Wow! That was… unexpected!

After a LONG time of not upgrading my site’s operating system, various initiatives I am undertaking required me to update from Fedora Core 5 (released March 20, 2006) to Fedora Core 9 (released May 13, 2008).

I was very nervous about this upgrade since it spanned so many versions of the operating system, but I started out with high hopes. I backed up my system to DVD using MondoArchive, an excellent bare-metal backup solution. Then, I inserted the Fedora Core 9 DVD, rebooted, and started the upgrade proceedure only to be told that one of my drives was a bit short of space (249 megs, to be exact).

The solution ended up being repartioning-in-place using a great product from Acronis which handled all the heavy lifting of the non-destructive repartition for me. I repartitioned the particular drive to a size large enough to make sure this particular problem will never surface again.

Launching the Fedora Core 9 DVD’s upgrade procedure a second time worked, using the newly-widened partition… The installer updated 890 files and rebooted successfully (I was worried about it rebooting successfully!)

However, that’s when I ran into two things… First, the webserver failed to launch because of a configuration error. Secondly, I ran into a time limit and we had to leave for dinner with friends. So, the site was down for a few hours while we enjoyed a very nice meal and evening with Brian, Milan, and Erin.

We came home, went to bed, and I was lying awake thinking of how to address the issues on the server. Next thing I knew, my feet carried me in to the server room and I started tinkering. An hour later (and about 10 minutes ago), I got the site online at last. But there is still more tweaking and testing to do… I need to ensure that the changes I made manually that got the site online will “stick” after the server is rebooted, which I will attempt to do after posting this article.

It was immediately apparent that the new operating system is considerably faster than the old one. Cold-booting takes less than 40 seconds on Fedora Core 9. I’m not sure how long it took on Fedora Core 5, but I know it was longer.

I apologize for the downtime, but it was necessary, and moving forward should be considerably smoother from now on. There is still a fair amount to do — applying non-critical patches & upgrades to the system and then another comprehensive backup, but being back online is enough for tonight.

UPDATE: Rebooting works… mostly. After rebooting, I need to enter “dhclient eth0″, “tzoupdate” and “service httpd start” to get things rolling properly. I need to determine how to automate those steps so the system reboots to an online state.

UPDATE 2: I’ve got the system configured properly now, so it boots into an online state.

I recently purchased a Dell Latitude XT Tablet PC, my first foray into the world of laptop/tablet PCs. I quickly noticed that the machine gets fairly warm during normal laptop operation, and that it sits fairly flat on my desk, making airflow underneath difficult. Plus the angle of the keyboard was flat and made long typing sessions a bit uncomfortable.

I tried to think of an inexpensive solution to these issues… I’d read about using wine corks to elevate the back of the machine, and even tried small pads of Post-It notes but nothing satisfied me.

That is, until I was cleaning out a closet and came across an old Jenga game. Judging from its position near the very back of the closet, up on a top shelf, it was apparent that it hadn’t been thought of, let alone played with in years. So I swiped a couple pieces from the game and placed them under the back corners of my XT. The pieces are nice and solid, they raise the machine just enough to make the keyboard more comfortable, and very, very inexpensive (you can probably get Jenga games at a second-hand shop for next to nothing — and who cares if the set is incomplete!).

Now, I keep a couple Jenga pieces on the desk in my office and at home, and I threw a couple into both of my travel bags, so I’ve always got them with me and ready to use.