OpenBSD 4.7 Preorders Are Up

badger.foo writes "The OpenBSD 4.7 pre-orders are up. That means the release is done, sent off to CD production, and snapshots will turn -current again. Order now and you more likely than not will have your CD set, T-shirt or other cool stuff before the official release date. You get the chance to support the most important free software project on the planet, and get your hands on some cool playables and wearables early. The release page is still being filled in, but the changelog has detailed information about the goodies in this release."

Comments

Re:Subjective summary is subjective

[bsDaemon]

OpenBSD is also responsible for, among other things, OpenSSH, OpenBGPD, and OpenNTPD -- all three of which are widely adopted and used far, far beyond the sphere of influence of even OpenBSD itself. OpenSSH accounts for some 90% of all SSH deployments world-wide. Whether you know it or not, OpenBSD-related software enables quit a bit of the internet infrastructure.

Re:Is ugrading OpenBSD still kind of a mess?

[flydpnkrtn]

To follow up on my own post, they have a draft upgrade guide up it looks like (they recommend that it not be used yet though):
http://www.openbsd.org/faq/upgrade47.html

Looks like they include a utility to make life easier when upgrading... looks similar to what Gentoo Linux does when config files are upgraded... new configs are diff'd, and can be interactively merged, etc:
"OpenBSD now includes the sysmerge(8) utility, which helps administrators update configuration files after upgrading their system. Sysmerge(8) compares the current files on your system with the files that would have been installed with a new install, and gives you the option of keeping the old file, installing the new file, or assisting you in the manual merging of the old and new files, using sdiff. For past upgrades, we've presented a list of files that are usually copied over "as-is", and a list of files which should be changed, and a patch file that applies those changes to what might be in those files on your system. You may opt to use sysmerge to make the changes, or you may wish to use the patch file first, and then follow up with a sysmerge session to clean up any loose ends."

So it looks like they're at least making an effort to make it less painful

Re:Is ugrading OpenBSD still kind of a mess?

[Just Some Guy]

The funny thing (to me) is that the upgrade process looks a lot harder than it actually turns out to be. On our servers, it usually amounts to running the installer, running patch to update files in /etc, running a single command to upgrade all the installed 3rd-party software, and rebooting a last time to make sure it comes back up cleanly.

In practice, the things that OpenBSD doesn't automatically upgrade with the above steps are the kinds of things you wouldn't want a script to attempt, such as upgrading the firewall configuration to use new features. The process certainly isn't slick or pretty, but it does the job well and safely.