I'm getting yum going and so far it's keeping a hundred or so machines
updated without any problems at all. I even have a nice setup where I
can stage updates to test machines before I roll them out to everyone.
But I have a few questions:
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I've seen folks structure their stock RPM repositories as "base" and
"updates". Is there some special reason to do it this way instead of
keeping "base" updated constantly? I install new machines from the
same repository and I certainly want them to get the proper packages
at install time rather than having to install them and then update
them.
---
What's the best way to maintain a set of "default packages" that can
change over time? Occasionally I need to add a package to the default
set, and when I do this I need all of the machines on the network to
install it automatically. I know I can set up yumgroups.xml and do a
"yum groupinstall blah", but that just installs what's in that group
at that time. If I add a package to the group I don't think the
regular nightly update will grab it.
So far I see two options: modify /etc/cron.daily/yum to do the
groupinstall every night, or make a package that has nothing but
dependencies and install it. Then when I add a package I can update
this RPM and the nightly update will take care of everything during
dependency resolution. Is there a simpler way?
---
Has anyone tried keeping laptops updated? The problem I see is that
they won't always be on the network, but I don't know how badly things
will blow up when that happens. I also can't do IP restrictions on
the server and I'm not sure if I can do any kind of secure or
authenticated HTTP to get the packages.
Thanks for yum and any info you might provide,
--
Jason L Tibbitts III - tibbs@xxxxxxxxxxx - 713/743-3486 - 660PGH - 94 PC800
System Manager: University of Houston Department of Mathematics
