Well, when I started with Gentoo Linux almost a year ago, I emerged --sync more than twice per week. I never experimented any damage or error. However, I do not advise people to do it so frequently just because they will not find updated versions of their favorite packages as often as I thought initially. Today I emerge --sync once every week.
Now I advise people to keep their systems synced at least once a month, not because their machine necessarily needs to, but because after much time with no emerging --sync, you'd see your computers spending one or two days downloading and compiling the updated packages, and that is really annoying. Here is a suggestion to have painless updates: emerge --sync emerge --update --deep world the --deep flag will ensure a throughly revision of dependencies.
How can I know whether I really need a sync and upgrade my system if a new kernel or glibc is released?
There are several guidelines no one really invented, but may be handy: o Whenever you find a bug in your favorite programs, there will be a big chance they are fixed in the latest versions; o Whenever you navigate a forum or post in a mailing list asking for help with your favorite programs, there is a low-to-moderate chance you get the answer "That only works with version x.x.x or above" or so o From time to time, new programs are added to the Portage tree and someday you will find yourself wanting to give a try to a program you do not have in your machines' tree. o If you need to have your machine secured against vulnerabilities, you definitely need to emerge --sync every two weeks at least. o When a new kernel version is released, there is no need to update everything. Actually, what I remember is that I just emerge the new kernel version, compile and reboot. o When a new glibc version is released, there is a number of packages directly depending on it being updated, but no so many. So this one is not really a guideline. Sascha's method is easier. Credits to her. Sincerely, -- Fabio A. Correa D. Physics Dept, Universidad Nacional, Bogota, Colombia [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] My webpage and OpenPGP key at http://facorread.150m.com My alexandria.cc address is not available anymore. -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list
