Upgrading Standing Systems from 6.3 to 8.0

[Martin McCormick]

Robert Huff writes:
>         Hot swap would be great, but I was referring to regular swap:
> human being with a screwdriver and a clue.  Reliable outside
> contractor, if you absolutely can't send someone in-house.

	You actually gave me a really good idea. We've got
people who I do trust to put in a CDROM or hook up a serial
cable. I think I will make up a headless installation CD and
send it and a serial communications server to our two remote
campuses and have them connect the CS and pop in the CDROM on
the system in question. Each FreeBSD box is half of a redundant
pair so we can get along without one for a few hours which is
probably less time than the upgrade to 7.0 and then to 8.0 would
take, assuming nothing went wrong during either of those
upgrades. I have seen cvs upgrades take anywhere from 2 to 8
hours, depending on the speed of the system, etc.

	We can ask them to hook up the CS, make sure it is
working, and then have them install the CDROM. I actually did
that once before and it worked. When done, we call them back and
have them remove the CDROM.

	That way, it stays in the rack, in one piece with all
cables connected and the remote staff is not asked to do as
much. Thanks for helping me think through a solution.

Martin McCormick