Will Gnome 2.24 be available in Hardy repos?

[madjr]

anyone who used a LTS (dapper?) before did you get the new gnome in the repos or were you forced to upgrade to a new release?

when i mean repos i mean the binaries (.debs), not manually download and install from source.

i would like to keep hardy around for a few years if at least the new Gnomes are available as binaries updates.

if not then i guess keeping hardy will not be worth it.

Even if they do offer a bunch of security updates for 3 years.

am rather more interested in the bug fixes and tweaks of the new gnome.

bye hardy and welcome intrepid. Your life was short for me.

I always thought an LTS was a system i could keep for 3 years with lots of updated software and specially latest gnome in the repos.

i see now LTS's are no big deal.. it's just another 6 month release.

[FuturePilot]

No. The repos are frozen.

[23meg]

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates

[smbm]

were you forced to upgrade to a new release?

No one is forced to do anything.

[madjr]

No one is forced to do anything.

so, i can get latest binaries for hardy without upgrading?

[smbm]

so, i can get latest binaries for hardy without upgrading?

No, but you're still not being forced to do anything.

EDIT: That being said you could still get binaries by making them yourself but you've already said you're not going to do that.

So it seems you are the one who is forcing yourself to upgrade.

[23meg]

so, i can get latest binaries for hardy without upgrading?

If someone provides them, of course. And of course they won't be supported by Ubuntu, and there will be no guarantee that every piece of your new DE version will work 100% fine with the underlying platform.

Sounds like you want a rolling release distribution, which Ubuntu isn't. It's not like if you upgrade to Intrepid today or any time until September, you'll get the complete GNOME 2.24 release (which doesn't exist) and have a stable working environment anyway.

[madjr]

If someone provides them, of course. And of course they won't be supported by Ubuntu, and there will be no guarantee that every piece of your new DE version will work 100% fine with the underlying platform.

Sounds like you want a rolling release distribution, which Ubuntu isn't. It's not like if you upgrade to Intrepid today or any time until September, you'll get the complete GNOME 2.24 release (which doesn't exist) and have a stable working environment anyway.

ok, what about those service packs for Dapper: 6.04.1 , .2 , etc

what where they for? just security updates?

so LTS = 3 year security updates, nothing else?

LTS had people's hopes up too high, when in reality is just another normal release...

[FuturePilot]

They were security and bug fix updates. LTS means exactly what the name says. Long Term Support. That doesn't mean it will get the latest version of <insert program here> throughout its supported life.

[23meg]

ok, what about those service packs for Dapper: 6.04.1 , .2 , etc

what where they for? just security updates?

They're just respins with all the updates that qualify for the stable release update criteria (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates) pre-applied.


so LTS = 3 year security updates, nothing else?

3 years of support for the Main component that covers all updates that qualify for the SRU criteria.


LTS had people's hopes up too high, when in reality is just another normal release...

It's a normal release with a longer support dedication. One of the two LTS releases so far also had a six week "bug fix only" period added to its development cycle.

And it looks like you're assuming things on behalf of "people" based merely on your experience: as I see it, you had your hopes too high, because you didn't know some of the basics of Ubuntu's development and stable release maintenance principles.

[SunnyRabbiera]

yeh but backports should be availible in my opinion.
If you ask me linux mint has a good idea right now of having a rolling release like update cycle.

[cardinals_fan]

@madjr: You want a rolling-release distro. Ubuntu isn't one. Enough said.

[Perfect Storm]

If you want a rolling release distro I can recommend Arch Linux (i686, amd64)

[cardinals_fan]

if You Want A Rolling Release Distro I Can Recommend Arch Linux (i686, Amd64)
+1

[smartboyathome]

If you want a rolling release distro I can recommend Arch Linux (i686, amd64)

+2

Also, you can backport GNOME 2.24 for yourself when it comes out by using jdong's prevu package. I'll see if I can find his guide.

[forrestcupp]

LTS releases are meant to be a stable release that will last 3 years. They aren't meant to stay cutting edge for those 3 years. They're meant for people who need stability more than the latest and greatest unstable testing stuff.

[Happy_Man]

Besides, I haven't heard anything about anything new and spectacular going on in 2.24 anyway. Hell, 2.22 introduced compositing natively into GNOME, and now that I don't have to run Compiz Fusion just to have my AWN and screenlets, 2.22 is good enough for me to stay with Hardy for a very long time (unless Intrepid has something so spectacular in it I will be forced to upgrade).

[madjr]

@madjr: You want a rolling-release distro. Ubuntu isn't one. Enough said.

thanks for the attitude...

know-it-all's, clearly like to threat less experienced users inferior.

and UF is not a place to discharge your days frustrations upon people.

i only used ubuntu and mint, i come from windows so please try to speak clearly.

ok, what the hell is a rolling release distro?

whats wrong with service packs adding new improvements (like in windows) for the life of the LTS (just 3 years)?

am not asking for new kernel and stuff that can be harmful, just some updated programs and gnome in the repos...

i always thought 6.04.1, etc were like service packs.

isn't windows like an LTS or is it a rolling release? or is it a combination of both?

i mean once intrepid is out, hardy will most likely be outdated and forgotten, except for some security updates.


+2

Also, you can backport GNOME 2.24 for yourself when it comes out by using jdong's prevu package. I'll see if I can find his guide.

i would love binaries, but thanks for the suggestion, i may learn something or make binaries available for the average joe (well maybe just my dad and granma to start with).


yeh but backports should be availible in my opinion.
If you ask me linux mint has a good idea right now of having a rolling release like update cycle.
sounds cool

[23meg]

thanks for the attitude...

know-it-all's, clearly like to threat less experienced users inferior.

You're probably just misinterpreting the tone. I don't think anybody means to treat you as inferior; to speak for myself, I would just prefer it if you did a few searches for the basics and read the links I posted.


i only used ubuntu and mint, i come from windows so please try to speak clearly.

ok, what the hell is a rolling release distro?

But you definitely must have used Google? I found this with it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_release


whats wrong with service packs adding new improvements (like in windows) for the life of the LTS (just 3 years)?

It's not "like in Windows" (see below), but the link (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates) I posted twice explains why:


In contrast to pre-release versions, official releases of Ubuntu are subject to much wider use, and by a different demographic of user. During development, changes to the distribution primarily affect developers, early adopters and other advanced users, all of whom have elected to use pre-release software at their own risk.

Users of the official release, in contrast, expect a high degree of stability. They use their Ubuntu system for their day-to-day work, and problems they experience with it can be extremely disruptive. Many of them are less experienced with Ubuntu and with Linux, and expect a reliable system which does not require their intervention.

Stable release updates are automatically recommended to a very large number of users, and so it is critically important to treat them with great caution. Therefore, when updates are proposed, they must be accompanied by a strong rationale and present a low risk of regressions.


am not asking for new kernel and stuff that can be harmful, just some updated programs and gnome in the repos...

You want backports, or a rolling release distro. The whole GNOME won't be officially backported, but you may be able to backport it yourself, or get others to do it and maintain it in a PPA.


i always thought 6.04.1, etc were like service packs.

And for the most part, they are. Service packs for Windows are collections of security and bug fix updates. They do not introduce any significant amount of new features, as far as I know.


isn't windows like an LTS or is it a rolling release? or is it a combination of both?

It's an entirely different paradigm, and any direct comparison would miss a lot, but in the sense that it only gets security + critical fixes after release, it has basically the same policy as Ubuntu.


i mean once intrepid is out, hardy will most likely be outdated and forgotten, except for some security updates.

For server and workstation use in large institutions, old = stable = good. There's a reason Debian takes years to do a release. Not everyone needs the latest and greatest all the time, and the target market for the LTS releases tend to have support contracts and/or IT departments with which to modify their software for their own use.

[madjr]

thanks 23meg,

about the back-porting, how many apps get backported? just a handful?


.i.e:
lets say i am going to install Ubuntu 8.04 on 100+ computers in an office building. After 6 months, Intrepid is out. and, we're interested in upgrading some software to the newest Evolution, firefox, OOo, gimp, ekiga, wine, tracker, etc, etc.

how can we update these apps without having to install Intrepid on all 100 pc's or having to compile all of these from source ?

we don't really care about new kernels (we're already happy with the current 1), but is essential that our work apps stay updated.

is ubuntu right for our office building or maybe we should look elsewhere (another distro maybe) or even stick with windows?

updating our software has to be kept as simple as possible.

i myself am a big ubuntu fan, but work is work...

[23meg]

about the back-porting, how many apps get backported? just a handful?

The amount of apps that get backported is pretty small. But this has much more to do with available workforce than policy. You can also make your own (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Prevu).


So, We're interested in upgrading to the newest Evolution, firefox, OOo, gimp, ekiga, wine, tracker, etc, etc.

If you're interested in running the latest versions of all these apps all the time (unlike most businesses that do large deployments, which would wait for months and do lots of pre-deployment testing before rolling out new versions or just keep the old ones as long as they do the work), why wouldn't you be interested in running the latest version of the platform itself as well? And as a company that runs more than 100 computers, do you not have an IT department capable of compiling the latest versions of apps as they become available, if or when necessary?

[smartboyathome]

You definately want a rolling release distro. Check out Arch, it should help you in the long run. It will require a bit of a learning curve, but will also save your hardware by being lighter.

[FuturePilot]

Usually in that scenario, you go by "if it ain't broke don't fix it." That's the situation where LTS makes a lot of sense. If a company has a lot of Ubuntu computers, they're probably not going to want to upgrade every 6 months. Especially if the version they use at the time is working perfectly fine. It's too much work and it's too risky. That goes for any OS. There's still companies out there using Windows 2000. Why? Because it works.

[madjr]

And as a company that runs more than 100 computers, do you not have an IT department capable of compiling the latest versions of apps as they become available, if or when necessary?

um, they have a very small it department, they handle mostly hardware related issues.

the install base is basically of win2000/XP

They don't know much about linux and don't know nothing about compiling and stuff.

they're just used to next, next, finish.

anyway, the company is looking into mass upgrading software. Office 2007, windows vista, etc. (OR another alternative :))



why wouldn't you be interested in running the latest version of the platform itself as well?

the problem is they won't be running fresh vanilla ubuntu.

We have to customize the OS to their linkings (install all restricted-extras, flash, drivers, java, setting up printers, the shared folders, different user accounts, passwords, etc.), and this actually takes much, much longer then installing the OS itself.

in fact the fist testing PC took me about 30 hours (and little sleeping) to get it perfect (or i think it is). some other PCs took me like 8 to 12 hours (since i already knew the procedure). Also, the interface and many small things needed some customizing...

upgrading all those computers every 6 months, backing up everything then customizing again can be tedious. Not mentioning, newest kernels may unexpectedly break something, so we're afraid of directly updating.

We're testing windows XP SP3 first before upgrading some of them, we heard of breakage too.

we don't really need to upgrade to latest gnome every 6 months. We may actually skip gnome 2.24 if it doesn't offer too many improvements/bug fixes. We may go for gnome 2.26 or 2.28, but is good to know there will be some binaries around in case we do want to (for easy deployment).

In essence we're looking for: a linux distro like an LTS (long term support), where is painless to install the software we need and when we need it without upgrading the OS every 6 months or yearly.

Ubuntu would be excellent for us if it worked that way. It has almost everything in it's favor, but it's weak spot is probably the back porting.

if ubuntu wants to fix bug #1, then they'll probably have to look more into the backporting.

it's not such a big deal now, but will be in the future.

the big question is: Why can't 8.04 use some of 8.10's, 9.04's, etc. tested and updated packages? the backports repos would grow a lot. There could be a backports-testing repo for non system apps. The ones that work would be added to the normal backports.

back in feisty i remember downloading some apps and dependencies from gutsy packages in packages.ubuntu.com and got the app to work.

but maybe the APT system has some limitations for this? maybe not handling different versions of a dependency? is APT being worked on by someone? is there any way to ask the dev for improvements?

LTS is a great idea (in theory), but we don't know yet if it'll satisfy us the way i mentioned above.

Ubuntu has great potential in meting the necessities of more companies than windows, but still not there yet in some aspects.

meanwhile i'll have to do more researching before i can present a full linux FOSS solution to the company.

oh and sorry for the long response.

[23meg]

um, they have a very small it department, they handle mostly hardware related issues.

the install base is basically of win2000/XP

They don't know much about linux and don't know nothing about compiling and stuff.

they're just used to next, next, finish.

anyway, the company is looking into mass upgrading software. Office 2007, windows vista, etc. (OR another alternative :))

Then, given that they're not willing to retrain, reinforce or replace their IT staff, they shouldn't look into GNU/Linux. At all.



the problem is they won't be running fresh vanilla ubuntu.

We have to customize the OS to their linkings (install all restricted-extras, flash, drivers, java, setting up printers, the shared folders, different user accounts, passwords, etc.), and this actually takes much, much longer then installing the OS itself.

in fact the fist testing PC took me about 30 hours (and little sleeping) to get it perfect (or i think it is). some other PCs took me like 8 to 12 hours (since i already knew the procedure). Also, the interface and many small things needed some customizing...


Customization is a given with any large institutional deployment. There are easy ways to mirror the customized installation to all machines that should save you a lot of time.


upgrading all those computers every 6 months, backing up everything then customizing again can be tedious. Not mentioning, newest kernels may unexpectedly break something, so we're afraid of directly updating.

That's what IT departments are for. It's their job to do exactly these tedious things, regardless of the OS they deploy.


In essence we're looking for: a linux distro like an LTS (long term support), where is painless to install the software we need and when we need it without upgrading the OS every 6 months or yearly.

My point is that "painless" is somewhat relative: painless for whom? For you, or a professional (who should in any case be overseeing the mission critical deployment of any OS to 100+ machines) for whom compiling from source / backporting is a daily task?


the big question is: Why can't 8.04 use some of 8.10's, 9.04's, etc. tested and updated packages? the backports repos would grow a lot. There could be a backports-testing repo for non system apps. The ones that work would be added to the normal backports.

Backports are actually done from the current development version. Some reading: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuBackports


but maybe the APT system has some limitations for this? maybe not handling different versions of a dependency? is APT being worked on by someone? is there any way to ask the dev for improvements?

It's not so much about package management as it is about binary compatibility. Keyword: ABI (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_binary_interface).

[madjr]

Then, given that they're not willing to retrain, reinforce or replace their IT staff, they shouldn't look into GNU/Linux. At all.

Depends on what they go with. If our proposal goes well, then we'll be hiring new staff/training, etc.. in linux

else, if they go with vista/o2007, the changes in staff will be a little bit less drastic. But they'll need some training anyway.




Originally Posted by madjr
upgrading all those computers every 6 months, backing up everything then customizing again can be tedious. Not mentioning, newest kernels may unexpectedly break something, so we're afraid of directly updating.
That's what IT departments are for. It's their job to do exactly these tedious things, regardless of the OS they deploy.

just referring to the short 6 month cycle. We focus more on 3 to 4 years.



Customization is a given with any large institutional deployment. There are easy ways to mirror the customized installation to all machines that should save you a lot of time.

thanks for the tip, was thinking about remaster (if remastersys has been updated).

[madjr]

i just found this thread
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=815869&highlight=rolling

Linuxmint LTS seems similar to what we're looking for. Not 100% but may save us some work and being ubuntu based is a huge +

[sultanoswing]

madjr...just to add a positive note to this thread...all the best, and I hope the conversion works out for you and your organisation. There are certainly many large organisations running linux in its various forms. It's different, sure, but doable.

Mirrored, scripted intallations and updates are all possible, and a 3-4 year cycle is certainly achievable if you plan well i.e. target which apps need updating when, and way you go. There is no point to update unless a feature is needed or a bug fix provided - not at an organisational level at least. Leave the burning edge stuff to home users where it's not mission critical. The most important updates are security anyway, and that is provided by LTS.

My humble advice would be to stick with an LTS distro (such as Hardy), and develop a startegic plan for targeted updates, which should be MUCH less disruptive and work-intensive, yet provide exactly what it sounds like you're lookinging for.

QED.

[sultanoswing]

madjr...just to add a positive note to this thread...all the best, and I hope the conversion works out for you and your organisation. There are certainly many large organisations running linux in its various forms. It's different, sure, but doable.

Mirrored, scripted installations and updates are all possible, and a 3-4 year cycle is certainly achievable if you plan well i.e. target which apps need updating when, and way you go. There is no point to update unless a feature is needed or a bug fix provided - not at an organisational level at least. Leave the burning edge stuff to home users where it's not mission critical. The most important updates are security anyway, and that is provided by LTS. A rolling release distribution might sound good, but they come with their own bleeding edge problems too - sudden breakages (just ask anyone who's run gentoo). A fundamental paradigm applies to O/S's: stability is inversely proportional to cutting edge. It all depends where you see your organisation's needs along that continuum :)

My humble advice would be to stick with an LTS distro (such as Hardy), and develop a strategic plan for targeted updates, which should be MUCH less disruptive and work-intensive, yet provide exactly what it sounds like you're looking for.

QED.

[forrestcupp]

Maybe it has already been mentioned, I didn't see it, but you can get more software package updates by enabling the right repos. If you go to System->Administration->Software Sources and click on the Updates tab, you can check the Pre-released updates and Unsupported updates boxes, and you'll get more updates. That's about the closest you can get to making Ubuntu like a rolling release distro. Also, a lot of software packages, like Wine, have their own 3rd party repos that you can add. If you add their repos, you'll automatically be updated as soon as there is an update to that program.

[23meg]

If you go to System->Administration->Software Sources and click on the Updates tab, you can check the Pre-released updates and Unsupported updates boxes, and you'll get more updates. That's about the closest you can get to making Ubuntu like a rolling release distro.

"Pre-released updates" activates the -proposed repository, which is for people who intend to test updates before they are rolled out to the wider public. It should not be used for any other purpose, and will not give you any newer versions outside the SRU policy anyway.

"Unsupported updates" activates the backports repository.

[exploder]

Something that I did not see mentioned in this thread is that it is possible to update some applications from getdeb.net. A good example would be the Gimp. I was able to upgrade Gimp to the 2.4.7 version through getdeb. The newer version had some bug fixes and updating something like this is reasonably safe. When I say reasonably safe I mean that if things go wrong it will not take the whole system down and things can easily be put back like they were if necessary.

Newer version numbers do not necessarily mean better applications. A good example of this is Transmission, currently the the newer versions are considered by many to be less stable than the version that shipped with Hardy. This is a case of, if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Gnome 2.24 will have some remaining bugs, Gnome 2.22 is at 2.22.3, so it took at little while to get the bugs out. Gnome 2.24 will more than likely be the same because once in wide scale use people will find things that need attention.

Certainly Gnome 2.24 has some nice features like tabs in Nautilus but are you or your user's going to use that feature enough to justify a wide scale upgrade? Probably not. The advantage of the LTS release is that it will work and it is slowly refined in a careful way.The LTS release has workarounds for problems and "How To's" in place that are going to be around for a few years.

Just my two cents.

[scorp001]

YES you can update parts...

I just gave this a shot and I shall be following this route - I am using Hardy here and have used intrepid repo to just upgrade parts of gnome 2.24 and it itself will give you the others parts which need to be updated as well.

deb http://fr.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu intrepid main universe

or use other repos

I have pretty much ruined my home system upgrading to intrepid - so since i have already switched to fluxbox+gdm at both home and work - I just need to update parts as I go along till say another 3 4 months and update if required to intrepid.

With Hardy I noticed that release product probably is too bleeding edge and wont work right on many system but it is like a catch 22 situation.

The amount of work that has gone into making ubuntu happen is something we cannot imagine - i have all my compliments to all concerned - but IMHO we need to slow down a bit...

cheers

[Saint Angeles]

you can just run "sudo update-manager -d" to update to intrepid, without having to reinstall fresh.

of course, some people have problems with that so... good luck. Linux Mint as mentioned above might be worth looking into.

[hotdoog]

I have to agree that from the new users point of view... (((And that is the point of Ubuntu isn't it? to win over more non-free software users with a well designed easy to use simple system...))) that from the new users point of view the LTS policy at the moment seems like a trick, like something promising something but not delivering.

In the M$******* world software are not that well integrated with each other. That causes all sorts of problems. But, one benefit is that you have the freedom to install what you want on it --- be it free software or not. You wouldn't install an old version of Photoshop in XP and a newer version in Vista. You would of course install the newest version you could get wherever you could put it. Maybe for an older version like Win2000 to make it it work, sure. But we're talking 6 months here vs 9 years. Even the "rush" from Vista to *******7 is a lot longer than 6 months. It is a VERY significant downside to free software if the underlying OS is sooo tied into the software sitting atop it that you can't upgrade one without the other.

After all, this has little to do with software being free. This is a design philosophy of having well integrated software. There are major benefits to that over ******* no doubt. IMHO however, too much integration contradicts the foundational Unix philosophy of a simple program that does what it does well and not a bunch of other stuff badly. (((huge fan of bash scripts)))

Gnome is a really interesting project and totally central to Ubuntu. Gnome takes away options from the user, to make it simpler. This gives the user the option of not being so flustered that they almost quit.(((Like I did when I tried KDE in Knoppix as a newbie before I had heard of Ubuntu 5.10))) This makes sense because Ubuntu/Linux is so powerful. We have multiple soundservers, videoservers, all levels of networking tools, virtual machines, desktops, emulators... we could run a supercomputer with the same OS we might run on a tiny portable device. (((and people do, I swap out hardware under my OS even the processor/Mobo in and out of virtualbox no problem))) TheGNU/Linux is the bees knees OS that can do everything. That power is intimidating and confusing to the newbie/******* convert. So it makes sense to simplify the GUI tremendously like Gnome and take options away. It's not about Freedom of software, it's about user friendly simplicity, reduction of clutter, that will have the eventual result Gnome->Ubuntu->winning new users to free software in progress.

However, that simplicity/reducing options design philosophy of Ubuntu/Gnome is a catch 22. Too many things are tied together to do a simple update of something minor. This makes it user-unfriendly. This means that the point of simplifying gets defeated.

For example myself, I've been having a hard time with my email. It's way too long a story for hearing here, but the result is I finally was relieved to discover this Gmail/Evolution integration guide (http://linux.com/feature/154875)that was going to finally after all that effort allow me to get what I needed done. I followed the instructions after I previewed them. It was all going so well until...:( The contact book Google option is missing. What version of Evolution is this guide? Oh, Intrepid. 2.24. Mine says 2.22. I was crushed.

Basically there is no way of updating Evolution without updating Gnome. A new Gnome basically means a new Ubuntu. Just to get the damn email address synchronisation feature to work I have to upgrade my whole OS away from the LTS onto the less-stable version??? In a world that was kind an just you would just get the software that is relevant to what you are doing (not even the whole address book program but the sync scripts/wizard) and you would have not to break a sweat. But the damn evolution/gnome/ubuntu triad. Grrr...

In short, we need to look at the Ubuntu policies of simplifying/integration for user friendliness/easy adoption to see if they aren't self defeating! I get frustrated and so do you.

I know that it's all free and we could figure out another way to do it (I will have to) but if we have ANY hope of advancing free software we have to admit where it is frustrating US!

;)

Infinite Thanks to all the people making all this Free Stuff possible for Free!

[hotdoog]

Wow, for all my whining...

I went over to getdeb after writing and came across Conduit 0.3.14 and voila... sorta works! Well, actually it is pretty messy but maybe if I fiddle with it - it certainly got some data off gmail and put it in evolution - though certainly not all of it.

Anyway, I don't have to upgrade to Intrepid just to do this (yet) YAY!:P

Hooray for getdeb!