FC3 to FC4 Upgrade Process Question

From FedoraNEWS.ORG

Posted by Thomas Chung on 2005-07-01

Michael L Owen asks:

I recently upgraded a working FC3 system to FC4 using the install disk
upgrade process, and seem to have lost iptables and/or ebtables
functionality. Logging rules would indicate that everything is still
working, but packets don't get through.
I considered some of the procedures performed by the standard upgrade, like
reactivating SELinux, to be annoying, and I assume that your procedure
bypasses some of these processes.

What are the benefits of using your procedure, and are other manual changes
necessary to keep the system up-to-date?

Thanks
Mike Owen

Rahul Sundaram replies:

Upgrading a system through the installer is always the recommended
procedure as the next option to a clean installation and restoration.
While the yum upgrade FAQ available here
(http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/YumUpgradeFaq) provides some good
documented hints and caveats for existing systems to do an upgrade with
it based on a few reports from advanced users including the yum
developers, the fact that this is a relatively untested path means that
you would probably run into wrinkles that the installer covers up based
on the bugzilla feedback that is available from the three test releases
that each release cycle goes through.

Fedora being a rapidly evolving distribution you are likely hopping
through major jumps like 2.4 to 2.6 kernel and things like xen being
added which has a good amount of complexity but brings in high impact
advantages . The standard uprade *does not* activate SELinux on an
installation if its inactive. Any behavior of any of the packages or
installer  that overrides user configured settings is likely to be
broken and should be reported in http://bugzilla.redhat.com against the
appropriate packages or the installer (anaconda) .

On a side note, SELinux adds an additional unique layer of protection
to the system  which is highly recommended for users. So instead of
treating it as a annoyance it would be a good idea to adopt and learn to
work with it.

http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/selinux-faq-fc3/
http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/selinux-apache-fc3/
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-4-Manual/selinux-guide/

For Fedora Core 5, a revamp of the policies to make it  more flexible
and easier is in order using
http://sepolicy-server.sourceforge.net/index.php

A recap of the the recommended procedures in Fedora in the following order

0) Make sure you have a backup

1) Do a clean installation and restore user data by keeping /home as a
   seperate volume. This is the planned  default behavior for by the
   installer in FC5
   https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=150670

(or)

2) Do a installation through the CD's following the installation guide.
   Kickstart would be useful for customisations and automatic
   installations. Installer works better if the settings are closer to the
   default ones without a large number of third party packages
   http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/fedora-install-guide-en/

(or)

3) Test upgrades through yum during the development process in an
   independant system dedicated for testing . Document the changes in the
   Yum upgrade Wiki. Make sure its in a supportable level and then use the
   procedure for your routine systems