Patching RHEL
Hi
Sorry for the newbie question but is there any consensus on re-booting a server, physical or virtual, after patching ?
Thanks
Greg
Responses
Hi Greg, it depends which packages were updated.
- kernel updates only take effect after a reboot
- After updating glibc it is normally recommended to reboot
- Services that get updated only need the service to be restarted (ie. if cups was updated, restart cups with
service restart cups - For other libraries it is only necessary to restart applications that are using the library
Also Greg, if you are patching an oracle server with ASMLib, you'll want to go through this article: https://access.redhat.com/solutions/315643
Also, if you deal with vmware, be ready to reapply vmware-tools after kernel updates and on other occasions.
Use the CLI method for vmware-tools if needed with the "-default" switch to take the proper defaults, instead of hitting enter 12-17 times in some cases.
This may be obvious, but even if it helps other people reading this discussion - I mention it here... Test your patches on a subset of systems first, get input to validate function of servers (perhaps before and) after patching. If it's vmware, take a snapshot prior for the tests. Before pushing patches to production, have a assured test plan you've gone through to make sure you and your customer are satisfied before proceeding. Then (after testing) I only push to part of production first and not all of production at once.
Kind Regards...
Remmele
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