[CALUG] Fedora upgrade .... CALUG Digest, Vol 54, Issue 14

[Bryan J Smith]

Depends on what is in the kernel, /boot support, etc...  Lately I've just been 
making /boot a full 1GiB exactly (down to the sector).  I've started making all 
partitions perfect 1GiB boundaries, and am considering writing a tool.  I'd 
consider 512MiB today to be the absolute minimum for more than a few kernels.

Of course, uEFI-GPT is coming.  Then you'll also have a FAT file system slice 
where you drop the GRUB loader into, instead of loading it into a MBR.  That's 
going to confuse even more people, but it's what we had in the ARC firmware days 
(for those of us who ran NT on non-x86, along with some targets of Linux, which 
also supported ARC for compatibility).

If you like FC6, then migrate to RHEL5 (or a rebuild of it).  Your software 
should all work, and it will be supported until 2014 (2017 with an ELS 
subscription).

As far a F15, the GNOME 3 Shell continues to impress myself.  I was shocked how 
well it runs on both AIGLX (accelerated) as well as non-AIGLX (seems to use 
IceWM, at least in F15).  Both are peppy and fast.  I liked Unity, but I'm 
finding I'm preferring GNOME 3.  I'm considering writing a tool to offer to set 
the GCONF profile to more of a NeXTstep default than Windows-like, as I'm tired 
of the GNOME 2 and, now, GNOME 3 defaults.  E.g., focus follows mouse.
 

________________________________
From: Walt Smith <waltechmail at yahoo.com>
To: "calug at unknownlamer.org" <calug at unknownlamer.org>
Sent: Sun, June 19, 2011 12:31:07 PM
Subject: Re: [CALUG] Fedora upgrade .... CALUG Digest, Vol 54, Issue 14




I don't recall anyone saying why /boot needs so much
space on an upgrade.

I have 3 kernels on F12. I did rpm -i rather than rpm -U

The biggest files in /boot are:

initfs   11 meg
vmlinuz  3.3 meg
system.map  1.6 megs

So I have 3 of each with a total /boot space of about 50 megs
including misc files such as grub etc, most of which are "small".

I can see some reason where an "upgrade" might require a bit more
space that a single kernel install.  But gee whizz !!!


The numbers bandied about suggest that the /boot wants to occupy
a full cylinder of a disk ( or rather some upgrade script program
wants  the space) (true:  ???? , ????).



-------

As an aside,  I fired up a FC6 yesterday.
The terminal fonts are nicer than F12.   The apps start faster.
They run smooth, the mouse is most responsive.

F12 is on a 2.8 gig box with 1 gig ram.
FC6 is on a 667 mhz box with 512 megs ram.

Generally, over the years this has always been the case: older runs faster
on slower hardware ( I'd say a dozen comparisons ).   The older distros
my have a (very) few less features....    but the sound plays and the movies
play.   It's the incompats with all the yearly  "newer" versions of the 

data files and servers that force me to upgrade my desktop OS.
I was also surprised how little difference there was between the apps in FC6  
and F12.

Memory ( human) can play tricks.  But I also preferred the look and feel of the
graphical boot window ( progress bar) and the FC6 desktop.


I'd been looking forward ( somewhat)  to upgrading  ( new install on other disk) 



to F15.   But I think I'll wait til the "next" edition (F16).   Guess I should 
check the 


dev list to see what will be  "new" or greatly improved in F16. (if anyone wants 

to donate
to ca-list the improvements, please say). 

I know I've mention this subject before.  But it's been awhile and thought with 
the recent
thread "new vs upgrade install"  might be worth simply repeating at this time.   

Heaven knows
how much longer the desktop will exist.  Most likely in 3 years, the tablets ( 
or smartphones)
will have enough power that desktops go away forever  and laptops wilt into 
server class performance
machines.