Is it possible to migrate already deployed Raspberry Pi devices to A/B OS updates remotely?

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1

Hi,

I have Rasp Pi4 devices i.e already deployed and they are running a official RaspPi OS 64bit lite image (single rootfs, no A/B) and are accessible via another remote access tool so I can access those pi’s remotely

Now I want to move to Mender with full A/B rootfs and OS OTA updates, without losing existing data on the devices is that even supported or possible?

If yes, is there any recommended way to migrate these devices remotely to an A/B Mender setup (for example using some in-memory / overlay / one-time migration approach), or is physical reprovisioning (SD card swap / reflash) the only safe option? so I can plan the migration correctly.

Thanks,

Sushil

2

Hi @sushil,

Once the word “safe” is involved then yes sorry, swapping the SD cards respectively reflashing is the only reasonable approach. Live repartitioning a system, exchanging the bootloader and root filesystem in one go can probably be done, but it’s a giant single point of failure so under no circumstances recommended, especially not on a piece of hardware with basically no safety nets, fallback or recovery options such as a Raspberry Pi.

Greetz,
Josef

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