Datasheet

“main” (Installation and Administration) — 2004/6/25 — 13:29 — page 164 — #190

5.1 Updating SUSE LINUX

Software tends to grow from version to version. Therefore, take a look at

the available partition space with df before updating. If you suspect you are

running short of disk space, secure your data before updating and reparti-

tion your system. There is no general rule of thumb regarding how much

space each partition should have. Space requirements depend on your par-

ticular partitioning proﬁle, the software selected, and the version numbers

of SUSE LINUX.

Note

Read the README ﬁle on the CD. This ﬁle contains any changes

made after this manual went to print.

Note

5.1.1 Preparations

Before updating, copy the old conﬁguration ﬁles to a separate medium

(streamer, removable hard disk, ZIP drive) to secure the data. This primar-

ily applies to ﬁles stored in /etc as well as some of the directories and ﬁles

in /var and /opt. Furthermore, you may want to write the user data in

/home (the HOME directories) to a backup medium. Back up this data as

root. Only root has read permission for all local ﬁles.

Before starting your update, make note of the root partition. The command

df / lists the device name of the root partition. In Example 5.1, the root

partition to write down is /dev/hda2 (mounted as /).

Example 5.1: List with df -h

Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on

/dev/hda1 1.9G 189M 1.7G 10% /dos

/dev/hda2 8.9G 7.1G 1.4G 84% /

/dev/hda5 9.5G 8.3G 829M 92% /home

5.1.2 Possible Problems

Checking passwd and group in /etc

Before updating the system, make sure /etc/passwd and /etc/group

do not contain any syntax errors. For this purpose, start the veriﬁcation

utilities pwck and grpck as root and eliminate any reported errors.

164 5.1. Updating SUSE LINUX