# Safely Updating and Upgrading a Production VPS Server with Backup Plan

I noticed there was upgradable packages on the VPS Server I run. Since this is the one hosting BookStack Publicly on my Website, I wanted to treat this with as much caution as possible.

I wanted to check what was upgradable:

```bash
app list --upgradable
```

[![2025-05-17 18_48_27-Task Scheduler.png](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/scaled-1680-/D8uMSnPG6qGdklvS-2025-05-17-18-48-27-task-scheduler.png)](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/D8uMSnPG6qGdklvS-2025-05-17-18-48-27-task-scheduler.png)  
  
I leveraged AI to take a look at the packages that were upgradable and get a better understanding for my approach:

<table id="bkmrk-category-safe-to-upd"><thead><tr><th>Category</th><th>Safe to Update?</th><th>Notes</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>`cloud-init`</td><td>✅ Yes</td><td>Handles initial cloud setup. Updating is safe and common.</td></tr><tr><td>`grub-efi-*`</td><td>⚠️ Yes, with caution</td><td>These are bootloader packages. Safe **but** be cautious on production VMs. A reboot is required after update.</td></tr><tr><td>`libldap-*`</td><td>✅ Yes</td><td>Core system libraries. These affect services using LDAP but are safe to upgrade.</td></tr><tr><td>`monarx-agent`</td><td>✅ Yes</td><td>This is a Hostinger security monitoring agent. Regularly updated.</td></tr><tr><td>`php8.1-*`</td><td>✅ Yes</td><td>You’re using a PPA (`deb.sury.org`) for PHP — updates are fine and likely beneficial. Restart PHP-FPM afterward.</td></tr></tbody></table>

I decided that the quick reboot wouldn't take long and services on my site aren't in need of scheduling a time for a reboot so I went ahead and did this while keeping an eye on the Cardinals game. If this were a critical system with many users operating on it, I would schedule a time to do these upgrades and restart (After-Hours) or wait until a need.  
  
I took a snapshot of my server before running the upgrades:

[![2025-05-17 18_50_13-Overview _ Hostinger — Mozilla Firefox.png](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/scaled-1680-/r8fydJEbFzDApH8a-2025-05-17-18-50-13-overview-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/r8fydJEbFzDApH8a-2025-05-17-18-50-13-overview-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)

[![2025-05-17 18_51_36-Snapshots & Backups _ Hostinger — Mozilla Firefox.png](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/scaled-1680-/C7FngTF2xwZR6l0Q-2025-05-17-18-51-36-snapshots-backups-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/C7FngTF2xwZR6l0Q-2025-05-17-18-51-36-snapshots-backups-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)[![2025-05-17 18_53_07-Snapshots & Backups _ Hostinger — Mozilla Firefox.png](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/scaled-1680-/fOW9Pgk3j1re4zs5-2025-05-17-18-53-07-snapshots-backups-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)](https://docs.natenetworks.com/uploads/images/gallery/2025-05/fOW9Pgk3j1re4zs5-2025-05-17-18-53-07-snapshots-backups-hostinger-mozilla-firefox.png)

After the snapshot was complete, I went ahead with the update:

```bash
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade -y
```

I Ticked the boxes to restart services (PHP, MySQL, Etc)  
Then I used:

```bash
sudo reboot
```

I waited for the server to come back online and made sure that php, mysql, was all up and running.

SUCCESS!!