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No More Need To Reboot Fedora w/ Ksplice

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the stacking-your-nines dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Ksplice, the technology that allows Linux kernel updates without a reboot, is now free for users of the Fedora distribution. Using Ksplice is like 'replacing your car's engine while speeding down the highway,' and it can potentially save your Linux systems from a lot of downtime. Since Fedora users often live on the bleeding edge of Linux development, Ksplice makes it even easier to do so, and without reboots!"

4 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. interesting by idontgno · · Score: 3, Interesting

    this may be based on Free software (residing in the machine needing its kernel patched), but it appears that patch preparation is based on a subscription service provided by the Ksplice Uptrack people. That's the part which is (selectively) free-as-in-beer. This isn't organic to the kernel or the normal methods of kernel updating.

    That means there's libre-free software and a service provided by a non-distro company which is, for selected distros, gratis-free. For now.

    The technical description sounds like the ancient OS patching techniques the old mainframes I used to work on used.

    And frankly, I'd still feel a little more comfortable with a reboot, since I'd worry a bit about state consistency of kernel and client processes. But, I guess smarter people than me says it OK, so what do I know?

    --
    Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
    1. Re:interesting by bsDaemon · · Score: 4, Interesting

      When you have around 1500 production servers to patch, such as with the memmap 0 bug last year, doing them one-by-one, or even in small batches, remotely over IP KVM takes a long-ass time. This is nice for those types of situations.

    2. Re:interesting by TooMuchToDo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Seriously? I patched 5500 linux servers in 24 hours *by myself*, all the while they were churning through collider data from the LHC. This would be, in my opinion, what I would call a production environment. Shortcuts are nice, but sometimes you don't need them if your environment is engineered properly.

  2. Debugging in space: a case for dynamic systems. by drainbramage · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Looks like you might be referring to this http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=130313&cid=10876098

    --
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