I am the only one finding freebsd-update not user-friendly?

reddy

reddy

Hi all!

I am a big fan of FreeBSD, and as I am contemplating upgrading servers from 14.1 to 14.2, this topic has emerged in my mind.

I've been running FreeBSD on servers since 2018, and I've done every major upgrade. But to this day, every time I have to update the system, I have the freebsd handbook open in a tab of my browser and am scared as hell of messing up a step (but never had a problem with an upgrade).

My problem is that there are many steps that one has to memorize (how many times to run freebsd-update, when to reboot etc...), and today I just realized "wait, why can't i just run freebsd-update and trust that the program will guide me at every step"?

This is not ranting but a genuine question: are you feeling the same when upgrading your system? And more importantly: do you have tips, commands, or even just mnemonic tricks i can use to confidently use freebsd-update without being hooked on the handbook page every second.

Thanks
 
reddy said:
and trust that the program will guide me at every step
Click to expand...
I am quite certain freebsd-update tells you when to upgrade, whether to do an extra run of freebsd-update and whether and when to run pkg to upgrade your packages. Perhaps it gets a bit lost (even though it always appears at the end) in all the messages and it could, perhaps, be highlighted with some colour.
 
reddy said:
how many times to run freebsd-update
Click to expand...
It's not that difficult to remember, patch updates once freebsd-update install, minor version upgrades twice, major version upgrades three times. And as tommiie already mentioned, it's going to tell you.

reddy said:
do you have tips
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Often overlooked. Set the EDITOR variable to your preferred editor, you're not stuck with vi(1).
 
I wrote a script in order not really to make freebsd-update more user-friendly, but to avoid to overlook something during the process. I'm waiting to test it further. Not convainced that it brings something really useful.

github.com

GitHub - Emrion/bin-upgrade: A script to make easier the FreeBSD upgrades

A script to make easier the FreeBSD upgrades. Contribute to Emrion/bin-upgrade development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com github.com

People can try it and report their feelings.

The more important problem with freebsd-update is the modification of some config files with vi. I make often mistakes here. This script does not address this.
 
Emrion that's basically a script version of my "notes to self" text files :)

As for the OP, I've never found it difficult, it does prompt you so you have to pay attention.
It also has a "chroot" option so if you are using ZFS, you can create a new BE and upgrade into that new BE, then run pkg with it's chroot option and you wind up with a new BE that should be fully setup/configured you just need to activate it and reboot once.
 
Let me count some beans first:
Personally I don't find freebsd-update non-userfriendly, but in contrary the most userfriendly update system I have ever experienced (which includes Linux and almost all Windows Versions until 7) I don't want to stress all whys here, but the main one was, you're neither forced, nor urged (by automatic annoying repeating pop-up windows) to blindely accept things you neither know shit about, nor get anything explained. You may stop it anytime, analyze what will be done in detail, inform yourself, read about it in comprehandable texts, before you hit 'fire'.

But, however, I also share similar concerns like yours about what an update may cause.

I use FreeBSD since 10.x. Until 13.x I never saw the editor came up - which by default is ee, not vi; anyway SirDice is right to set it to your preferred one - while updating (it was when root shell changed from csh to sh), and ask me to manually edit some config files.
If I hadn't read about it before in the release notes, here in the forums, and mails from mailing lists I had been really clueless (and pissed.)
Which was my first tip: Pick and subscribe to some mailing lists, like security, just for reading; you'll get best information, often even better as within the forums (the forums is not primarily ment to inform, but to discuss certain things, and another, open way the community can communicate)
Looking back neither was a big deal - if you know about and how to handle it, before you run blindly into it.
Most/best things I almost always pick here from the forums.
Currently the drm-modules for graphics adapters cause some X-servers break, and some other packages also cause troubles after updates, which is precisely looked at not the issue of freebsd-update, and can also be solved quickly and easily, if you know what to do.
But I agree, I feel similar, it's nothing which makes the common user more comfortable with FreeBSD, if this ain't a temporary situation.

My main tip: Don't do updates the very moment they occur - wait!
Before I update I always wait at least several days.
This way I can scan the forums about issues, and how they are solved before I run into them clueless myself.
Free yourself from this panicky update-stress! Your machine will not catch fire if you postpone updates a couple of days, nor you risk serious security issues - unless, of course, you have a server directly connected to the internet, and there is a real security issue, which you will be informed about right in time by the mailing list; of course you better update immediatly then, no question. But you don't run immediately into most urgent security issues because of your desktop wallpaper manager lags a minor version behind for a couple of days.
Besides I also want to believe not to stress the servers, while others really need to update immediately. Give the developers time for to patch propable bugs in the patches (😁) But furthermore the compilation of userland's packages is more mature. Sometimes the packages builds lag a bit behind the freebsd-update, so are yet not completely congruent. Wait a few days will have you fewer dependencies issues, fewer package problems, fewer problems at all - knew about possible issues and their solutions.

And last but not least: If you have a sophisticated backup system, you don't need to panic at all, because worst thing can happen was you had to reinstall new all over again, which was annoying, yes, but no serious problem, and can be made most easily and almost fully automated if you have tailored yourself a well-considered bu-system, such as having backups of all system's config files you can easily restore, and a list af all installed packages.
Such bu-system to have I strongly recommend anyway.
 
reddy said:
I've been running FreeBSD on servers since 2018, and I've bone every major upgrade. But to this day, every time I have to update the system, I have the freebsd handbook open in a tab of my browser and am scared as hell of messing up a step (but never had a problem with an upgrade).
Click to expand...
Why the handbook though? If you're using the console then I can highly recommend adapting to either sysutils/screen or sysutils/tmux; this allows you to keep multiple console sessions open at the same time.

Then just check the manualpage in another 'tab': freebsd-update(8), this will show you all the options you need.

reddy said:
This is not ranting but a genuine question: are you feeling the same when upgrading your system? And more importantly: do you have tips, commands, or even just mnemonic tricks i can use to confidently use freebsd-update without being hooked on the handbook page every second.
Click to expand...
Well... this is probably not for you but I can't help but mention anyway... I no longer rely on freebsd-update at all and instead fully focus on /usr/src; in other words: I simply build my own updates as soon as I deem an update required, based on security issues or issues which I spot in the Git logs and deem important enough; next to the official releases of course.

As for the required steps... I don't try to remember those, a quick peek at /usr/src/Makefile explains all the required steps, and that never failed me so far.

It can be a bit more time consuming, but at the same time you're also in full control as well. When I issue # make installkernel (to install a new kernel update) then I only do so because I know that the whole thing got build cleanly, so I don't have to worry about hiccups or glitches.

Still hope this can give you some ideas.
 
"not user friendly" is a bit exaggerate, at the end of each operation freebsd-update guides you a little bit by literally telling you what to do.

reddy said:
I've been running FreeBSD on servers since 2018, and I've bone every major upgrade. But to this day, every time I have to update the system, I have the freebsd handbook open in a tab of my browser and am scared as hell of messing up a step (but never had a problem with an upgrade).

My problem is that there are many steps that one has to memorize (how many times to run freebsd-update, when to reboot etc...), and today I just realized "wait, why can't i just run freebsd-update and trust that the program will guide me at every step"?
Click to expand...
You don't need to memorize anything, just write your own notes from the handbook(or forum, blog posts, mailing lists), it only takes 10 minutes.
I've done this when I started my adventure with FreeBSD 4 years ago.
When I do a minor or a major upgrade I just follow what is on my notes (which is basically a simple file.txt nothing fancy) and it's fine.
Plus there is nothing to fear because of boot environment.
 
No, you are not the only one, and it wonders that people do not complain,
it wonders that freebsd-update is not being improved / substituted.

See my 'rants' here:

H

Thread 'Unable to update repository FreeBSD'

I am having problems with pkg:

Code: 
% pkg update
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
pkg: An error occured while fetching package
pkg: An error occured while fetching package
repository FreeBSD has no meta file, using default settings
pkg: An error occured while fetching package
pkg: An error occured while fetching package
Unable to update repository FreeBSD
Error updating repositories!

Well, I did not upgrade, I had something else to do:

Code: 
% uname -a
FreeBSD fbsd.local 12.3-RELEASE-p3 FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE-p3 GENERIC  amd64

Any hint?
 
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