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= Upgrading Alpine =
This page covers upgrading to newer releases.


This document describes how to replace an Alpine installation with a newer version.
Doing regular security updates with the package manager is shown at [[Alpine_Linux_package_management#Upgrade_a_Running_System|Upgrading a running system]].


The upgrade process consist of the following steps:
* Backup current setup
* Upgrade Alpine CD/USB
* Execute upgrade script
* Save changes
* Reboot


== Backing up current config ==
Its recommended to make a backup of your config before you start.<BR>
The idea is to save the (*apkovl*) from your media to a safe place.<BR>
If you need to rollback, simply revert to your old *apkovl.tar.gz*.


=== Backing up to media ===
{{Warning|Before actually upgrading your system, make sure that you have a backup of your important data.}}
You could replace the existing floppy with a new (dos-formatted) floppy and then run the command:
lbu ci floppy


Or you could use a USB to store your configuration.
lbu ci usb


== Download new Alpine ==
== Upgrading an Alpine Linux Hard-disk installation ==
[http://wiki.alpinelinux.org/w/index.php?title=Downloads Download] latest ISO image (or USB image).


=== Upgrade CD media ===
=== Upgrading from older versions ===
Burn the ISO on a blank CD and replace the existing CD with the new.
/etc/init.d/modloop stop
eject
Now you should insert the new media.
/etc/init.d/modloop start


=== Upgrade USB media ===
In case an older version needs to be upgraded, i.e. not just upgrading from the last release to the subsequent version as covered by the individual release notes, also check [[Upgrading from older versions]] for potential specifically required upgrade steps.
On USB installations you can just download and unpack the latest tar directly to ''/media/usb''.
$ wget -C /media/usb -q -O - \
      http://distrib-coffee.ipsl.jussieu.fr/pub/linux/alpine/alpine/v1.7/usbdrive/alpine-1.7.22-i386.tar.gz \
      | tar -zvx


== Execute upgrade script ==
=== Upgrading to latest release ===
The new media has a ''upgrade'' script found on root level on media (/media/cdrom/upgrade or /media/usb/upgrade).<BR>
Start by executing this script (in our example below we use CD media).
/media/cdrom/upgrade


=== Example on how a upgrade could look ===
When Alpine Linux is installed in '''sys''' mode, e.g. on a hard drive, upgrading to the next stable version should be a straightforward package manager operation. However, for specific info always refer to the appropriate release notes.
Before actually upgrading packages it will get an overview what packages will be upgraded.<BR>
It migh look something like this:
<pre>~ $ /media/usb/upgrade
Upgrading from alpine-1.7.2 to alpine-1.7.6
Will try to upgrade packages from
fetching usb://apks/INDEX.md5.gz
Looking for new packages...
The following packages will be updated:
alpine-baselayout-1.4.1-r1          <  needs updating (index has 1.6.0)
alpine-conf-0.9                    <  needs updating (index has 1.0)
busybox-1.5.0-r1                    <  needs updating (index has 1.7.1)


Press Enter to continue or Ctrl-c to abort.
{{:Include:Upgrading to latest release}}
</pre>


Verify that it looks ok and press [''enter''] to start the upgrade.
=== Upgrading to Edge ===
{{:Include:Upgrading to Edge}}


As a first step the upgrade script will try to upgrade apk-tools, uclibc and busybox.<BR>
== Upgrading Alpine Linux on CD ==
Then it will upgrade all packages by running'' 'apk_add -u'''.<BR>
It will look something like this:
<pre>fetching usb://apks/busybox-1.7.1.apk
updating busybox-1.5.0-r1 to busybox-1.7.1
fetching usb://apks/alpine-baselayout-1.6.0.apk
updating alpine-baselayout-1.4.1-r1 to alpine-baselayout-1.6.0
fetching usb://apks/alpine-conf-1.0.apk
updating alpine-conf-0.9 to alpine-conf-1.0
</pre>


When then'' 'apk_add' ''application upgrades packages, it will detect that you have modified some config files.<BR>
=== Boot media ===
Instead of overwriting your config, it will install the new config with the suffix'' '.apk-new'''.<BR>
This way you are able to review and merge in changes from the default config to your own config file.<BR>
Config files that are untouched will just silently be replaced.


The'' 'upgrade' ''script will execute'' 'update-conf' ''to assist you in merging the config files.<BR>
If the boot media being used (such as a CD, for example) is separate from the media used to store the configuration information, simply download the latest ISO, and replace the boot media contents with the contents of the latest ISO.
It will first display a list of config files that you will need to take care of manually.<BR>
Like this:
<pre>The following config files have been updated and need attention:
/etc/profile
/etc/modules
/etc/inittab
/etc/hosts
/etc/init.d/syslog
/etc/init.d/networking
/etc/init.d/modloop
</pre>


Afterward it will step through every file, displaying a diff and give you options to act:
If booting from a CD, this would simply mean replacing the CD with a CD made from the new image and rebooting the Alpine Linux box.  
<pre>
--- /etc/profile        2007-05-31 14:11:47 +0000
+++ /etc/profile.apk-new        2007-09-07 06:33:36 +0000
@@ -1,4 +1,3 @@
export PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/sbin:/sbin
export PAGER=less
umask 022
-export LBU_MEDIA=usb
New /etc/profile available:
Quit, Next, Show diff, Edit new, Zap new, Use new (q/n/s/e/z/u) [s]:
</pre>


In this case we have added'' 'export LBU_MEDIA=usb' ''so we don't need to specify the media to'' 'lbu'''.<BR>
=== Update local package installations ===
We want to keep our current file as it is so we just press'' 'z' ''(and [''enter'']) to zap the new config and keep the old.
Next is file is'' '/etc/modules''':
<pre>
--- /etc/modules        2007-05-09 16:02:31 +0000
+++ /etc/modules.apk-new        2007-09-07 06:33:36 +0000
@@ -1,4 +1,2 @@
deadline-iosched
af_packet
-xt_state
-xt_tcpudp
New /etc/modules available:
Quit, Next, Show diff, Edit new, Zap new, Use new (q/n/s/e/z/u) [s]:
</pre>


Also here we just keep the current config by pressing'' 'z' ''since the modules are needed for our ipsec.
If you have locally installed and configured additional packages using [[How_to_enable_APK_caching|APK caching]] you should also perform the following steps.


Next file is'' '/etc/inittab''':
Backup the local configuration prior to upgrading.
<pre>--- /etc/inittab        2007-06-20 13:21:20 +0000
{{Cmd|lbu ci}}
+++ /etc/inittab.apk-new        2007-09-07 06:33:36 +0000
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
::wait:/etc/init.d/rcL
# Set up a couple of getty's
-::respawn:/sbin/cttyhack /sbin/getty - 9600 vt100
+::respawn:/usr/bin/cttyhack /sbin/getty - 9600 vt100
tty2::respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty2
tty3::respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty3
tty4::respawn:/sbin/getty 38400 tty4
New /etc/inittab available:
Quit, Next, Show diff, Edit new, Zap new, Use new (q/n/s/e/z/u) [s]:
</pre>


This time the change is not caused by us, but its a change in the default config.<BR>
{{:Include:Upgrading to latest release}}
This is even related to where the login screen should appear so if we dont merge this change, we might not be able to see the login screen!<BR>
We choose'' 'u' ''to use the new config.


Continue go through every config file.<BR>
After upgrading the packages, save the upgraded configuration changes.
Sometimes you might want to edit the new file, or leave the upgrade process to take care of the config file manually by using option'' 'q'''.<BR>
{{Cmd|lbu ci}}
You can always resume later by either running the'' 'upgrade' ''script again or by executing'' 'update-conf -i'''.


== Save changes ==
== Upgrading Alpine Linux on other removable media (such as CF/USB) ==
Now that all upgrades are done, we should save our settings to our media (which you hopefully have backed up).
lbu ci floppy


== Rebooting ==
The following instructions are for run-from-RAM Alpine installations running on Compact Flash or USB media. Updating your repositories using [[#Upgrading_an_Alpine_Linux_Hard-disk_installation|the procedures detailed above]], then running:
In most cases you will need to reboot Alpine (specially if there are changes in the kernel):
{{Cmd|apk upgrade --update-cache --available}}
kill 1
will suffice for some purposes. (If you want the new packages to be used after a reboot, you should [[How_to_enable_APK_caching|enable APK caching]].)
'''''Note:''' If you know what you are doing, you might not need to reboot.<BR>But make sure that all services affected by the upgrade are restarted.''
 
However, this is not an adequate general solution because it won't honor any kernel upgrades and the like. For the general solution, you'll need to upgrade your boot medium (Compact Flash or USB). That is what the following steps describe how to do.
 
{{:Include:Upgrading_Alpine_environmentvars}}
 
=== Upgrade Operating System ===
 
Start by checking that you have enough space on your media. For a '''standard''' Alpine image, you need at least 400MB available space.
{{Cmd|df -h {{!}} grep "Filesystem\{{!}}$LBU_MEDIA"}}
 
==== Download and verify new release ====
 
Make sure the media that holds your Alpine system is mounted readwrite.
{{Cmd|mount -oremount,rw /media/$LBU_MEDIA}}
 
'''If using Alpine Linux 2.2.3 or newer''': Download the latest release, {{Cmd|wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/<arch>/<image>.iso}} and then use the following command to mount and copy files as needed for you: {{Cmd|setup-bootable -u alpine-extended-<version>-<arch>.iso /media/$LBU_MEDIA}} Once the command completes, proceed to the [[#Save changes|Save changes]] section.
 
==== For older versions of Alpine ====
Start downloading a new '.iso' and a '.sha1' file
{{Cmd|cd /media/$LBU_MEDIA
wget -c {{#latestalp:alpine|url}}
wget {{#latestalp:alpine|url}}.sha1}}
 
Check integrity of the downloaded files ''(it might take some time)'':
{{Cmd|sha1sum -c {{#latestalp:alpine|file}}.sha1}}
''The output of the above command should say 'OK'.<BR>''
''If says 'FAILED', delete the iso file and download it again.''
 
'''If using Alpine Linux 1.10.4 or newer''': there is a tool ''setup-bootable'' that will mount and copy the image you just downloaded to your boot medium. With this tool simply do: {{Cmd|setup-bootable -u {{#latestalp:alpine|file}} /media/$LBU_MEDIA}}
 
[[Upgrading from older versions#Upgrading_a_removable_medium_from_Alpine_before_1.10.4|Instructions for older versions of Alpine]] are located elsewhere.
 
=== Save changes ===
Now that all upgrades are done, we should save our settings to our media (which you hopefully have backed up prior to doing this upgrade).
{{Cmd|lbu ci}}
 
=== Load new kernel ===
In most cases you will need to reboot Alpine Linux (especially if there are changes in the kernel):
{{Cmd|sync
reboot}}
 
{{Note|If you know what you are doing, you might not need to reboot. But make sure that all services affected by the upgrade are restarted.}}
 
=== Update to latest kernel on armhf (eg. Raspberry Pi 0 or 1) ===
On Alpine 3.X and newer, kernel is not upgraded when using <code>apk upgrade</code> and <code>setup-bootable</code> does not work properly.
 
If you want to upgrade your kernel, you will need to get it from the latest release, but first you must have and run :
{{Cmd|apk update; apk version -l '<';
apk upgrade;
lbu ci;}}
 
So now all your packages are upgraded, you can upgrade your kernel.
 
1. We need to get some variables :
{{Cmd|. /etc/os-release;
. /etc/lbu/lbu.conf;
ARCH&#61;$(cat /etc/apk/arch);}}
 
2. You '''must''' verify if they are correctly set, using this :
{{Cmd|echo "alpine version : $VERSION_ID";
echo "lbu media : $LBU_MEDIA";
echo "arch : $ARCH"}}
 
3. And it will output something like this (if not, do not continue this process) :
{{Cmd|alpine version : 3.16.2
lbu media : mmcblk0p1
arch : armhf}}
 
4. Then you can run this script (WARNING : config.txt will be overwritten!) :
{{Cmd|cd /media/$LBU_MEDIA;
mount -oremount,rw /media/$LBU_MEDIA;
wget <nowiki>https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/$ARCH/alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz</nowiki>;
wget <nowiki>https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/$ARCH/alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz.sha256</nowiki>;
sha256sum -c *.sha256;
rm /media/$LBU_MEDIA/apks/$ARCH/*;
rm /media/$LBU_MEDIA/cache/*;
apk update && apk cache -v download;
tar xzf alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz;
rm alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz.sha256;
sync;
reboot;}}
 
5. Test-it !
{{Cmd|uname -a}}
 
Alternatively, you may [[Raspberry Pi - Upgrade kernel from repos|upgrade the kernel from repositories]].
 
=== Update local package installations ===
 
This is done just as at [[#Update local package installations]], above.
 
== Updating a USB/CF diskless install without setup-bootable ==
It is possible to update a diskless install of Alpine from another system, or without using the setup-bootable script. This was tested for the 3.13 to the 3.14 upgrade on a Raspberry Pi.
 
Before starting, update /etc/apk/repositories file to retrieve packages for the new release. Then update all packages with:
{{Cmd|apk update && apk upgrade -i -a --update-cache}}
 
We can then use update-conf to check for changes to configurations from the new packages.
{{Cmd|# check apk-new config changes
update-conf -a -l
update-conf -a
}}
 
We now need to prepare to update the kernel and boot materials. To do this, we stop the modloop (which is the loopback mount providing kernel modules) and remount the SD media as read/write.
 
We can also shutdown the system, eject the media, and perform the next steps on another machine (if so, skip this command block)
 
{{Cmd|rc-service modloop stop
mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,rw
cd /media/mmcblk0p1
}}
 
At this point, remove all files from the SD media '''except for /cache, *.apkvol.tar.gz, usercfg.txt, and config.txt''' Rename config.txt to config.txt.bak temporarily, as extracting the new tar file will overwrite the file.
 
We can now download the new release and extract it. This example is for an Alpine Raspberry Pi release, so feel free to adjust the URLs for your system.
 
{{Cmd|wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.13/releases/aarch64/alpine-rpi-3.13.0-aarch64.tar.gz.sha256
wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.13/releases/aarch64/alpine-rpi-3.13.0-aarch64.tar.gz
sha256sum -c *.sha256
tar zxf *-aarch64.tar.gz && sync
rm alpine-rpi-*
}}
 
Restore the original config.txt:
{{Cmd|mv config.txt.bak config.txt}}
 
Update the persistent storage using lbu:
{{Cmd|lbu ci -d}}
 
We can now reboot, and this should boot into the new kernel. Once this is done, we can clean up and re-download apk caches:
{{Cmd|mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,rw
rm /media/mmcblk0p1/cache/*
sync && apk update && apk cache -v download
mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,ro
}}
 
[[Category:Installation]]
[[Category:Package Manager]]

Latest revision as of 16:22, 4 February 2024

This page covers upgrading to newer releases.

Doing regular security updates with the package manager is shown at Upgrading a running system.


Warning: Before actually upgrading your system, make sure that you have a backup of your important data.



Upgrading an Alpine Linux Hard-disk installation

Upgrading from older versions

In case an older version needs to be upgraded, i.e. not just upgrading from the last release to the subsequent version as covered by the individual release notes, also check Upgrading from older versions for potential specifically required upgrade steps.

Upgrading to latest release

When Alpine Linux is installed in sys mode, e.g. on a hard drive, upgrading to the next stable version should be a straightforward package manager operation. However, for specific info always refer to the appropriate release notes.

Repository Settings

First thing is to to edit or check the /etc/apk/repositories file.

Besides doing it manually (see below) this may be done using one of the following shortcuts.

  • Launching the corresponding Alpine setup script,

    setup-apkrepos

    and pressing e to edit /etc/apk/repositories. Then editing the repository lines to reflect the new version number.
  • Or, use a one-line command to edit all version numbers in the file "in place". Here's how you'd change v2.5 to v2.6:

    sed -i -e 's/v2\.5/v2\.6/g' /etc/apk/repositories

Note, subsequent manual changes of the version numbers in /etc/apk/repositories may be avoided for future release upgrades by having the repository lines refer to "latest-stable" instead of an absolute value:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/main http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/community

However, beware of initiating unexpected release upgrades.

Manual editing of /etc/apk/repositories:


Edit the /etc/apk/repositories file using an editor (nano for instance) and if necessary, add references to the Alpine package repositories. In the example below, the file references the Alpine CD, so that if a requested package is available on the local media, it will be obtained from there instead of being downloaded from the remote repository:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

/media/cdrom/apks http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.3/main

To upgrade, in this example, from version 3.3 to 3.19, simply change:

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.3/main

to

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/main

So that the file will look like this:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

/media/cdrom/apks http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/main
Note: Starting with version 3.3, there is a new repository called community. Many packages have been moved from the main repository to the community repository to indicate that they are not guaranteed to be supported beyond six months. If you are using any of these packages, be sure to add the community repository. For example: http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/community

Above, only one possible repository is shown, however, http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/ may also be replaced with any geographically close mirror from: http://rsync.alpinelinux.org/alpine/MIRRORS.txt

Updating package lists

With the correct repositories file in place, the latest index list of available packages can be obtained with:

apk update

Tip: Adding the --update-cache or -U to another apk command, as in apk add -U ... or apk upgrade -U, has the same effect as always running apk update immediately before the other apk command. Instead of auto-update it only if the index has not been updated recently.

Upgrading packages

At times it is required to first upgrade just the Alpine Linux Package Manager itself to the latest available version, before upgrading any other package. This was the case, for example, when upgrading from a version of Alpine before 2.3.0_rc1. But simply always doing so shouldn't hurt, either:

apk add --upgrade apk-tools

Next, to upgrade all installed packages:

apk upgrade --available

The --available switch is used to force all packages to be upgraded, even if they have the same version numbers. Sometimes changes in musl require doing this.

Note: All services that have been upgraded need to be restarted, to begin using the upgraded version. If the kernel is upgraded, it's required to reboot to begin using the upgraded version:

sync reboot

Upgrading to Edge

An upgrade of Alpine Linux from a stable version to the rolling development version edge basically requires the same steps as Upgrading to latest release.

The crucial difference is, that when editing the /etc/apk/repositories file, all referenced repository versions (such as v3.19 or latest-stable) therein need to be pointing to edge as in:

https://<mirror-server>/alpine/edge/main

Warning: Do not enable stable and edge repos at the same time. This can break your system. Either use edge or stable.


After upgrading to edge, the currently installed edge version may be checked with

$ cat /etc/alpine-release

and referring to the build date that is attached to the release.

Upgrading Alpine Linux on CD

Boot media

If the boot media being used (such as a CD, for example) is separate from the media used to store the configuration information, simply download the latest ISO, and replace the boot media contents with the contents of the latest ISO.

If booting from a CD, this would simply mean replacing the CD with a CD made from the new image and rebooting the Alpine Linux box.

Update local package installations

If you have locally installed and configured additional packages using APK caching you should also perform the following steps.

Backup the local configuration prior to upgrading.

lbu ci

Repository Settings

First thing is to to edit or check the /etc/apk/repositories file.

Besides doing it manually (see below) this may be done using one of the following shortcuts.

  • Launching the corresponding Alpine setup script,

    setup-apkrepos

    and pressing e to edit /etc/apk/repositories. Then editing the repository lines to reflect the new version number.
  • Or, use a one-line command to edit all version numbers in the file "in place". Here's how you'd change v2.5 to v2.6:

    sed -i -e 's/v2\.5/v2\.6/g' /etc/apk/repositories

Note, subsequent manual changes of the version numbers in /etc/apk/repositories may be avoided for future release upgrades by having the repository lines refer to "latest-stable" instead of an absolute value:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/main http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/community

However, beware of initiating unexpected release upgrades.

Manual editing of /etc/apk/repositories:


Edit the /etc/apk/repositories file using an editor (nano for instance) and if necessary, add references to the Alpine package repositories. In the example below, the file references the Alpine CD, so that if a requested package is available on the local media, it will be obtained from there instead of being downloaded from the remote repository:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

/media/cdrom/apks http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.3/main

To upgrade, in this example, from version 3.3 to 3.19, simply change:

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.3/main

to

http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/main

So that the file will look like this:

Contents of /etc/apk/repositories

/media/cdrom/apks http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/main
Note: Starting with version 3.3, there is a new repository called community. Many packages have been moved from the main repository to the community repository to indicate that they are not guaranteed to be supported beyond six months. If you are using any of these packages, be sure to add the community repository. For example: http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.19/community

Above, only one possible repository is shown, however, http://dl-3.alpinelinux.org/alpine/ may also be replaced with any geographically close mirror from: http://rsync.alpinelinux.org/alpine/MIRRORS.txt

Updating package lists

With the correct repositories file in place, the latest index list of available packages can be obtained with:

apk update

Tip: Adding the --update-cache or -U to another apk command, as in apk add -U ... or apk upgrade -U, has the same effect as always running apk update immediately before the other apk command. Instead of auto-update it only if the index has not been updated recently.

Upgrading packages

At times it is required to first upgrade just the Alpine Linux Package Manager itself to the latest available version, before upgrading any other package. This was the case, for example, when upgrading from a version of Alpine before 2.3.0_rc1. But simply always doing so shouldn't hurt, either:

apk add --upgrade apk-tools

Next, to upgrade all installed packages:

apk upgrade --available

The --available switch is used to force all packages to be upgraded, even if they have the same version numbers. Sometimes changes in musl require doing this.

Note: All services that have been upgraded need to be restarted, to begin using the upgraded version. If the kernel is upgraded, it's required to reboot to begin using the upgraded version:

sync reboot

After upgrading the packages, save the upgraded configuration changes.

lbu ci

Upgrading Alpine Linux on other removable media (such as CF/USB)

The following instructions are for run-from-RAM Alpine installations running on Compact Flash or USB media. Updating your repositories using the procedures detailed above, then running:

apk upgrade --update-cache --available

will suffice for some purposes. (If you want the new packages to be used after a reboot, you should enable APK caching.)

However, this is not an adequate general solution because it won't honor any kernel upgrades and the like. For the general solution, you'll need to upgrade your boot medium (Compact Flash or USB). That is what the following steps describe how to do.

Setup environment variables

To make the documentation a bit more "generic" we start by setting some environment variables.

vi /etc/lbu/lbu.conf

Make sure that the variable LBU_MEDIA is not commented (by removing the leading '#').

You also need to set a appropriate value for your LBU_MEDIA. The media you choose will be the media where you store your settings/configuration.

Note: Even if you have you alpine installed on CF, HD or USB you can still choose to save your config on some other media that suits your needs. But remember that both the media where you have your Alpine system AND the media where you have your config need to be in your box when booting it.

Examples:

LBU_MEDIA=usb

or:

LBU_MEDIA=sda1

Now that you have your /etc/lbu/lbu.conf configured for your needs, we will set the environment variables (note the leading .).

. /etc/lbu/lbu.conf

You can test if your environment variable was set:

echo $LBU_MEDIA

It should output something like usb, sda1, or whatever you just configured.

Back up your config

Before starting to upgrade, it's wise to save your configuration.

lbu ci

Upgrade Operating System

Start by checking that you have enough space on your media. For a standard Alpine image, you need at least 400MB available space.

df -h | grep "Filesystem\|$LBU_MEDIA"

Download and verify new release

Make sure the media that holds your Alpine system is mounted readwrite.

mount -oremount,rw /media/$LBU_MEDIA

If using Alpine Linux 2.2.3 or newer: Download the latest release,

wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/<arch>/<image>.iso

and then use the following command to mount and copy files as needed for you:

setup-bootable -u alpine-extended-<version>-<arch>.iso /media/$LBU_MEDIA

Once the command completes, proceed to the Save changes section.

For older versions of Alpine

Start downloading a new '.iso' and a '.sha1' file

cd /media/$LBU_MEDIA wget -c {{#latestalp:alpine|url}} wget {{#latestalp:alpine|url}}.sha1

Check integrity of the downloaded files (it might take some time):

sha1sum -c {{#latestalp:alpine|file}}.sha1

The output of the above command should say 'OK'.
If says 'FAILED', delete the iso file and download it again.

If using Alpine Linux 1.10.4 or newer: there is a tool setup-bootable that will mount and copy the image you just downloaded to your boot medium. With this tool simply do:

setup-bootable -u {{#latestalp:alpine|file}} /media/$LBU_MEDIA

Instructions for older versions of Alpine are located elsewhere.

Save changes

Now that all upgrades are done, we should save our settings to our media (which you hopefully have backed up prior to doing this upgrade).

lbu ci

Load new kernel

In most cases you will need to reboot Alpine Linux (especially if there are changes in the kernel):

sync reboot

Note: If you know what you are doing, you might not need to reboot. But make sure that all services affected by the upgrade are restarted.

Update to latest kernel on armhf (eg. Raspberry Pi 0 or 1)

On Alpine 3.X and newer, kernel is not upgraded when using apk upgrade and setup-bootable does not work properly.

If you want to upgrade your kernel, you will need to get it from the latest release, but first you must have and run :

apk update; apk version -l '<'; apk upgrade; lbu ci;

So now all your packages are upgraded, you can upgrade your kernel.

1. We need to get some variables :

. /etc/os-release; . /etc/lbu/lbu.conf; ARCH=$(cat /etc/apk/arch);

2. You must verify if they are correctly set, using this :

echo "alpine version : $VERSION_ID"; echo "lbu media : $LBU_MEDIA"; echo "arch : $ARCH"

3. And it will output something like this (if not, do not continue this process) :

alpine version : 3.16.2 lbu media : mmcblk0p1 arch : armhf

4. Then you can run this script (WARNING : config.txt will be overwritten!) :

cd /media/$LBU_MEDIA; mount -oremount,rw /media/$LBU_MEDIA; wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/$ARCH/alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz; wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/latest-stable/releases/$ARCH/alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz.sha256; sha256sum -c *.sha256; rm /media/$LBU_MEDIA/apks/$ARCH/*; rm /media/$LBU_MEDIA/cache/*; apk update && apk cache -v download; tar xzf alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz; rm alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz alpine-rpi-$VERSION_ID-$ARCH.tar.gz.sha256; sync; reboot;

5. Test-it !

uname -a

Alternatively, you may upgrade the kernel from repositories.

Update local package installations

This is done just as at #Update local package installations, above.

Updating a USB/CF diskless install without setup-bootable

It is possible to update a diskless install of Alpine from another system, or without using the setup-bootable script. This was tested for the 3.13 to the 3.14 upgrade on a Raspberry Pi.

Before starting, update /etc/apk/repositories file to retrieve packages for the new release. Then update all packages with:

apk update && apk upgrade -i -a --update-cache

We can then use update-conf to check for changes to configurations from the new packages.

# check apk-new config changes update-conf -a -l update-conf -a

We now need to prepare to update the kernel and boot materials. To do this, we stop the modloop (which is the loopback mount providing kernel modules) and remount the SD media as read/write.

We can also shutdown the system, eject the media, and perform the next steps on another machine (if so, skip this command block)

rc-service modloop stop mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,rw cd /media/mmcblk0p1

At this point, remove all files from the SD media except for /cache, *.apkvol.tar.gz, usercfg.txt, and config.txt Rename config.txt to config.txt.bak temporarily, as extracting the new tar file will overwrite the file.

We can now download the new release and extract it. This example is for an Alpine Raspberry Pi release, so feel free to adjust the URLs for your system.

wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.13/releases/aarch64/alpine-rpi-3.13.0-aarch64.tar.gz.sha256 wget https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.13/releases/aarch64/alpine-rpi-3.13.0-aarch64.tar.gz sha256sum -c *.sha256 tar zxf *-aarch64.tar.gz && sync rm alpine-rpi-*

Restore the original config.txt:

mv config.txt.bak config.txt

Update the persistent storage using lbu:

lbu ci -d

We can now reboot, and this should boot into the new kernel. Once this is done, we can clean up and re-download apk caches:

mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,rw rm /media/mmcblk0p1/cache/* sync && apk update && apk cache -v download mount /media/mmcblk0p1 -o remount,ro