On Sat, 7 Dec 2002, Steven M. Bellovin wrote:

> In message <Pine.NEB.4.33.0212071955390.12035-100000@vespasia.home-net.internet
> connect.net>, Bill Studenmund writes:
> >
> >Why not use build.sh to make a release? It will make the sets for you. And
> >if you do an unpriv'd build, you need to do something to get the
> >permissions right.
>
> The problem is that installing a release from sets is an annoying
> process.  You have to zap all the things that a full installation
> needs but you already have (i.e., root's crontab), and take the usual
> care with /etc.  etcupdate is a big step forward, but I'm still not at
> all satisifed with the ease of upgrading.  (Note:  this isn't to say
> that tar-ing DESTDIR on top of the running system is easier -- it's the
> same set of problems.  But I wish there were an easier way to keep
> -current.)

Root's crontab and /root files are in "etc.tgz", so just don't install
that; use "etcupdate" instead. The really annoying thing about that
method is that you have to build "sysinstall" and all the alternate
kernels, when you really only want the sets. It would be nice if "make
release"  were factored so that you could easily make just the sets,
or just sysinstall (plus INSTALL kernels), or just the other kernels.

Frederick