I learned something new today.  In SLES11, if you want to be able to install 
new kernels, and keep your older version(s), you can modify /etc/zypp/zypp.conf 
to do that.  The default is to not allow that, as the parameter in zypp.conf is 
commented out:
# multiverson = kernel-default,kernel-smp

To enable that, create a new line with the list of kernel "flavors" you want to 
have enabled:
multiversion = kernel-default,kernel-default-base

For SLES11 SP1, you have a bit more flexibility.  You can use the same list of 
RPM packages, or you can specify:
multiversion = provides:multiversion(kernel)

Beginning with SP1, SLES11 kernels, both the "normal" and "-base" ones, will 
show "multiversion(kernel)" if you do an "rpm -q --provides" on them.

Note that this functionality is not limited to just the kernel packages, but 
they're the only ones I know of (without digging further) that can have 
multiple versions installed concurrently without problems.

The downside to this, of course, is that now the system administrator is 
responsible for deciding when to remove older versions.  This means that you 
could conceivably fill up /boot (or if you don't split /boot out of the root 
file system even / in extreme cases) if you're not paying attention to how much 
space is being used.


Mark Post

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