[GAVEUP] upgrading an old system (around 3 years old)

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

Hi,

I'm following https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Upgrading_Gentoo#Updating_old_systems

When I run this:

Hu · Administrator Joined: 06 Mar 2007 Posts: 23262

According to your output, the installed gentoolkit and java-config want a Portage with the old Python. An upgrade would not satisfy that requirement. Consider updating both of those packages in the same step, so that they can be updated to accept a newer Python.

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2025 7:51 pm Post subject:

Vieri,

You can't cross a chasm in several smaller jumps. You ether update world, or not.

What you can do is update to some portage snapshot in the past. As described in HOWTO Update Old Gentoo
That page needs some TLC as the VCS repo (pre git) has been migrated to git and there are some squashfs snapshots available at https://distfiles.gentoo.org/snapshots/

The idea is to cross your chasm is smaller jumps but by dividing the chasm into several smaller chasms, then crossing each one in one jump.

Look at your /var/log/emerge.log and determine the date of the last successful @world update.
To check and practice the process, get a portage snapshot from that date, or as soon after as you can.
Use that as your :;gentoo repo.
Do a full update, @world, --depclean, etc-update, kernel, read and act on news items. Everything you would normally do for an update.

Now get a newer ::gentoo repo snapshot and update to that.
How much newer?
If you feel lucky, try 9 months. If that won't do an

logrusx · Advocate Joined: 22 Feb 2018 Posts: 2872

Unless you're in for the challenge/fun/learning/curiosity/something like that, I recommend stashing your use settings, world and other related settings and performing a new install base off of them. It'll take a lot less work and especially time regardless if you chose the binhost route or not. If you chose the binhost route it'll be even faster.

Best Regards,
Georgi

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

Thanks for the feedback everyone!
Hu was right about the 2 packages I needed to update in one go before updating portage.
That went well. However, I'm now faced with a silly hurdle when selecting the Apache MPM.

I'm not sure how to force/select an MPM. I would like to emerge event even though the original/old system had prefork.
So I enabled the threads USE flag as well as this:

sam_ · Developer Joined: 14 Aug 2020 Posts: 2241

The --root handling can be janky, especially with autounmask. But I don't think you even really need to be using --root for something only 3 years old.

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

Could it be because of:

sam_ · Developer Joined: 14 Aug 2020 Posts: 2241

Yeah, it varies based on if ithreads is enabled:

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

So here goes nothing:

logrusx · Advocate Joined: 22 Feb 2018 Posts: 2872

You can deselect apache and come back to it later. You can do that for all the stuff that's not crucial to running portage. You can leave stuff behind and rebuild it once you have current system core.

As to why /etc/portage, I think it's a hard-coded message. Put it into you config root and try again to see if it regards the changes. It should.

Best Regards,
Georgi

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

I think the main issue is with --config-root not picking up all the settings in the specified directory (ie. the files in package.accept_keywords/ and package.use/ are ignored -- only the ones in the build env are taken into account!).
In fact, the emerge man page FILES section does not mention these directories...
So at this point, --config-root may honor make.conf in that dir but not the rest of files in /etc/portage that actually define specific USE flags or keywords.

Quite confusing.

In any case, I've gone further down the path, but now I'm seeing this error:

logrusx · Advocate Joined: 22 Feb 2018 Posts: 2872

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

logrusx · Advocate Joined: 22 Feb 2018 Posts: 2872

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

That's the thing...
I did NOT alter anything at all manually either!
In other words, if I run:

logrusx · Advocate Joined: 22 Feb 2018 Posts: 2872

Since you have been posting partial output, at this point I don't understand what you're trying to say.

Best Regards,
Georgi

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2025 2:04 pm Post subject:

Vieri,

Make friends with wgetpaste.
Post the entire output of

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

Thanks again everyone.
It's just not worth the hassle.
Neddy, you were right about having to go back in time and grab the right portage tree, and go step by step.
Also, I have a set of custom ebuilds with an old EAPI. There's no backward compatibility so I would need to update those too (or find an alternative).
Kernel-wise I used genkernel, but now there are better options.
Besides, I would still need to carefully adapt/confirm my config files in /etc and elsewhere.

I've come to the conclusion that it's "easier" to install from scratch and migrate the configuration and custom packages.

Thanks

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2025 8:15 am Post subject:

Vieri,

The new install is certainly faster but you are missing out on a learning experience you will get no other way.
I think that the oldest install I've updated was about nine years.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

Vieri · l33t Joined: 18 Dec 2005 Posts: 921

True, Neddy.
I wish I'd have the time for that experience. It would be a lot of fun - especially knowing I can count on this great Gentoo community.