In attempting to use up2date I get a message that I cannot update until the system is associated with a channel, how do I do this?

Version: Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Symptoms:

The is an error message indicating that I cannot update until the system is associated with a channel.

Possible Solution:

It sounds like you have ran the registration process for up2date, but the system did not get associated with a channel to match the OS version. The most common cause of this is that you have run out of entitlements for that version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. For example, you paid for 5 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 AS licenses and already have 5 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 AS systems registered within your Red Hat Network (RHN) account, and so attempting to register a 6th Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS 3 system will allow the registration of the system to your RHN account, but you cannot associate it with the correct channel.

To resolve this you will need to either free up an entitlement or purchase an additional entitlement. To free up an entitlement, login to your RHN account and delete a system. A possible system you can delete would be one that maybe you have registered more than once within your RHN account or a system which is no longer in production usage which you can delete. To delete a system, click onto it and then click on 'delete system' near the top right, then click the 'Delete Profile' button to confirm.

The other option is to contact your Sales Representative and purchase an additional license (entitlement) to associate with that new system.

Once you have a free entitlement, you can then associate that entitlement with the system which has no channel currently associated with it. To do this, within RHN click on the system in question, then click onto 'Channels' to see the channels associated for that system. Under 'Base Software Channel' choose from the drop down menu the correct channel for the system and click the 'Modify Base Channel' button to confirm the changes.

You should now find that the up2date program should run on that system and it functions as expected now that it has an entitlement and is associated with a base channel.

If you are still experiencing problems with your account, please contact Customer Service or Technical Support.