[PLUG] Slackware swaret question

[Chris Jantzen]

On Sat, Jun 19, 2004 at 07:36:37PM -0700, Rich Shepard wrote:
>   Any of you Slackware users using swaret to keep the distribution current
> with security upgrades?

I don't use Slackware, but I do have two items to kibitz on.

>   I've read the manual, faq and man pages but I don't think I've properly
> set up /etc/swaret.conf or used the proper command. I know that there's a
> revised cvs now, and cvs is installed on my workstation, but swaret didn't
> upgrade it.

Maybe it's not considered a "security upgrade" and that's why it
doesn't update it?

> I'm wondering if there are secrets I need to learn before I add
> this to cron.weekly.

Even for Debian, it is very strongly discouraged that you put actual
upgrades into a cron job. Dry-runs, sure; but never the actual thing:

* The application interface may change, rendering parts of your system
broken (not so much a problem with Debian stable, which always
backports).

* A security compromise upstream would cause mass compromises
downstream.

* If something does go wrong, you're not there to fix it quickly.

* May require additional restarts of support software that's hard to
tell in an automated system.

It may well be you only intended to put in a dry-run or notification
command in your cron script, but I think this all needed to be said
anyways.


-- 
chris kb7rnl =->
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