[PLUG] Recovery mess...

[someone]

Well, Fedora Core 3 isn't supported anymore and I don't think it is possible
to grab all the updates for it.  I tried to upgrade glibc and ended up  
hosing it.  Yikes!  Some quick thinking and I've temporarily got the  
machine back up.  I installed Fedora Core 3 again on the backup  
partition minimal installation and wholesale copied /lib and /usr/lib.

I'm debating on how to upgrade this machine and I probably should because
it is in a sorry state.  There are so many customizations though.  What
is the best way to migrate logs and email?  I'm thinking of going to
Fedora 9/10 or CentOS 5.  I have network root servers running off of
this box, so I have a lot of stuff to replace when I upgrade.

Concerning updates, they are a real nightmare considering that Linux is so
stable in general that I may go for years between major upgrades.  Has anyone
created their own local yum repository seeded from all the repositories that
are typically used?  Dependencies become problematic when you do upgrades.
I had an upgraded glibc and couldn't get flash installed.  Turns out, I needed
the upgraded glibc and a few other upgrades I don't have.

Keeping older Linux distributions makes sense considering that Linux  
in general has been getting more memory and resource intensive over  
time.  For how much longer will a Pentium III be adequate for Linux?   
Are the days of the 486 mail
server past now?  There should be some focus on tailoring future Linux
distributions to be only as fancy and resource intensive as the computer they
are installed on can handle.  Should Linux need more powerful hardware  
from one
year to the next?  Gnome and KDE seem pretty mature, how about cutting their
resource use in half without significant feature loss? Just because  
today's computers have more memory and processing power, there is no  
need to waste it.

I need to figure out how to migrate this major server to a supported Linux
distribution that is more current.  I've been dreading this.

      Michael C. Robinson

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