[Cialug] uptime

[Brandon Griffis]

Dan is right.  Linux is basically a resident memory OS (that is once you
load a program into memory it stays running as the version and patch level
it was origionally loaded as).  The only way to use the new updates or
patches you've installed is to reload the program.  For the kernel this
basically means rebooting the OS (though arguably you could do a lot of work
using chroot in another environment and change it that way without
rebooting, but it's quite difficult and not at all worth it).

Uptime is fun and it does show the stability of Linux, but to actually keep
your machine secure you need to reboot every so often.

-Gamble

BTW - having programs fully loaded into memory is rather cool.  I once had a
desktop Linux system on which I had to uninstall KDE, QT and most of my apps
and then wait for all of them to recompile for a major system change.  So I
simply brought up KDE and loaded everything I thought I might use.  I didn't
bother finishing the update for a week.  Even though KDE was uninstalled it
continued to run because it was all in memory.

On 7/6/06, Daniel A. Ramaley <daniel.ramaley at drake.edu> wrote:
>
> I've used up2date on the RHEL machines at work and no, it doesn't force
> you to reboot. But then the new kernel doesn't actually take effect.
> Under Debian aptitude doesn't force me to reboot either, though it is
> helpful enough to display a message strongly encouraging a reboot.
>
> I used to care about uptimes, but now i keep my kernels patched instead.
>
> On Thursday 06 July 2006 11:34, Dave J. Hala Jr. wrote:
> >After a kernel update using yum or up2date on RHEL you don't need to
> >reboot.
> >
> >:) Dave
> >
> >On Thu, 2006-07-06 at 11:20, Daniel A. Ramaley wrote:
> >> On Thursday 06 July 2006 10:10, Dave J. Hala Jr. wrote:
> >> >[root at www root]# uptime
> >> > 08:21:28  up 375 days, 22:35,  1 user,  load average: 0.01, 0.02,
> >> > 0.00
> >>
> >> This means your kernel hasn't been patched in over a year, right?
>
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Dan Ramaley                            Dial Center 118, Drake University
> Network Programmer/Analyst             2407 Carpenter Ave
> +1 515 271-4540                        Des Moines IA 50311 USA
> _______________________________________________
> Cialug mailing list
> Cialug at cialug.org
> http://cialug.org/mailman/listinfo/cialug
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://cialug.org/pipermail/cialug/attachments/20060706/bd96cc68/attachment-0001.html