you describe what advantages your complex mechanism which has a
lot of room for errors has, as compared to a regular upgrade?
-Otto
