I use slapt-get [1] for upgrades ....
[1] - https://software.jaos.org/
Yes, gg was using slapt -u and slapt --upgrade. First try, he did an upgrade on the Slackware build used for the November 30th builds BUT ended up with the kernel version 4.14.47 dated May 2018 and "modules" dated May 30, 2018. This seemed to be wrong already since neither the kernel or modules had changed. Then when he ran "startx", the graphics card lost its configuration -- the keyboard interface died but the kernel continued for a little longer but then died too. So it was dead. Next he started from scratch with an install of Slackware from the original CD ISO of the current 14.2 release of June 2016 and then did an upgrade. This seemed to work correctly. We will see what happens in the Cinelerra build on December 31.
In the past he has been able to install Slackware from the CD and upgrade 2 times and then not a third or ever again. Starting a fresh install every 2-3 months is too time-consuming as it takes a whole day. We will see if this latest upgrade fixes some unknown problem preventing multiple upgrades.
Yeah, strange bug, I looked into slackbuild provided in blds dir, it looks sane ...
Thanks for checking -- it is good to have someone look that is much more knowledgable in Slackware. gg/phyllis