uptime 4.0

[Mike Hoskins]

Paul Robinson wrote:
> 1. Uptimes of 1,200 days says wonderful things about FreeBSD.
> 2. Uptimes of 1,200 days says terrible things about the administrators
> of those boxes.

i can see both sides.  i tend to agree (in practice) with #2, but i also 
know people running "mission critical" apps on 2.2.x...  apps much 
larger than the ones i admin...  so i can't really judge (too much). ;)

> Of course, the real answer here is to work on a way of allowing for an
> "upgrade" to happen without re-booting the machine, thereby getting
> kerenel patching without losing service or uptime. However, until we get
> to that point, consider patching at least once a quarter to a recent
> -RELEASE or even better, -STABLE cvsup, and go from there.

i believe the best/recommended way is to track the relevant (preferably 
latest) _security_ branch in production envrionments.  that would be 
RELEASE + bug/security fixes.  STABLE isn't always "stable" (for good 
reasons).  i've tracked stable in production environments, but wouldn't 
suggest doing so unless you have a nice staging environment.  tracking 
RELENG_x_x ("security") vs. RELENG_x ("stable") can avoid some hassle, 
but admittedly there are times when only STABLE will do.