[CentOS] Spacewalk? Local repo? Cache?

Mon Sep 29 18:19:31 UTC 2014
Les Mikesell <lesmikesell at gmail.com>

On Mon, Sep 29, 2014 at 12:59 PM, Chris Beattie <cbeattie at geninfo.com> wrote:
> I have a mix of CentOS 5, 6, and now 7 servers at work.  There are enough of them now that it is starting to make sense for them to get updates from an internal source.
>
> I've seen RHN Satellite in years past.  It looks like it may be a way to allow Windows admins here (familiar with WSUS) to update Linux boxes.  A local repo might be easier to set up, but (as with Spacewalk) it seems like we'd end up with a lot of packages we don't need.  A proxy and a sufficiently-large cache might do the trick if the first Linux box to get updates populates the cache which the files the others will need, but I haven't looked into this enough to see if there's even a way that works.
>
> How do you all keep a dozen or more Linux boxes updated?

I don't think there is a way to do it that doesn't take more human
effort than it is worth unless you have limited internet access.  It
is basically designed not to work.   A simple squid proxy with the
file size bumped up will work with no extra attention (and be useful
for all your internet accesses), but the first dozen or so runs are
probably going to pick different mirror URLs instead of reusing the
copy you have already cached. You can change the repo mirrorlist entry
to a fixed system - but then your updates will break if it is down.
Or you can mirror a bunch of stuff you'll never need into your own
repo.  Or set up some special-case thing that only works for Centos -
or maybe even just one version of Centos.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
     lesmikesell at gmail.com