FreeBSD STABLE, CURRENT and upgrading

[Nikolas Britton]

Oliver Fuchs wrote:

>Hi All,
>
>I am using FreeBSD since 5.2 RELEASE and I am now running 5.2.1 RELEASE.
>I upgraded between the two versions from scratch that means I backuped
>the main configuration files and directories (like home), deleted the
>old version, installed the new one and reconfigured the whole system.
>
>As I see 5.3 is now coming up so I want to avoid this procedure.
>I have read the handbook, the FAQs and Greg Lehey's book 'The complete
>FreeBSD'.But I am still quite unsure/confused about some aspects of FreeBSD
>philosophy.
>
>1) CURRENT and STABLE
>
>As I read in the FAQS there are two main development branches: STABLE
>and CURRENT. At the moment the 4-STABLE is the STABLE-branch and the
>5-CURRENT is the current brunch up to the point where it gets STABLE (I
>think it is 5.3). Then the CURRENT branch will change to 6?
>Is that right.
>
Right... as of a few days ago 5-CURRENT is now 5-STABLE, CURRENT (HEAD) 
is now 6.

>
>Then FreeBSD would have two STABLE branches (4 and 5) so what will then
>be the difference between them? Or will the 4 branch be ended?
>So I am not quiet sure about this terminology.
>
The difference? a whole lot of stuff.  Eventually 4.x will be "phased 
out" in favor of 5.x but we have awial before this happens.

>
>2) Updating 5.2.1
>As far as I understood there are three parts of the system that have to
>be upgraded:
>
>kernel
>userland
>ports
>
>So to do the first two ones I am going to use sysinstall (I use a slow
>internet connection so I have to by the CDs with binary collection).
>After userland and kernel have been upgraded I need to upgrade my
>prts/packages. 
>Therefore I copy my binary packages (from the CDs) to 
>/usr/ports/packages/All and first run 
>portversion 
>and then
>portupgrade -P
>
>Is this all for now?
>
>3) Get the latest security patches/packages
>On the FreeBSD security page I have read about three 
>security patches for the 5.2.1 RELAESE. They only affected the kernel.
>Running freebsd-update gave me a lot more security hints but for the
>packages.
>So am I right believing that the security patches only regard kernel
>and to get the latest package-updates I have to run freebsd-update?
>Or is there another possibility?
>
>Thanx for your patience and help in advance
>
>Oliver
>  
>