Linux Upgrades

> My tale of woe, leading to a request for suggestions: I have a Redhat 7.2 box
> I use for PHP/MySQL development, and was thinking it would be nice to upgrade
> so I could take advantage of those nice fonts I hear about in the newer
> versions, for the occasional times I use the GUI. I guess a good place to
> start would be the kernel, since other stuff sort of grows out of that. (I'd
> rather not start from scratch with a new boxed set because I already have a
> bunch of stuff configured the way I want, and this seems like a good
> opportunity to learn.) So I find what looks to be the latest stable kernel
> (2.6.1?), download, unzip etc. In the README I find a long list of version
> dependencies (gotta have bin-utils-x.y.z or you're screwed, etc.) After a
> couple of builds on those I get a GCC error (a real problem with GCC, not a
> compile error.) I'm using the GCC version called for in the build
> instructions. So then I indulge in a little profanity and throw some things
> around the room. Next step: consult a guru or two. So... any suggestions?
> Chasing a greased pig is not my idea of fun.

The problem you are encountering is trying to use the latest stuff with outdated
versions (RH7.2 was released 10/2001). I've had very few problems with RH and
doing upgrades from one distro to the next (7.2 -> 7.3 -> 8.0). I've also used
Debian and Gentoo. All the current software for linux needs GCC3 which you
won't find in RH7.2. For that dependency it is best to go ahead and do a distro
upgrade, though you are going to need to update the stuff that you have now that
wasn't part of 7.2 as 8.0 and 9 are fully compiled with gcc3. The libs of which
can't be used by things compiled with a gcc 2.9.x compiler.

> PS- I've heard a lot about consumer Linux-desktop ambitions, but if that is
> ever going to happen I think this morass of version-dependence has to be
> controlled a little better, and you can't require users to start from scratch
> every time they upgrade. Linux against Windows is like a Martin-Luther King
> rally against the Luftwafe. -- Phil Mattison Ohmikron Corp. 480-722-9595
> ext.1 602-820-9452 Mobile

Funny, Windows works best if you install the newer version from scratch rather
than doing an upgrade (at least this has been my experience).