Mintupdates for grandma

[madwoollything]

LMDE is just great!!

I'd like to be able to automate the mintupdate process for a laptop which a relative is using.

If I knew what the command was for selecting the updates which are displayed in the mintupdate gui, then I could automate this process in a weekly cron job.

It would be nice to be able select the priority 1,2 and maybe 3 updates automatically.

Thanks

[kwevej]

This could work:

Code: Select all

#!/bin/bash
apt update -qq && apt dist-upgrade -y -q

or you can use debdelta to save some bandwidth, which I'd recommend:

Code: Select all

#!/bin/bash
apt update -qq && (debdelta-upgrade; apt dist-upgrade -y -q)

(requires 'debdelta' package installed)

chmod +x it, place it to the PATH
and put into cron

you can make some error logging too

Code: Select all

#!/bin/bash
LOG=/var/log/mupdates.log
apt update -qq 2>> $LOG && (debdelta-upgrade; apt dist-upgrade -y -qq 2>> $LOG )

[gotjazz]

Although that way lvl 4 and 5 updates would also be included which isn't something the OP wanted. Akthough those levels and everything are still in ubuntu-mode so to say so that might even be better so I'd do it like kwevej explained. Although if it was my grandmother I'd switch her repos to point to squeeze instead of testing

[madwoollything]

Although that way lvl 4 and 5 updates would also be included which isn't something the OP wanted. Akthough those levels and everything are still in ubuntu-mode so to say so that might even be better so I'd do it like kwevej explained. Although if it was my grandmother I'd switch her repos to point to squeeze instead of testing

I like the idea of pointing the repos at squeeze rather than testing however will this breaking the 'rolling' capability of LMDE if I do this?

[gotjazz]

yeah well it will of course. but does grandma really care?

[madwoollything]

yeah well it will of course. but does grandma really care?

Probably not but I'm looking for a system setup that is easy to maintain.

I look after a number of boxes and a rolling distro sounds easier to maintain that the alternative of reinstalling LTS Ubuntu every couple of years, as the upgrade process has not worked successfully yet.

[gotjazz]

hrm well i'd prefer the lts route (or debian stable) - a couple of years is a couple of years and while testing isn't exactly known for wild breakage I could imagine little problems that do come up being more frequent than lts releases reaching the end of their life-cycle.

THat's a pure guess though.

[madwoollything]

What do you think of a standard LMDE install but instead of using mintupdate on a regular basis (as Grandma won't want too) using say 'unattended-upgrades' in a weekly cron job?

Would this keep the system secure but also stable (ish)?