Re: bigmem kernel
On Thu, 4 Mar 2010 11:46:06 -0500 (EST), Marc Auslander wrote:
>
> having installed the bigmem kernel package, should I then remove the
> regular kernel package?
>
> my concern is that if I don't, the next update to it will replace vmlinuz
> with the regular kernel.
>
> or are the installers smart enough to avoid that?
There are two issues here: the kernels themselves and the symbolic links
used by bootloaders such as lilo.
If the kernel image package names are different, then the package
management system will keep them straight. You don't need to worry
about a "bigmem" kernel getting updates from a non-bigmem kernel.
The vmlinuz symbolic link generally points to the most recently installed
kernel image. Its companion symbolic link, initrd.img, points to
the initial RAM filesystem image that goes with it. vmlinuz.old
generally points to the next most recently installed kernel, and its
companion symbolic link, initrd.img.old, generally points to the initial
RAM filesystem image that goes with it. It is a good
idea to check them manually to make sure they point where you want
them to point after applying maintenance. If in doubt, manually run
lilo too. Then shutdown and reboot. If you have more than two
kernels installed, only two are generally bootable through a bootloader
such as lilo which uses symbolic links. You might as well purge
the non-bootable ones, since all they're doing is taking up space.
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