[Resolved] Use "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade" in Proxmox or not?

Hello all. Need some sage advice before I mess up my server. OR advice on how to save my server before trying this.

Situation: I have a Proxmox Server I am running here at home. I was going through doing my manual weekly update like I usually do. Everything went well. Went I went back through to see if there were more updates or dependency updates I found this-

7 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.
user@server:~$ apt list --upgradable
Listing... Done
libnvpair1linux/stable 0.8.5-pve1 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
libuutil1linux/stable 0.8.5-pve1 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
libzfs2linux/stable 0.8.5-pve1 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
libzpool2linux/stable 0.8.5-pve1 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
zfs-initramfs/stable 2.0.3-pve2 all [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
zfs-zed/stable 2.0.3-pve2 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
zfsutils-linux/stable 2.0.3-pve2 amd64 [upgradable from: 0.8.4-pve2]
user@server:~$ sudo apt upgrade
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Calculating upgrade... Done
The following packages have been kept back:
  libnvpair1linux libuutil1linux libzfs2linux libzpool2linux zfs-initramfs zfs-zed zfsutils-linux
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 7 not upgraded.
user@server:~$ 

Are these packages something I should try to update with sudo apt-get dist-upgrade? I did some reading and it seems there are differing theories and ideas about this. Some say yes do it for security reasons, others say it may delete dependencies and break your install package. The readings also mentioned as long as you have safe repositories you are getting the updates from you should be fine. So here is a list of my repos for review-

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian buster main contrib
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib
deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian buster pve-no-subscription
deb http://httpredir.debian.org/debian buster-backports main contrib non-free
# security updates
deb http://security.debian.org buster/updates main contrib

As I said I am running proxmox and I know there are others out there that do as well so I wanted to ask to see if I could get some advice. I see the ZFS versions are very diffrent so I’m wondering if that would be good to update for sure, but dont know if that will break proxmox’s interface with it. I’d rather not rebuild the server, and I have no other backup node as yet in the home lab. I do have a 3rd disk in the raid 1 setup for the I can update then detach in ZFS if thats a option. Either way thanks for reading and hope I can get some help.

If you click on upgrade button on the web interface this is actually what it does under the hood.

apt-get dist-upgrade

The big difference between upgrade and dist-upgrade is that the later will remove obsoletes IIRC.

3 Likes

I will try that. I had been using CLI only

Ahh gotcha.

The default upgrade process will not break proxmox (usually), unless you’ve done some very strange custom tweaks.

You should be totally fine to proceed.

That said, always do backups just in case.

3 Likes

Yeah ill backup…the update option is greyed out in proxmox, I do not have a paid subscription or at least got as notification about it. Ill just go for it see what happens

dist-upgrade is probably fine as Dynamic_Gravity mentioned. It’s also OK to simply do this as well:

sudo apt-get install libnvpair1linux libuutil1linux libzfs2linux libzpool2linux zfs-initramfs zfs-zed zfsutils-linux
1 Like

Well, New issue…lol

   pool: pool name
 state: ONLINE
status: Some supported features are not enabled on the pool. The pool can
        still be used, but some features are unavailable.
action: Enable all features using 'zpool upgrade'. Once this is done,
        the pool may no longer be accessible by software that does not support
        the features. See zpool-features(5) for details.
  scan: scrub repaired 0B in 00:03:22 with 0 errors on Sat Mar 13 00:27:30 2021
config:

        NAME                                           STATE     READ WRITE CKSUM
        poolname                                          ONLINE       0     0     0
          ata-Samsung_SSD_850_EVO_1TB_S21CNWAFC19438R  ONLINE       0     0     0

errors: No known data errors
user@server:~$ sudo zpool upgrade
This system supports ZFS pool feature flags.

All pools are formatted using feature flags.


Some supported features are not enabled on the following pools. Once a
feature is enabled the pool may become incompatible with software
that does not support the feature. See zpool-features(5) for details.

POOL  FEATURE
---------------
archive
      redaction_bookmarks
      redacted_datasets
      bookmark_written
      log_spacemap
      livelist
      device_rebuild
      zstd_compress
dvrdrive
      redaction_bookmarks
      redacted_datasets
      bookmark_written
      log_spacemap
      livelist
      device_rebuild
      zstd_compress
rpool
      redaction_bookmarks
      redacted_datasets
      bookmark_written
      log_spacemap
      livelist
      device_rebuild
      zstd_compress
vmbox
      redaction_bookmarks
      redacted_datasets
      bookmark_written
      log_spacemap
      livelist
      device_rebuild
      zstd_compress

user@server:~$  :(

What’s the problem?

Upgrade without the poolname afterwards seems to list all the features available on your sytem.

Add the poolname to upgrade if you want upgrade one of the pools?

Oh, and I started using dist-upgrade after hearing Alan Pope recommend it on the Ubuntu podcast, but forgot why, so thanks for making the thread! Am gonna give the podcast another listen…

1 Like

Well it was all backed-up so took the plunge and updated all the libraries… No issues for future refrence. All seems intact and proxmox is humming along.

1 Like

Should have said, if you are unsure: Stop, take a sec, make a backup before upgrading, then test a few normal apps/ have a quick look through logs after.

Or just Yolo it…
Like 2017 when an update killed my wifi and I had to start from clean, on holiday…

1 Like

yikes…yeah trying to set up a test bed pc but the B550 and 2.5g nic are proving troublesome for linux and hypervisors. I may have to pop in the x470 I know works. Then the vlan thing I still dont want to do yet because my wife will kill me if I mess up her plex recordings again lol

1 Like

Way off topic now, but I haven’t really done Vlans. Just subnets