Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Safe way to test a new kernel?

[Grant]

>>>>>> I need to test a kernel config change on a remote system.  Is there a
>>>>>> safe way to do this?  The fallback thing in grub has never worked for
>>>>>> me.  When does that ever work?
>>>>>
>>>>> You can press ESC in the Grub screen and it will take you to text-only
>>>
>>> mode.
>>>
>>>>>  There, you select an entry, press "e" and edit it.  Press ENTER when
>>>
>>> you're
>>>
>>>>> finished, and then press "b" to boot your modified entry.
>>>>>
>>>>> That way, you can boot whatever kernel you want if the current one
>>>
>>> doesn't
>>>
>>>>> work.
>>>>
>>>> I can't do that remotely though.  I'm probably asking for something
>>>> that doesn't exist.
>>>>
>>>> - Grant
>>>
>>> Situations like these that made me decide with great conviction to always
>>> deploy my servers virtualized, even if the box in question will only host a
>>> single VM.
>>>
>>> Now, if I lost my intelligence for a couple of seconds and somehow ended up
>>> with a VM that's no longer accessible remotely, I just connect to the
>>> virtual console.
>>>
>>> The flip side? Now I'm getting too daring/careless, and the uptime now
>>> drops below my (self-imposed) target of 99.99% :-P
>>
>> What do you do when you need to upgrade the host, rather than the guest?
>>
>
> I think setting up a VM on the server using the new kernel should help
> test a new kernel?
>
> --
> Nilesh Govindarajan
> http://nileshgr.com

I haven't used a virtualized OS in awhile but the last time I did the
hardware interacting with the virtualized OS was also virtualized and
wasn't representative of the actual hardware.  I don't think I can
test the interaction between a kernel and my actual hardware from a
virtual OS.

- Grant