This tutorial explains the upgrade procedure to upgrade Debian from Wheezy to Jessie in a few
simple steps.
Before you start with the upgrade, backup all critical data. Thats especially the config data in the
/etc directory and the user data in /home. When you run a server then you should include the
databases (MySQL, Postgresql, etc), web and email data in the backup as well. The backup
should be stored on a external harddisk, on an external server e.g. by FTP or on a cloud drive.
Here are a few examples on how to create backups with tar.
Backup the configuration and data
Configuration files in the /etc directory.
tar -pczf etc.tar.gz /etc
Backup of the /var/www website directory.
tar -pczf www.tar.gz /var/www
Backup of the /home directories.
tar -pczf home.tar.gz /home
For ISPConfig 3 users: Backup of your email server files.
tar -pczf vmail.tar.gz /var/vmail
Backup MySQL databases
mysqldump --defaults-file=/etc/mysql/debian.cnf -cCeQ --hex-blob --quote-names --routines --
events --triggers --all-databases -r all_databases.sql
Then move the tar.gz and .sql files for safe storage on a backup drive.
Check the apt sources.list file
We will install all available Wheezy updates first before we upgrade to Jessie. On some systems
the package source is defined as "stable" in the sources.list file instead of "wheezy" or "jessie".
To avoid an accidential early upgrade to Jessie, please check the sources.list now and ensure
that it contains "wheezy" and not "stable" as source:
Use a commandline editor like nano or vi to open /etc/apt/sources.list, the lines should be
similar to the ones below:
nano /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian wheezy main contrib non-free
deb-src http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian wheezy main contrib non-free
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian wheezy-updates main contrib non-free
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian-security wheezy/updates main contrib non-free
Your country code is most likely not "de", you should use the code of your country here. Using
your country code in the file will speed up the package download.
Update the packages for Wheezy
The following commands will install all pending Wheezy updates. This ensures that your system
is in a good shape for the update to Jessie.
apt-get update
Ready for first upgrade:
apt-get upgrade
Follow this with:
apt-get dist-upgrade
Check the package state to ensure that no packages are on
hold or in half installed state
This test is important, we will check the package state to ensure that no packages are on hold or
in half installed state. Your system and apt database must be in a good shape before we proceed
with the dist upgrade. If there are any broken or "on hold" packages, then fix these issues before
the upgrade.
Check that no packages are on hold by querying the package database with the dpkg command:
dpkg --audit
dpkg --get-selections | grep hold
When both commands did not return any packages, then proceed with the upgrade.
Update the sources.list for Jessie
Edit the /etc/apt/sources.list file again:
nano /etc/apt/sources.list
and replace its content with the following lines:
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
deb-src http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
deb http://httpredir.debian.org/debian jessie-updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://httpredir.debian.org/debian jessie-updates main contrib non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ jessie/updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ jessie/updates main contrib non-free
Choose your nearest locale by replacing "de" with e.g. "us" or your country code. Then save the
file and run the following command to update the sources database:
apt-get update
Jessie Upgrade in two steps
It is recommended to do the upgrade in two steps, first run "apt-get upgrade" to install the base
packages and then run "apt-get dist-upgrade" to do the actual distribution upgrade,
Start with the update by running this command:
apt-get upgrade
Next we will do the distribution upgrade by running:
apt-get dist-upgrade
A reboot is required to finish the upgrade and load the new kernel:
reboot
Check the update
To check which Debian version is currently installed on the system, take a look at the file /etc/os-
release.
cat /etc/os-release
The result on an Debian Jessie system is:
Links
Debian: http://www.debian.org/
