SB-4 2016-03-31 Debian Squeeze end-of-life
===============================================

Service bulletin: SB-4
Date: March 31, 2016

On February 29, 2016, Debian 6 "Squeeze" reached end-of-life. Debian no
longer issues any updates, including security updates, for Debian
Squeeze.

As of 6.0, no new bonding versions are available for Squeeze. Previous
bonding versions on bonders will continue to work with newer versions of
bonding on aggregators.

Changes to Debian Squeeze repositories
---------------------------------------

When Squeeze reached end-of-life, Debian changed the location of Squeeze
software repositories. To upgrade packages to the final Squeeze
versions, and to upgrade Bonded Internet packages, you need to update
the ``/etc/apt/sources.list`` file on all Squeeze nodes. You can do that
with the following commands run on the node command line:

::

    SOURCES=`wget https://bondingadmin.example.com/sources/squeeze -O - --no-check-certificate` && \
    echo "$SOURCES" > /etc/apt/sources.list
    rm -f /etc/apt/sources.list.d/*.list

In the above command, replace ``bondingadmin.example.com`` with the
domain name of your management server.

You can update the sources.list file on all your Squeeze nodes at once
by running this command from the management server command line:

::

    update-squeeze-sources

This command only updates the apt configuration of Squeeze bonders and
aggregators. It does not upgrade their packages. To upgrade their
packages, follow the normal `upgrade
procedure <../nodes/upgrading-and-replacing-a-node/upgrading-a-node.html>`__.

When upgrading packages on Squeeze nodes, you also need to avoid an
issue caused by an expired key on the Squeeze LTS repository. Instead of
using the normal apt-get update command, you must now use this command:

::

    apt-get -o Acquire::Check-Valid-Until=false update

This command ignores the expired key on the Squeeze LTS repository.

To manually add this key for the Squeeze LTS repository, you can run:

::

    gpg --keyserver pgpkeys.mit.edu --recv-key  8B48AD6246925553      
    gpg -a --export 8B48AD6246925553 | apt-key add -

You can also configure apt to always ignore the expired key, without
having to set an argument on the command line, by running this command
on the node to reconfigure apt:

::

    echo 'Acquire::Check-Valid-Until "0";' > /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/80ignorevaliduntil

If you run the ``update-squeeze-sources`` command, a configuration is
added on each Squeeze node to automatically ignore the expired key, and
no special commands are needed when upgrading the host.

Upgrading to Debian 7 "Wheezy"
-------------------------------

It is not recommended to upgrade deployed Debian Squeeze bonders to
Debian Wheezy. Distribution upgrades are relatively risky operations and
because bonders don't have network console access via IPMI (or similar
technology), any issue interrupting network access will require an
onsite visit to fix. If you do perform a remote distribution upgrade, be
sure to schedule an outage window with the customer of at least two
hours, as a distribution upgrade can require multiple reboots and
downloading and installing packages can take a long time.

Squeeze aggregators can be upgraded to Wheezy safely if you have network
console access via IPMI (or similar technology). With remote console
access, any networking issues caused by the upgrade can be resolved
without a datacentre visit. It's recommended to move the aggregator's
bonds to a different aggregator during the upgrade. If it's not possible
to move bonds to a different aggregator, an outage window of at least
two hours should be scheduled with all the customers on the aggregator.
Bonded Internet can continue to operate during a distribution upgrade,
but performance may be reduced and multiple reboots may be required.

`Technical Support <../spaces/technical-support.html>`__ does not provide
help for distribution upgrades. The easiest, most reliable method to
upgrade a node is to remove it from service and reimage it with the
latest `Bonded Internet
ISO <../nodes/provisioning-nodes/creating-bootable-usb-disks-from-iso-images.html>`__.

References
-----------

-  Debian Squeeze EOL announcement:
   https://www.debian.org/News/2016/20160212
-  Debian Squeeze: https://www.debian.org/releases/squeeze/
-  Debian Squeeze-to-Wheezy upgrade notes:
   `https://www.debian.org/releases/wheezy/amd64/release-notes/ch-upgrading.en.html <https://www.debian.org/releases/oldstable/amd64/release-notes/ch-upgrading.en.html>`__
