Mandrake Linux Upgrade?

[Shuten]

I have Mandake 9.0 installed but was wondering
if it easy to upgrade linux, specifically to mandrake 9.1 rc1?

 

[Nothinman]

AFAIK you should be able to pop in the CD and hit "upgrade"

 

[civad]

I would not rush to upgrade my system if I were you: bear in mind that 9.1 rc1. is not an official release, and as such for everyday use, even official release can cause problems

moreover, I think that though there is the temptation of having the latest and greatest application(s) installed on one's system; one should wait and watch: read the reviews, go through the forums, etc...

However, if your Mandrake system is not your primary system OR Mandrake is not the primary OS on your system, I think its worth a try

 

[Shuten]

I wasn't planning on putting a RC1 but was just entertaining the idea
and was wondering what happens when it finally goes gold.

Thanks ya'll

 

[civad]

Btw: a clean install is recommended over an upgrade. Epsecially if you have the /, /home and /usr partitions separate..

I usually have only two: / and /home. so one of these days I just might get tempted to install Mandrake 9.1 rc1..

 

[Tiger]

Btw: a clean install is recommended over an upgrade. Epsecially if you have the /, /home and /usr partitions separate..

Ditto that. I tried several times with RH and Mandrake to "upgrade". It never worked and I wasted more time trying than a clean install would have taken.

 

[Spyro]

Originally posted by: Tiger

Btw: a clean install is recommended over an upgrade. Epsecially if you have the /, /home and /usr partitions separate..

Ditto that. I tried several times with RH and Mandrake to "upgrade". It never worked and I wasted more time trying than a clean install would have taken.

When I tried to upgrade my mandrake box from 8.2 to 9.0, it broke my entire distro. A clean install is always better than a patch job, and never use a single "/" partition for your linux distro.

 

[Nothinman]

Interesting, I've upgraded my Debian system from potato->woody->sid and never had any major issues. I've had basically the same install for close to 4 years now.

 

[civad]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Interesting, I've upgraded my Debian system from potato->woody->sid and never had any major issues. I've had basically the same install for close to 4 years now.

um....in case it was a question hidden somewhere in your statement, remember, you already have the answer ebian
In case it was just an observation, I agree with you....

 

[Shuten]

How much different is debian from Mandrake?

Is there anything majorly differnt?

Software transferable?

 

[civad]

In GNU/Linux world, distributions are based on a particular type of package. Some distros are based on RPMS (Redhat, Mandrake, etc.) others on .deb (Debian, Knoppix,etc.) many more on .tgz (e.g Slackware). Though with a window manager such as KDE/GNOME, one might not be able to find much differences between the various package formats, the REAL difference is noticable when one looks "under the hood''

Debian is by far the best distroaccording to many people, though many of the popular distros are based on RPMS.

The closest analogy I can think of in Windows world is ..well.. a program that comes as xyz.exe. To install the program, one just has to click the .exe file; versus the applications that come in a zipped version. Poor analogy, but I think you should get the idea.

For more info, there are numerous resources on the net, Distrowatch being one of them.

Btw: I dont know whether to thank you or... for 'inspiring' me to download and give Mandrake 9.1 RC1 a try. So far, its love at first sight.. But I will stick to Debian as my primary OS.

 

[Tiger]

Mandrake uses the rpm software installation system. Debian uses apt-get.
RPM's are easy to install/un-install and are plentiful on the net. The one drawback is that package dependencies aren't taken into account until you try to install the package. The user needs to keep track of what needs what to run.
With apt-get the dependent packages are downloaded and installed at the same time as the original package. No RPM dependency hell.

Some say, and I agree with them, that people new to Linux should cut their teeth on easier to install RPM distro's like Mandrake and RedHat. Some say to start off with a distro like Debian to cut your teeth on. Kinda like learning to swim in the deep end.

 

[Nothinman]

The closest analogy I can think of in Windows world is ..well.. a program that comes as xyz.exe. To install the program, one just has to click the .exe file; versus the applications that come in a zipped version. Poor analogy, but I think you should get the idea.

A better analogy would be the difference between the setup.exe being made with Installshield or Nullsoft's installer software. Most of the time it doesn't matter.

Mandrake uses the rpm software installation system. Debian uses apt-get.

Mandrake uses RPM and Debian uses dpkg. apt-get works fine with RPMs (i.e. freshrpms.net) but no major distros have adopted it for some strange reason.

RPM's are easy to install/un-install and are plentiful on the net. The one drawback is that package dependencies aren't taken into account until you try to install the package. The user needs to keep track of what needs what to run.
With apt-get the dependent packages are downloaded and installed at the same time as the original package. No RPM dependency hell.

You can install apt4rpm and use apt-get with RPMs just fine, as long as you can find a decent RPM repository.

 

[civad]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
You can install apt4rpm and use apt-get with RPMs just fine, as long as you can find a decent RPM repository.

apt4rpm at Sourceforge
Another list of reps.

As usual, there are different repositories for different rpm-based distro's. And its a pain in the a** to use them quite often.

 

[MGMorden]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

A better analogy would be the difference between the setup.exe being made with Installshield or Nullsoft's installer software. Most of the time it doesn't matter.

Or Inno's Setup software. It's free and easy as heck to use. I use it to distribute all my freeware junk I write (not gonna pay for Installshield just to give software away ).

 

[civad]

Nullsoft's installer...

isne that what most of the GNU/ GPL'd apps for Window$ use?

 

[manly]

Originally posted by: civad
Btw: a clean install is recommended over an upgrade. Epsecially if you have the /, /home and /usr partitions separate..[/i]

Along with Nothinman, I'm going to disagree with this notion, that's generally accepted in the Windows world.

Personally, I've upgraded SuSE Linux several times and Red Hat Linux before, with good results. UNIX operating systems (I'm *not* referring to the kernel) are generally designed for relative ease of upgrading.

One note regarding RPMs. Sure they aren't as powerful as Debian packages. But most RPM-based distros have built automated dependency resolution systems around them by now (unfortunately they don't track foreign packages). Stating that the user still has to manually resolve dependencies is not a wholly accurate assessment.

 

[civad]

In the past I have done upgrades from RH 6.2 to Mandrake 8.0; and then from Mandrake 8.1 to RH 7.3 without any problems. However, I faced problems while upgrading my friend's machine from Mandrake 8.0 to 9.0. First of all, it took a very long time, and after logging in, half the apps did not work. That may be a rare problem, but it does occour.

Moreover, a clean install doesnt destroy any data from your /home directory. And its faster....just my personal opinion

 

[Shuten]

how do you do it from a clean install?

I am extremely new to linux so be descriptive please.

Thanks to everyone who has helped

 

[MGMorden]

Originally posted by: Shuten
how do you do it from a clean install?

I am extremely new to linux so be descriptive please.

Thanks to everyone who has helped

Repartition your drive and go at it .


Well, there's some strategies. Break up your filesystem some. In general I usually only seperate /, /boot, /home, swap, and my own creation /etc/mine. /home is most important to seperate. It will contain all your data and personal application settings (akin to the Documents and Settings folder under Win2k/XP, but Unix holds you to using /home a bit more). If this is kept seperate then between clean installs you can just remount your /home partition (don't format it when installing) and you keep your data and app settings. In /etc/mine I keep any scripts or config files that I have written myself or modified to a certain point and then just create symlinks in /etc where these files should be. this just keeps them handy for reimplementation after a reinstall. /boot I seperate out just because I normally use reiserfs for /home and /, and then use ext3 for /boot because lilo has less problems with ext3 than reiser. In generally just tell the installer to format the old partitions (except /home or other stuff you want to keep) and you're good to go. lather, rinse and repeat as new versions come out (though I've resorted to just using my Slackware box as-is and upgrading packages by hand as I see fit. Works out ok for me as I keep the same system up and working how I need it, but still can pluck and recomplile the occasional app that I want upgraded).