On 20.07.05, 01:35:34, Laurent FAILLIE wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> my current website is running under NetBSD 1.6.1 on a
> SparcServer 5, 110 Mhz and 128 Mb ram.
> 
> I'm planning to upgrade to the latest 2.0.2.
> 
> 1/ do you know if there will be new version in comming
> weeks ?
> 
> 2/ instead of upgrading my current system, I'll
> install 2.0.2 on my SS2 (40Mhz AFIK, 64 Mb) and, as
> soon as everything  is running, I will install SS2
> disks into my SS5.
> 
> 2.1/ if I create a new kernel on my SS2, will it run
> on my SS5 ? Will I have to build another one on the
 
It will run.

> SS5 to take in account the new CPU and larger memories
> (optimisation ?).

You can build an optimised kernel. It may run very slightly faster
if it contains support only for sun4m machines, and not for sun4c.

Memeory will not be an issue. NetBSD detects and uses whatever is
there with reasonable default starting values for buffers sizes
etc.

You can fine tune some kernel parameters if you think that it's
not running as well as it should, but since you use an older Sparc
as web server I assume it's not a heavily loaded server anyway.

Fine tuning kernel VM parameters is an arcane art and take a _lot_
of trial and error in most cases.

> 
> 2.2/ idem for applications : I run Apache2,
> Postgresql, PHP and I compile them form original
> sources + some network tools as DHCP server, DNS, NAT,

You mean you don't use pkgsrc to install software, but compile them
manually? Why? pkgsrc also does compile from original sources, but
frees you from all the tedious work.

> ...
> If I compile them on my SS2, will the binaries the
> binary run on my SS5 ? 

Yes.

You may want to rebuild versions optimised for sparc v8 to take
advantage of some of the newer processor architecture. But for most
stuff the gains will be small.

> 
> Thanks for your tips.
> 
> Laurent
> 

-- 
Bernd Sieker

NetBSD - Will even run on i386
		-- Brian Hechinger