Upcoming Dreamhost upgrade

[LurkerLou]

Is there anything I need to know about? It seems like it's pretty straight forward.

As part of our ongoing efforts to keep your DreamHost service safe, secure, and stable, we are transitioning your VPSes off of the Debian distribution of Linux and onto Ubuntu.

The following VPSes on your account are scheduled to be updated:


We're upgrading your VPSes from Debian 4, 5 and 6 because they have all been End-Of-Lifed (EOLd) by the Debian project, and are no longer receiving critical security updates.

Whether you're on Debian 4 (Etch), 5 (Lenny), or 6 (Squeeze), we will begin the migration of your data very soon.

How soon? Starting in about two weeks, we will begin automatically updating these VPSes to Ubuntu Linux. You will get an email when the update is complete.

Several of your domains are currently using an outdated version of PHP. The following domains are running PHP 5.5 or lower:


Don't worry - once your VPS has been upgraded to Ubuntu, a whole new world of PHP opportunities will open to you!

For a little more information about DreamHost's support of PHP, check out what our knowledge base has to say!

We expect that most sites should update without incident to Ubuntu. However, there are some rare cases where sites can break as a result of the upgrade. We've put some information in our wiki to help you sort that out, and our technical support team is always on standby if you run into any trouble!

Want to take things at your own speed? No problem. Reply to this message and let us know if you'd like us to delay the update. We'll be able to pause the update to your account until May 24th, 2016. After that date we will be migrating ALL remaining VPSes to Ubuntu Linux.

As always, if you've got any questions or concerns about this transition, please don't hesitate to submit a ticket, open a LiveChat or make a request for phone support to contact our technical support team. We're happy to help in any way that we can!

Thanks!
- The Happy DreamHost "Migration Notification Station" Team

 

[WSWD]

I'm so confused by all of this.....how would they have access to your VPS, and why would a host ever update the OS on their own without you asking them to do this???

The customers should be up in arms over this. You should be able to run whatever OS you want on your VPS.

 

[TPerry]

The only thing/reason I could see is if it is a managed VPS. Then they probably have a minimal OS/stack requirement that they will support.

 

[Mouth]

Ubuntu LTS is now 2 years old, with them about to release the latest/current LTS this month. Why would you do a major distro migration to a 2 year old version, instead of just waiting another couple of weeks/months and doing it with current?

 

[TPerry]

14.04 LTS (which is most likely what they will use) came out in 04/14 and still has 3 years until it hit's it's 5 year support point. Debian versions listed are not getting any more security updates so they present a hole that can be used for intrusion.

 

[Mouth]

14.04 LTS (which is most likely what they will use) came out in 04/14

Yes, that's what I said - 2 years old.
Dreamhost's managed VPS's still use the old Ubuntu 12.04, 4 years old, with support only for the next 12 months.

 

[TPerry]

If they are on 12.04, then I can see them upgrading it also.. but the Debian ones definitely need to be upgraded - especially the Etch & Lenny line.
The problem I'd have is if they are "upgrading" to 12.04 - and their notice isn't really clear on that.

 

[Mouth]

The problem I'd have is if they are "upgrading" to 12.04 - and their notice isn't really clear on that.

12.04, as listed at https://www.dreamhost.com/hosting/vps/

 

[TPerry]

12.04, as listed at https://www.dreamhost.com/hosting/vps/

Refer to OP.. almost at the end. They only say Ubuntu Linux. Just because they have 12.04 listed on their webpage does not necessarily mean that's what they are upgrading to... ergo my point (and statement) about

The problem I'd have is if they are "upgrading" to 12.04 - and their notice isn't really clear on that.

And based on this, I'd hope they use a 14.04 image (granted, this is for their cloud/openstack but I would imagine for continuity they'd also roll it out to the VPS images)
https://www.dreamhost.com/blog/2015/10/08/creating-images-for-dreamcompute/

It's rather stupid to upgrade to a version that will be DIW in 1 year when you have 14.04 LTS out with 3 years still on it.