Minimizing service windows on servers using NanoBSD + ZFS + jails

Paul Schenkeveld
PSconsult ICT Services BV

Abstract

With more and more services and applications running on your average server, upgrading the operating system and application software becomes trickier and larger service windows are needed performing these upgrades.

Over the last four years the author has searched for means and methods to keep software up to date with minimum downtime and inconvenience for users and maximum consistency. The result is a model which combines the strength of NanoBSD, ZFS and jails to build servers where application upgrades result in downtime of only a few seconds and kernel upgrades only need the time to reboot without installing in (tampering with) the running system. This system is in production now for several months on 6 to 8 servers at four different sites.

Biography

Paul Schenkeveld has been working on ICT since the late 1970s and met UNIX for the first time in 1983. After 'growing up' with 7th edition and System III derived systems he spent more than ten years programming and supporting System V UNIX but when he first saw FreeBSD in 1993 and learned about the FreeBSD project, FreeBSD became his first choice operating system.