Re: [TriLUG] large-scale patch rollouts?

[Greg Brown]

I'll throw another shout out for yum.  I haven't been using for years 
but wish I had.  It's simple and effective.

Greg

On Tuesday, Sep 16, 2003, at 14:02 US/Eastern, Joseph Tate wrote:

David R.Matusiak wrote:

hello Linux enthusiasts --

please don't flame my foolish question, but it is possible to roll 
out linux security patches to a network of machines at the same time? 
 also, are there any known security vulnerabilities presented by 
doing such a thing?

i know up2date is the tool to apply patches to a single (Red Hat) 
machine, but can this functionality be extended to tens or hundreds 
of machines?

i'm looking for more ammunition for my "switch campaign."  can't 
really tell people "Linux is better" if they have to waste massive 
amounts of time applying patches across a large network of systems, 
ya know.

i know you can use Kickstart/Jumpstart to automate multiple system 
builds, now i'm wondering about ways to speed up/automate on-going 
administration.  the ideas would be primarily aimed at Windows 
admins, so they can see an advantage in Open Source.

muchas gracias!
dave m.
You really should take a look at Yum: http://linux.duke.edu/yum/.
As a cron job run every night, it queries new packages from a 
repository you specify.  You push patches when you've tested them.  
I've been using it for years.  The other alternative is Current, which 
is a locally run up2date server, of course then all dependency 
calculations are done on the server, and it requires some muscle.  All 
Yum requires is an FTP or HTTP server.  Others will tout apt or urpmi, 
but I've not found them to be easier to use or more feature complete, 
contrarily, with yum it's easy to script individual package listings 
to give to hosts based on IP or some other criteria.  That's not the 
case with apt.

Joseph

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