Upgrading from Lucid to Maverick: Fresh, new Install vs Upgrade using Update Manager

[Tom H]

On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 2:48 PM, Mark <mhullrich at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:34 PM, Basil Chupin <blchupin at iinet.net.au> wrote:
>>
> <upgrade vs. fresh install>
>>
> I had similar experiences with CentOS when I was using that, but the
> distinctions were generally much clearer:
>
> For minor releases (i.e., 5.1->5.2), use 'yum update' because it works
> really well (for yum).  'Yum upgrade' does the same thing.
>
> For major releases (i.e., 5.x->6.0), reinstall.  Period.  Upgrades
> sometimes work, but they come with major headaches, partly because
> it's yum (and rpms) and partly because it's a huge deal that is tricky
> to upgrade under the best of circumstances.  'Yum update' doesn't work
> across the major release boundary, by design.
>
> With Ubuntu, the release cycle is different and the numbers don't
> really reflect the same kind of distinction (major vs. minor release,
> etc.), but I suspect similar principles apply.

You cannot compare Ubuntu and CentOS.

Going from CentOS 5.0 to CentOS 5.1 is similar to going from Ubuntu
10.04 to Ubuntu 10.04.1. IT isn't an upgrade and is therefore
performed in a straightforward way with yum/apt.

Going from CentOS 5.6 to CentOS 6.0 will be similar to going from
Ubuntu 6.10/7.04 to Ubuntu 10.10.

But I agree with your re-install philosophy. Going from CentOS 5.6 to
CentOS 6.0 or from Ubuntu 10.04 to Ubuntu 10.10, re-installation's the
best solution.

(You can upgrade Fedora "across the major release boundary" with yum
but it isn't recommended in the same way that Ubuntu doesn't recommend
upgrading with apt.)