On 2/25/2013 9:03 AM, Dennis Jacobfeuerborn wrote: > On 02/25/2013 02:48 PM, Robert Moskowitz wrote: >> I have read a couple old threads here on updates for servers, and I am >> looking for some mechanics to getting the actual updates done. I don't >> want automatic updates; I want to control when and what gets updated. >> >> First I have to determine that a particular server needs updates. I >> suppose a daily script that would run "yum check-updates' and emails me >> the results could work, but then I would only want the email IF there >> was something to update, at my limited use of this option does not show >> anything to trigger a notify on changes. Does anyone know of a script >> that would do this? > A daily cronjob could call "yum check-update" and use the return code to > decide if the output should be mailed or not. From the yum man-page for > "check-update": > "Implemented so you could know if your machine had any updates that needed > to be applied without running it interactively. Returns exit value of 100 > if there are packages available for an update. Also returns a list of the > packages to be updated in list format. Returns 0 if no packages are > available for update. Returns 1 if an error occurred. Running in verbose > mode also shows obsoletes." > > So redirect the output into a file and when the return code is 100 mail > that file to the admin. > I also like to add the "download-only" plugin to yum so that when I do go back and do the updates, the files are waiting and I don't have to wait around for them to be downloaded. run "yum install yum-downloadonly" and the in your script run " /usr/bin/yum --downloadonly -y update" Hal