Forum OpenACS Development: Support for "Upgrade" mode when running openacs?

I am running into fun when trying to upgrade an existing install.

1) notifications is trying to run, but there apparently are changes in acs-mail-lite data model that are not applied yet
2) I have some local updates to acs-authentication that need to be supported.
3) Problem with new portal requiring new columns to display a portal

These things are all broken if I use the copy new packages over existing install then run APM upgrade.

Would it make sense to allow some sort of aolserver config option to set openacs in "upgrade" mode that will allow the APM to run the upgrades without running shceduled procedures, and possibly ignoring logins or using only local login (easier and slightly more secure).