Updating a stable NetBSD release

• Tracking -current
• Updating the sources
• Building the tools
• Building a new kernel
• Building a new userland
• Installing the kernel and userland
• Updating only parts of the source tree
• Terse summary of an updating procedure

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Tracking -current

See this document for our documentation on how to track NetBSD-current.

Updating the sources

If you are running a stable NetBSD release (such as NetBSD 6.1), in a production environment, you should occasionally update your sources and rebuild the system or the kernel, in order to incorporate any security fixes that have been applied to the branch since its release.

Most of the following steps can be done as ordinary user. Only the installation of a new kernel and the userland will require root privileges. Although /usr is choosen as the working directory in the following examples, the procedure can also take place in a user's home directory. Ordinary users have normally not the permissions to make changes in /usr, but this can be changed by root.

You can retrieve or update the sources for your release using anoncvs over ssh by specifying the correct branch tag. For example, to checkout the sources for the NetBSD 6.1 release branch, you would use:

$ cd /usr
$ export CVS_RSH=ssh 
$ cvs -d anoncvs@anoncvs.NetBSD.org:/cvsroot co -r netbsd-6-1 -P src

To update an existing source tree, do:

$ cd /usr/src
$ export CVS_RSH=ssh 
$ cvs update -dP

Building the tools

The next step is to build the toolchain. You need to create an obj/ and a tools/ directory, followed by a run of build.sh:

$ mkdir /usr/obj /usr/tools
$ cd /usr/src
$ ./build.sh -O /usr/obj -T /usr/tools -U -u tools

Building a new kernel

Building a new kernel pretty much follows the steps as described in this document.

The steps to build the kernel are:

$ cd /usr/src
$ ./build.sh -O ../obj -T ../tools -U kernel=<KERNEL>

Building a new userland

The build the userland, do:

$ ./build.sh -O ../obj -T ../tools -U distribution

Installing the kernel and userland

Installing the new kernel, rebooting (to ensure that the new kernel works) and installing the new userland are the final steps of the updating procedure:

$ cd /usr/src
$ su
# mv /netbsd /netbsd.old
# mv /usr/obj/sys/arch/<ARCH>/compile/<KERNEL>/netbsd /
# shutdown -r now
...
$ cd /usr/src
$ su
# ./build.sh -O ../obj -T ../tools -U install=/ 

If the new kernel netbsd does not boot successfully, you can fall back on booting the netbsd.old kernel.

Updating only parts of the source tree

If a security advisory has been issued, and you want to just rebuild the necessary libraries and applications, your best bet is to follow the instructions provided in the advisory. An example is given below:

$ cd src
$ export CVS_RSH=ssh cvs update -d -P -r netbsd-6-1
$ cd libexec/httpd
$ make USETOOLS=no cleandir dependall
$ su
# make USETOOLS=no install

Terse summary of an updating procedure