FreeBSD Update, Upgrade (Part II)

In the previous article we saw how to update FreeBSD from source.

In this article I will add a few steps necessary when upgrading FreeBSD trough a major release. A good example is going from FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE to FreeBSD 9.0-RELEASE. In reality the steps are more or less the same.

First and for most, make sure that your ports are up to date. If you are using portupgrade like myself do a:

 portsnap fetch update && portversion -v | grep "<" 

This will so you which ports if any need to be updated. Read /usr/ports/UPDATING for special instructions on ports that might affect you and upgrade all your ports. Follow the instructions you read and after you finish if you are using portupgrade this will do the job:

 portupgrade -arR

At this point you have your sources synchronized and your ports updated. Follow the instructions you read in the previous article with the exception of  running make installworld and mergemaster while in single user mode.

After your system boots it is time to rebuild all of your ports. If you are using portupgrade you will have to start by rubby:

cd /usr/ports/lang/ruby18/
make deinstall && make install clean

cd /usr/ports/ports-mgmt/portupgrade/
make deinstall && make install clean

Now that portupgrade is done continue with the rest:

 portupgrade -af

This should be enough. Reboot your system and you will have a perfect functional upgraded FreeBSD.