Upgrading from Debian 8 to 9

[Robertg]

Hello everyone I wanted to know what is the best method to upgrade Debian 8, to 9. Is there easy way to do this besides doing a clean installation

Thanks so much

[Hallvor]

https://www.debian.org/releases/stretch ... ng.en.html

[acewiza]

Is there easy way to do this besides doing a clean installation?

I would venture to say doing a clean install "is" the easy/best way to accomplish this. JMHO. YMMV.

[Bulkley]

The "easy" is not always best. Pushing a button on a graphic tool might be easy but you don't want to spend the next week troubleshooting if it all go south. I posted my method here a few times. Whatever method you choose, be sure to do a complete backup beforehand.

[ruffwoof]

Does your hardware necessitate 'upgrading' (with the expulsion of the lead livecd developer, systemD, and aufs being relegated some are seeing D9 as being more of a downgrade. Compounded by the flight of some pretty good supporters/developers (Devuan etc.))?

Jessie will continue to be supported until 2020 so if that works for you and your hardware ... if it ain't broke don't fix it. Perhaps postpone for a year at least?

[Lysander]

Hello everyone I wanted to know what is the best method to upgrade Debian 8, to 9. Is there easy way to do this besides doing a clean installation

Thanks so much

The best method is to take your time, not rush, read around other's experiences and do some research.

As said above, the easy way is not always the best. In fact a lot of the time, the easy way is just cutting corners.

If you're not running a server, there's little reason not to go with a clean install. Do a backup, and take some time to install your new system [the net install worked best for me]. The whole process of backing up and installing should take under an hour, I'd like to think. Which is way less time than it would take for you to do a lazy upgrade and then spend ages posting on forums to find out what went wrong if there were conflicts.

[Caitlin]

I've just upgraded from Jessie (8 ) to Stretch (9) with a clean install, and it worked out well for me. First, I copied all the files in my home directory (e.g, source code) that I wanted to keep, backed up Jessie for the last time, formatted the / and /home partitions, then installed Stretch from a DVD that I had downloaded.

It took me more than an hour, though. I had to reinstall and reconfigure all the apps I need. I worked from a plan (which was basically a journal of what I did when I installed Jessie). But some things had changed, and I had to stop and research what I had to do differently this time. I've spent about 9 or 10 hours so far, and I'm not finished (although my system is usable for most things now). I had fixed things like Firefox's "well this is embarrassing" message before only to have to fix them again.

I am looking forward to installing Stretch's first point release when it is available -- although I'm going to use upgrade and dist-upgrade for that.

Just my $.02.

Caitlin

[Lysander]

First, I copied all the files in my home directory (e.g, source code)

Do you mean source code or sources.list?

It took me more than an hour, though. I had to reinstall and reconfigure all the apps I need. I worked from a plan (which was basically a journal of what I did when I installed Jessie). But some things had changed, and I had to stop and research what I had to do differently this time. I've spent about 9 or 10 hours so far, and I'm not finished (although my system is usable for most things now). I had fixed things like Firefox's "well this is embarrassing" message before only to have to fix them again.

I meant less than an hour to do a backup and the clean install. Of course this would depend on the size of the backup. I keep a similar 'journal' to you regarding what I need to do to get my Debian install working with all the packages I want, it's a 25-30 point program. I would say that took me 3-4 hours to do for 9.0, though again it's relative to what the user requires.

I am looking forward to installing Stretch's first point release when it is available -- although I'm going to use upgrade and dist-upgrade for that.

Indeed there is no need to do a clean install for point releases. If you normally update regularly there shouldn't be much to do.

[Caitlin]

First, I copied all the files in my home directory (e.g, source code) [that I wanted to keep ... .]

Do you mean source code or sources.list?

I mean source code -- mostly in C, without any pluses. If I meant sources.list, I would have said so.

Besides, the installer gives you a new sources.list -- conveniently set to Stretch, of course.

It took me more than an hour, though. I had to reinstall and reconfigure all the apps I need. I worked from a plan (which was basically a journal of what I did when I installed Jessie). But some things had changed, and I had to stop and research what I had to do differently this time. I've spent about 9 or 10 hours so far, and I'm not finished (although my system is usable for most things now). I had fixed things like Firefox's "well this is embarrassing" message before only to have to fix them again.

I meant less than an hour to do a backup and the clean install. Of course this would depend on the size of the backup. I keep a similar 'journal' to you regarding what I need to do to get my Debian install working with all the packages I want, it's a 25-30 point program. I would say that took me 3-4 hours to do for 9.0, though again it's relative to what the user requires.

-snip-

I'm sure it would have taken me about that long to do it, if I didn't run into problems -- like WINE not working and having to muck around with the main menu. Each such problem has to be researched and fixed. And I need to update my journal, for next time.

Caitlin

[HarborView]

Yeah, I have to use a shared wifi and do it from midnite till whenever. I have scribbled notes of what to reinstall. Diet cola or another caffeine source is a necessity.

[biochemistrygmcs]

I upgraded 3 systems.
One could not load kernel after upgrade. I had to create initramfs manually before it worked again.
In another, home partition was not mounted. I had to login as root only.
Do clean install as far as possible. dist-upgrade is intelligent, but far from perfect

[RU55EL]

I think that clean install is easiest. To cut down on the configuration time, I use a separate partition for /home. It is rsync'd on a regular basis to a backup drive. (Of course, freshen the backup before upgrading.) That allows me to retain software configuration files, .bash_aliases, and such. So, that I don't have to spend time re-configuring everything to the way that I like it.

I start a clean install on the root partition, choose manual partitioning, format the root partition, but set the /home partition to keep all files and not format, but remain as /home. Perform the clean install. Check sources.list to be sure it is pure Debian (personal preference) and configured correctly (such as commenting out the installation CD.) Because I install from the first disk of the set on a usb drive, I then run updates. Followed by installation of a small list of software: sudo, vim, rsync, tmux, vlc, handbrake, openvpn, gnucash, etc. Then copy vpn configuration files from a backup on /home to /etc/openvpn. Good to go. I did have to import the older Keepassx 1 database and save it as a version 2 database due to the newer version of Keepassx, but other than that, smooth sailing.

I updated three computers all quad cores with ssd drives. The fastest took about 15 minutes for the clean install and about 15 to 20 minutes for everything else. the slowest took about an hour and a half for the whole thing. But, other than the new stuff in Debian 9, the systems look virtually the same because I retained the old /home partition, with it's configuration files.

I'm no rocket scientist. This is the easiest method that I have figured out so far. I hope someone may find this useful. On the other side of the coin, suggestions are very welcome.

[Caitlin]

... To cut down on the configuration time, I use a separate partition for /home. It is rsync'd on a regular basis to a backup drive. (Of course, freshen the backup before upgrading.) That allows me to retain software configuration files, .bash_aliases, and such. So, that I don't have to spend time re-configuring everything to the way that I like it. ...

IMHO I make it a point to wipe out all the configuration files. That way, if I misconfigured something to begin with, I have a second chance to get it right.

I do keep a list of what configuratings I've done so I can reconfigure fairly quickly.

Within /home, I only need to preserve things like my source code, binaries, and scripts.

Caitlin

[luvr]

I make it a point to wipe out all the configuration files. That way, if I misconfigured something to begin with, I have a second chance to get it right.

Same here. Plus, this way avoids any issues in case some software upgrade changes its configuration file format but does not properly convert existing files from an earlier version.

I do keep a list of what configuratings I've done so I can reconfigure fairly quickly.

That's what I also try to do, but I'm just not particularly disciplined. I often end up looking back into the old files, or trying to figure out what it was that I did in some other way.

[pendrachken]

Is there easy way to do this besides doing a clean installation?

I would venture to say doing a clean install "is" the easy/best way to accomplish this. JMHO. YMMV.

This isn't Ubuntu, sonny.

I've had an install go from Sarge > Etch > ( image failed drive to a new one, on different hardware ) > Lenny > Squeeze ( image the same installation AGAIN on different hardware) > Wheezy. All in place with no re-installation. Only major PITA was tracking down and filing a bug report on why the migration from KDE 3.x > 4.x lost sound on upgraded install but not on fresh installs.

[dasein]

+1 to everything RU55EL said.

One very effective way to shorten total install time is to automate system configuration steps. Install whatever you're going to install via CLI and then save those commands to text file via the history command. Something like this (as root):

Code: Select all

history |grep apt > foo.sh

where foo.sh is the name of the output file.