# FreeBSD 11.2 server. Upcoming 11.3 or 12.1 ?



## abishai (Jun 15, 2019)

Hello, I have a bhyve/jail vimage server at home. As we have 2 versions of FreeBSD upcoming, I'm not sure what to choose.
My 11.2 setup relies on https://svnweb.freebsd.org/base/head/sys/netpfil/pf/pf.c?r1=320848&r2=320847&pathrev=320848 to properly operate VIMAGE jails, but I think this patch is merged to both upcoming versions. Other than this, I have no issues and pretty happy with my setup.
I run 12.0 on my laptop and poudriere build node without any issues. Should I conservatively upgrade to 11.3 or try something new ? I'm interested in VIMAGE and bhyve improvements mostly.


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## vermaden (Jun 15, 2019)

First 11.3, then (eventually) 12.1.


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## abishai (Jun 16, 2019)

Well, that's doubles the work. Probably. I'll upgrade to 11.3 and stop 
Is jails continue to operate without upgrade? I never updated jails before, so it will take some time.


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## vermaden (Jun 17, 2019)

Yes, they will work ok ... and yes, you can stop at 11.3 now with 11.4 upgrade in mind after about 1.5 years.


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## SirDice (Jun 17, 2019)

I'd upgrade the production system to 11.3 and use a separate machine to do a lot of testing with 12.0-12.1. Keep the status quo on the production systems until you've tested everything and are sure 12.1 will work for you.


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## Lamia (Jul 24, 2019)

Exactly what I was looking for. The problem is that we would like to be testing FBSD12.x on our dedicated server, which now runs 11.3. Unfortunately, that is not possible with Poudriere.

It's not convenient to be using Poudriere on the desktop machine despite that it runs FBSD12.


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## toorski (Jul 24, 2019)

In my case, I've been running 12.0 for a while with 11.3 jail,  upgraded form 11.2.
The strange thing, after upgrading the jail from 11.2  to 11.3,  is that my uname inside the jail indicates only:
`12.0-RELEASE-p7 FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE-p7 GENERIC  amd64`

If I remember correctly, the jail should indicate its own release version as well - is that right?

In my 11.3 jail the following show:


```
cat /etc/profile
# $FreeBSD: releng/11.3/etc/profile 208116 2010-05-15 17:49:56Z jilles $
#
# System-wide .profile file for sh(1).
```

and 


```
cat /etc/csh.cshrc
# $FreeBSD: releng/11.3/etc/csh.cshrc 50472 1999-08-27 23:37:10Z peter $
#
# System-wide .cshrc file for csh(1).
```


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## SirDice (Jul 24, 2019)

toorski said:


> The strange thing, after upgrading the jail from 11.2 to 11.3, is that my uname inside the jail indicates only:


A jail doesn't have a kernel, it runs on top of the host's kernel. So it will _always_ show the host's kernel information.


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## toorski (Jul 24, 2019)

SirDice said:


> A jail doesn't have a kernel, it runs on top of the host's kernel. So it will _always_ show the host's kernel information.


Thank you for clearing my confused state of mind 
Sir, your are a scholar and and a gentleman


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## Lamia (Jul 24, 2019)

Exactly a jail would have the same version as its host. You probably did not run 'mergemaster -iU' to merge your system files for the host and 'mergemaster -iU -D /JAIL_DIR/' for the jail. 
Your jail might however be on a different patch level (perhaps for its userland) if you don't update it. If you are not using custom kernel AND you are using a jail utility like ezjail, you could run 'ezjail update -u'. 
Don't forget to also regularly update your jail ports like its userland with "ezjail-admin update -P"


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## toorski (Jul 24, 2019)

Lamia said:


> You probably did not run 'mergemaster -iU' to merge your system files for the host and 'mergemaster -iU -D /JAIL_DIR/' for the jail.


No, I don't use mergemaster or ezjail. I create and manage my jails with iocage, it works for me.


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## Lamia (Jul 24, 2019)

Your /etc/csh.cshrc and /etc/profile should no longer be showing 11.3. Your base OS runs FBSD12. You need merge your system files with mergemaster. There should not be anything like 11.2 or 11.3 unless you are using a buildsystem - Poudreire etc.


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## abishai (Jul 26, 2019)

Strange enough, patch I mentioned not merged to 11.3.  So, vanilla kernel still unusable for VNET.



SirDice said:


> A jail doesn't have a kernel, it runs on top of the host's kernel. So it will _always_ show the host's kernel information.


`freebsd-version` shows userland version. Useful for upgrade.


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