Automated download&installation of Errata Updates without RH Satellite.
Hello,
I have been browsing RedHat web reading and looking many information regarding the title of this discussion.Also I have read documentation about Spacewalk&Satellite.
Im going to explain what I have to do as I cannot use RH Satellite, so everything will make sense:
"I need to set up a machine which contanis up to date packages&updates&eratas (RHEL 5.9) so the rest of the platform will use it as a main repo(channel) server.I want to set up a local Yum repository, keeping it updated(reposync). "
Im new working with RedHat environments so I have some doubts I would like to clarify:
-Does an oficial Red Hat repo like "rhel-x86_64-server-5" contain errata&updates packages?
-Is it enough to make a "reposync" every night to have the repo updated?
-What is the difference between an oficial repo and the errata information?
-In case oficial repo doesnt contain errata&updates packages. How can I get this packages apart from manually download?
-I have read about spacewalk and the tool: spacewalk-clone-by-date. Is it what I need to download errata information?
-Can I use spacewalk-clone-by-date as a stand-alone tool without installing spacewalk?
I guess these are the questions I need to solve in order to achieve what I need, but It´s very luckily that Im missing something or what Im asking make no sense.
Thank you all for your time and help.
Responses
Red Hat
25369 points
Hi Isabel. Thanks for your patience here. Sorry no one from the community has been able to respond yet. I'm trying to track down a Red Hat associate to assist you, so you should see some response here shortly.
Expert
851 points
I would suggest using Spacewalk or Satellite if you can. Spacewalk is the upstream for Satellite.
I will try to answer some of your questions from my experience.
-Does an oficial Red Hat repo like "rhel-x86_64-server-5" contain errata&updates packages?
You can only connect to the official Red Hat repo via a Red Hat Subscription and being subscribed to RHN. If you have a subscription then yes you can connect the the repo or 'Channel' will have errata and updates, ie. 5, 5.1, 5.3, etc..
-Is it enough to make a "reposync" every night to have the repo updated?
we run a script via cron to run repo/channel sync to sync our channels.
See Automating Syncronization
https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Satellite/5.6/html/Installation_Guide/sect-Installation_Guide-Maintenance-Automating_Synchronization.html
-What is the difference between an official repo and the errata information?
Offical repo I'm not sure what you mean, but official repo or channels do contain errata, which are packages or bug fixes, security fixes, or just rpm updates.
-In case oficial repo doesnt contain errata&updates packages. How can I get this packages apart from manually download?
Again, if you have a subscription, yes you can manually download 'official' updated rpm.
-I have read about spacewalk and the tool: spacewalk-clone-by-date. Is it what I need to download errata information?
spacewalk-clone-by-date is a tool that is part of satellite or spacewalk. it allows you to clone a channel (repo) from a particular date. For example, look at this article https://access.redhat.com/site/articles/3078 which lists all the release dates. You could clone a rhel 6 channel to a specific version, like rhel 6.3 to 2012-06-20. Of course this tool can be used for creating all kinds of custom channels based on dates. I pick dates by quarter, ie 9/1/13 and clone-by-date there to a dev channel, then stage, prod.
-Can I use spacewalk-clone-by-date as a stand-alone tool without installing spacewalk?
I believe you can download just the tool, but it would be useless without spacewalk or satellite to clone a channel from.
I hope this information helps. Talk to Red Hat if you have more questions and they should be very helpful.
Welcome! Check out the Getting Started with Red Hat page for quick tours and guides for common tasks.