Re: what upgrades require reboot?
On Tue, Jun 06, 2000 at 01:32:34PM -0500, Ashley Clark wrote:
> * Brian Stults in "what upgrades require reboot?" dated 2000/06/06 14:00 wrote:
>
> > I am curious about when you need to reboot after upgrading packages. I
> > assume if I upgrade a package like gnome-libs, I should restart gnome
> > but it won't require rebooting. On the other hand, I assume that
> > upgrading packages like bash and libc will require a reboot. Is that
> > true? How can I know when I should reboot or not?
>
> The only package I can think of that would require a reboot is the
> kernel-image packages. With Linux all user-space programs are just
> that, user-space, meaning that stopping and starting them is enough, no
> reboot required. Things that would be kernel-space are things like
> filesystem drivers, raid support in the kernel, &c. Unfortunately MS
> has tainted people's views of just what exactly an operating system is
> and contains and requires reboots for the simplest things (ahem,
> network configuration)!
>
A major revision in the C library may require a reboot (for example
due to the wtmp format changing).
A minor change in C library hardly ever requires reboot.
And a major change in X will go far smoother if you restart X (not necessarily
reboot), and this is due mostly to memory issues.
In any case, reboots should be due almost always to "changed the kernel",
and only once in a blue moon to other things. If the package developer
does not specifically tell you to reboot, you may assume it is safe
not to.
Jim
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