[SAGE] Change control and patching for Linux

[Jim Ankenbrandt <jim.ankenbrandt@xxxxxxxxx>]

I work for a bank in the American mid-west.  Our data security group has 
handed down a ruling that we need to begin a routine patching process. 
Joy.  By routine they mean a log of patches considered, reasons they 
where rejected or passed, and a defined process to follow when 
installing the patches.  This will be subject to audit by the Fed's and  
our internal  groups.

Our environment is that we are running Red Hat Linux supporting Oracle 
10g  RAC clusters.  The problem is that by the time we start a migration 
from the certification cluster, test cluster, disaster recovery cluster, 
to production cluster patches may have been outdated. What with change 
windows, meetings with DBA's and sign offs it may take close to a month 
to complete this path. Up2date is too blunt a tool, we cannot have 
different levels on different clusters.  We are considering installing 
yum and defining our own repositories, but any experience or group 
insight would be welcome

Jim Ankenbrandt