[ale] Staying current with mainstream distribution

[Dow Hurst]

I'll add to this that we used checkinstall to install the commercial SSH and 
any other source based package such as EMBOSS.  Checkinstall will register the 
packages in the rpm database.  The user ended up keeping some older packages 
based on Yast's questions and so she didn't break anything during the upgrade. 
  I would have done a fresh install but she is a newbie and trusting.  A 
testimony to Yast is that there were no glitches at all for her and since she 
kept the old packages all her special apps kept running.  I think Yast just 
kept an older but compatible glibc plus didn't replace the commercial SSH with 
openSSH.  When someone can upgrade like that, who is a relative newbie to 
Linux, then YaST and SuSE impress me.  This lady is tje mother of an adopted 4 
year old, two grown up children, is able to learn how to buy and build her own 
computer to my specs, has gave up Windows to learn Linux, and now has 
successfully upgraded her machine without destroying it.  I gave her 4 stars 
and lots of encouragement.  It is nice to be able to have users successfully 
admin for themselves when possible.
Dow


Dow Hurst wrote:
> YAST will resolve your dependencies.  Upgrading the 9.1 can be 
> successfully done.  I just had a user upgrade themselves successfully 
> from 8.2 to 9.1.
> Dow
> 
> 
> BruceG wrote:
> 
>> Hey all,
>>
>>       I am running SuSE 9.0 on one desktop, and Debian 
>> testing/unstable (from Knoppix) on another. I noticed with the Debian 
>> desktop I can do an apt-get update, apt-get dist-upgrade and end up 
>> with the latest and greatest Gimp, Open Office, Mosaic, KDE, Wine ... 
>> - it all just upgrades to the latest versions (well, maybe after some 
>> apt-get -f install, and a rare dpkg --force-overwrite on occasion).
>>
>>       Are there any tools in the SuSE world that will let me upgrade 
>> to the latest packages, or do I just wait for the most recent release 
>> and do an upgrade of all packages? Does Ximian red-carpet offer that 
>> kind of service, and is it at cost?
>>
>>       I like how stable and reliable SuSE has been, but don't feel 
>> confident in upgrading specific packages by RPM - I kind of prefer 
>> Debian's way of dealing with that. Any thoughts or recommendations?
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Ale mailing list
>> Ale at ale.org
>> http://www.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
>>
> 

-- 
__________________________________________________________
Dow Hurst                  Office: 770-499-3428            *
Systems Support Specialist    Fax: 770-423-6744            *
1000 Chastain Rd. Bldg. 12                                 *
Chemistry Department SC428  Email:   dhurst at kennesaw.edu   *
Kennesaw State University         Dow.Hurst at mindspring.com *
Kennesaw, GA 30144                                         *
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