On Tue, 26 Oct 2004, Philip Rowlands wrote: > On Mon, 25 Oct 2004, Brian Long wrote: > > >I'd like some ideas on how folks on this list customize their install > >base. We currently create a completely customized kickstart tree based > >on RHEL 3 where we integrate third-party and internally-written RPMs. > > > >I'm thinking we should just use Red Hat's kickstart (comps.xml) as it > >comes on the CD (each quarter) and bootstrap Red Carpet or RHN into the > >mix to install all third-party and internal RPMs after the initial > >kickstart. > > > Pre-patch vs yum/up2date? Putting all the RPMs in RedHat/RPMS vs %post > scripts? Both will work fine technically, so the decision then moves > into softer areas such as time-to-deploy, maintainability etc. > Does pre-patch work? I seem to remember that somewhere along the way, RedHat required that updated rpms had to be installed in order. I used to replace the CD rpms with the latest updates and rebuild the headers for my installations but that stopped working. So, I shifted to installing the CD rpms as is, then in the %post section, putting all the updates in in the order they were released. > Once the packages are on though, we use a good deal of %post-invoked > scripts to tweak about 30 different things; again what you do here will > depend a lot on internal requirements. > > Yes, I also do most of my stuff in the %post section. Besides the updates for an install of a new machine, I have a lot of scripts that do post-configuration mainly site customizations and to comply with local security requirements. One point I will mention: If there are a lot of update rpms (like if you're running an old RedHat release), the updating part in %post takes a pretty long time. Cheers! Ken
