upgrading 4.0 to stable

[F. Even]

>-------------------------------------------------------------
>Adam McLaurin adam.mclaurin at gmx.net 
>Sun Sep 28 20:20:47 PDT 2003 
>
>On Sun, 28 Sep 2003 21:57:04 -0500 (CDT)
>"F. Even" <freebsdlists at elitists.org> wrote:
>
>> I would like to upgrade a 4.0 machine to STABLE, or at least to the
>> RELENG security level.  How difficult will this be?  Is 
>there anything
>> 
>> special that I need to be concerned about, so I don't get bit?  This
>> is kind of an important box....and I don't want it to take a 
>nose-dive
>> 
>> after I reboot it remotely.
>
>The most common advice is to upgrade incrementally. Upgrading 
>directly from 4.0 to 4.8 is likely to encounter problems. 

OK.

>I personally would recommend 4.0 to 4.3, then 4.3 to 4.6.2, 
>then 4.6.2 to 4.8. Check the handbook for the appropriate CVS tags.

I was planning on using CVSup.  Can I use the section on CVS tags for 
this?  This is the page I found, correct?:

http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/cvs-tags.html

>In any case, it is *very* important that you read 
>/usr/src/UPDATING each time you update your source. This will 
>inform you of any special steps you need to take before 
>upgrading to that respective version.
>
>If you're especially paranoid and have plenty of time, you 
>could even do the upgraded in more increments than I 
>recommended. Just be sure to read the UPDATING file each time.

Now what is really recommended?  Assuming I can use the CVS tags for 
CVSup, what should I do?  Can I use the "release" tags?  Like 
RELENG_4_0_0_RELEASE.  Should I?  Should I bother going to a "STABLE" 
version and just update my "RELEASE?"  ...or, should I CVSup my 
machine to every "RELEASE" branch until I get to the current 
one.  ..or should I go directly to the RELENG_4_3 and then upgrade 
every level of that.  I don't really see much in the way of guidance 
in the handbook of what I should do to bring this box to some state of 
being "current."  Hence...my pleading for assistance here.  ;-)  

Thanks for any help.

Frank