Will I hit any issues going from Debian 7 (wheezy) to 9 (stretch)?

[Chris Green]

I have a fairly old (just coming up to 4 years) BBB running Debian 7
which I have kept up to date with security fixes etc.

It's used to monitor various things on my boat and runs headless with
remote ssh access to manage it. Just about all of the monitoring code
is written in Python and lives in my home directory on the BBB.

Debian Wheezy is only supported until May 2018 so I need to move to a
newer version. Will I hit any significant issues if I go straight
from Debian 7 (Wheezy) to Debian 9 (Stretch)?

I intend to simply get the latest Stretch image on microSD and put
that in the BBB (having copied software from the Wheezy of course) and
then install my existing Python code onto that. I'll be doing it
'locally' (i.e. I'll be on the boat) so swapping microSD cards will be
easy enough and I can hit the power and reset buttons as needed.

Presumably I can use the Stretch IoT (non-GUI) image as I don't need a
GUI on my BBB.


--
Chris Green
·

[Robert Nelson]

On Mon, Jan 29, 2018 at 10:31 AM, Chris Green <c...@isbd.net> wrote:
> I have a fairly old (just coming up to 4 years) BBB running Debian 7
> which I have kept up to date with security fixes etc.
>
> It's used to monitor various things on my boat and runs headless with
> remote ssh access to manage it. Just about all of the monitoring code
> is written in Python and lives in my home directory on the BBB.

root over ssh is now disabled by default, so remember to ssh in as "debian"..

> Debian Wheezy is only supported until May 2018 so I need to move to a
> newer version. Will I hit any significant issues if I go straight
> from Debian 7 (Wheezy) to Debian 9 (Stretch)?
>
> I intend to simply get the latest Stretch image on microSD and put
> that in the BBB (having copied software from the Wheezy of course) and
> then install my existing Python code onto that. I'll be doing it
> 'locally' (i.e. I'll be on the boat) so swapping microSD cards will be
> easy enough and I can hit the power and reset buttons as needed.

Debian 9, still has Python 2.7.x available.

Debian "10/Buster" "might" drop Python 2.7.x, and only have 3.x available.

> Presumably I can use the Stretch IoT (non-GUI) image as I don't need a
> GUI on my BBB.

As long as you aren't doing anything with "overlays" in the old Debian
7 wheezy image, it should be an easy transition..

Just ping us if you run into any issues. (and keep a spare microSD
with your old image. ;) )

Regards,

--
Robert Nelson
https://rcn-ee.com/

[Chris Green]

Robert Nelson <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 29, 2018 at 10:31 AM, Chris Green <c...@isbd.net> wrote:
> > I have a fairly old (just coming up to 4 years) BBB running Debian 7
> > which I have kept up to date with security fixes etc.
> >
> > It's used to monitor various things on my boat and runs headless with
> > remote ssh access to manage it. Just about all of the monitoring code
> > is written in Python and lives in my home directory on the BBB.
>
> root over ssh is now disabled by default, so remember to ssh in as "debian"..
>

OK.

> > Debian Wheezy is only supported until May 2018 so I need to move to a
> > newer version. Will I hit any significant issues if I go straight
> > from Debian 7 (Wheezy) to Debian 9 (Stretch)?
> >
> > I intend to simply get the latest Stretch image on microSD and put
> > that in the BBB (having copied software from the Wheezy of course) and
> > then install my existing Python code onto that. I'll be doing it
> > 'locally' (i.e. I'll be on the boat) so swapping microSD cards will be
> > easy enough and I can hit the power and reset buttons as needed.
>
> Debian 9, still has Python 2.7.x available.
>
> Debian "10/Buster" "might" drop Python 2.7.x, and only have 3.x available.
>

I think I've written all my Python code to work in Python 3, it won't
be a big issue to fix anyway.

> > Presumably I can use the Stretch IoT (non-GUI) image as I don't need a
> > GUI on my BBB.
>
> As long as you aren't doing anything with "overlays" in the old Debian
> 7 wheezy image, it should be an easy transition..
>
> Just ping us if you run into any issues. (and keep a spare microSD
> with your old image. ;) )
>

Thanks Robert.

--
Chris Green
·