Looking for someone to set up a new server

[Fairlight]

On Tue, Sep 13, 2011 at 02:48:52PM -0400, Boaz Bezborodko, the prominent pundit,
witicized:
> I can wait a bit if necessary, but I remember going with Centos 4 just 
> as 5 was coming out.  I don't like loading a new OS into an operating 
> system and especially not in software that hasn't be certified for it.   
> I could be convinced to go with 5, but since our demands don't grow all 
> that quickly servers tend to last 4 or 5 years.  I was just trying to 
> avoid outdating the OS too early.

CentOS 5 has official updates until March 31, 2014.  I'd take that over
going to CentOS 6 straightaway.  It's part of the cost of doing business on
linux servers and expecting stability--you sacrifice the first year or so
of any given life-cycle.  That's just the way it's always been with even
the best distros.

I really do concur with Bill on staying with 5.x for now.

Even after that point, given that SRPMs are readily available, you can
still hold it together with duct tape and baling wire.  Grab the SRPM,
install it, rip out the old source and patches, drop in the new vendor
source, and build the RPM.  Often, things need to be tweaked a bit if they
won't build, but sometimes you get lucky and nothing extra is necessary to
make it work.  You thus get new versions with CentOS stock configs.  I've
held both Red Hat and SuSE systems together for up to 2yrs past EOL using
this methodology.  Not as easy as grabbing vendor updates, slightly more
expensive depending on the package (PHP is a lot bitchier than OpenSSL,
for instance...I know kernel developers that would rather reinstall a new
OS than upgrade PHP this way, since PHP breaks things on a z-level point
release [where z is in x.y.z version numbers), but I've done it with 100%
success rates), but definitely doable.  Even without SRPMs, it's possible
to hold a system together well past EOL (even without the stuff Bill uses),
but it's a nice shortcut that meshes with the vendor stock specs.  You
never know the difference, the way I go about it.

mark->
-- 
Audio panton, cogito singularis.