Re: [gentoo-user] Any consequences to package.mask'ing newer kernels?

[Neil Bothwick <neil@digimed.co.uk>]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1711 bytes --]

On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 01:55:10 -0400, Walter Dnes wrote:

>   Partial "df" output before unmerging a bunch of kernels 
> Filesystem           1K-blocks      Used Available Use% Mounted on
> /dev/sda1             11726996   7325372   4401624  63% /
> 
> 
>   Partial "df" output after  unmerging a bunch of kernels 
> Filesystem           1K-blocks      Used Available Use% Mounted on
> /dev/sda1             11726996   4183616   7543380  36% /
> 
>   Yes folks, 3.14 gigs.  Having gotten rather tired of doing this
> manually... again... 

At around 300MB per kernel, that's ten excess kernels, so you can't be
doing it that often. Once you're happy with the current kernel, you only
need "emerge -P gentoo-sources" to remove the rest. I use a script that
removes all but the last two, and also cleans out /lib/modules and /boot.

> I went into /etc/portage/package.mask and added
> 
> >sys-kernel/gentoo-sources-2.6.19-r5  
> 
>   It won't hurt me now, but is there anything that might depend on newer
> kernels?  It's assumed I'll upgrade when required by a security alert.
> Other than that, how long can I get away between kernel upgrades?

As long as you like, some people are still running 2.4 kernels! As long
as you don't add hardware supported only by a newer kernel, your system
will work exactly the same in six months as it does now, although you
should bear in mind that -r updates are generally problem fixes.

I usually read the Changelog when a new kernel is released and then
decide whether it's worth installing. There's no point in forcing a
reboot when the old kernel works for me.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

Reality is for people who can't handle Star Trek

[-- Attachment #2: signature.asc --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 189 bytes --]