Best update procedures <SOLVED>

[lwfitz]

Just a quick question......

What are the best update habits for SID?

I have been updating with

Code Select Expand

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

once a week or so and seem to have  around 125 updates each week. Is once a week often enough to update? Or to often (if possible)?

Also is dist-upgrade still the recommended update command?

Thanks guys

[jst_joe]

I use smxi which does dist-upgrade but have been running it every couple of days.
It seems that upgrades are coming more frequently now that Wheezy has become stable.

[VastOne]

Daily lwfitz, it is the only choice....

I have been running SID for a long time (5 years) and the absolute best thing you can do is daily updates to avoid massive updates and those dreaded dependency breakdowns

This is the main reason why I included aliases so that users can easily do them daily

[blaze]

If there is a massive amount of stuff when I want to do a dist-upgrade, is it then better to do an upgrade first, and the dist-upgrade after that?

[VastOne]

Good question blaze, but since I only use dist-upgrade I am not sure which is better

[lwfitz]

@ VastOne and jst_joe

Thanks guys. For safety sake Ill start updating daily 

@ Blaze

Thats a great question. Seems like that could really limit breakage or dependency issues.

[hinto]

If you're tracking SID, you always want to do a dist-upgrade and not an upgrade.  You can think of an upgrade in SID like a brake in an ice storm.  Treat both like they don't exist. 
-Hinto

[VastOne]

^ Perfectly said... 

[blaze]

ok, but if I am on lets say a 3.7.2 kernel and with a dist- upgrade will get a 3.9.8 kernel, is it still better to just do a dist-upgrade, and not an upgrade first, and after that do a dist-upgrade, I am talking massive upgrade with maybe 600 - 700 package upgrades, + 60 - 80 of new package installs?  and is it possible to do a sort of "safe upgrade" with apt-get, like you can do with aptitude?

[hinto]

On SID, you always want to do a dist-upgrade.
-Hinto

[lwfitz]

If you're tracking SID, you always want to do a dist-upgrade and not an upgrade.  You can think of an upgrade in SID like a brake in an ice storm.  Treat both like they don't exist. 
-Hinto

Perfect, thanks Hinto.

[hinto]

I ran a single install of Kanotix, when it was based on SID, for about 6 years using the h2 scripts, which are now called smxi.
-H