Rolling release schedule in Canonical's near future?

[Bill36027]

An interesting read;

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/14 ... g-releases

[viking777]

Well I wouldn't mind, in fact I would prefer it, as long as it was properly maintained. However the best bit about that link is the "rolling release semantics" sublink it contains - it absolutely cracked me up that one

I get this vision of a bunch of beardies sitting around a dingy room at 4am arguing vociferously over the relative merits of psuedo-rolling versus cyclic-rolling, assuming they can agree the definition of each one in the first place that is - priceless

[Orbmiser]

relative merits of psuedo-rolling versus cyclic-rolling,

They forgot the fork of those with cyclic-pseudo rolling release.
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[exploder]

I saw this this morning and I kind of like the idea.

http://arstechnica.com/information-tech ... ase-cycle/

Ubuntu has gotten much better lately at providing updated software for their releases and I kind of like the idea of a rolling release until the next LTS arrives. I understand that this is only in the discussion stages right now but it would be nice if it became a reality. Canonical is going to update the kernel for the 12.04 LTS, this is a first for them and it suggests to me that a rolling release is possible.

This could also be good for distributions that are built from Ubuntu like Mint. Also, this could make upgrading from one release to another less problematic because everything would not be so out of date. At any rate, what are your thoughts on this?

[Orbmiser]

I would love rolling tho wary of ubuntu as even recommend upgrade process I still see a lot of breakage out there with others.
Don't know how many times I see "Upgrade borked my setup" threads.

Instead of wasting time now fixing broken issues with updates.
I do snapshots of partitions once a week just in case kind of thing.

With debian it appears is less issues and breakage with rolling?
Have no extensive knowledge just the impressions I get reading around.
And wonder to how well Conical can implement such a drastic change from the old way of doing it.

And done smooth & well can only help promote linux in the mainstream.
And eliminate one of the beefs that others have about linux.
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[altair4]

So are they trying to make things difficult for Mint? Can't think of a better way to spend time than basing your distro on a moving target. So does this force Mint to do what it does with LMDE? Hold back on updates until it figures out if something messes up the Mint customizations?

Ever since using PCLinuxOS I am not impressed with the idea of a rolling release. It gets further and further away from the idea that a distro is a product vs a collection of independent software projects that at any given moment depending on their individual development cycles may or may not play well together.

[KBD47]

I think this is a horrible idea. Ubuntu has a hard enough time keeping the LTS releases from breaking with updates.
http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/ ... 90183.html

[catweazel]

I think this is a horrible idea. Ubuntu has a hard enough time keeping the LTS releases from breaking with updates.

Any issues people might have with a rolling release are easilly fixed with a bit of sleight of hand and some smoke and mirrors. The installer can have a checkbox that says "Install as a rolling release". If the user doesn't check the checkbox then the update manager wakes up every six months instead of every 15 minutes

[MALsPa]

Ubuntu's LTS releases have been good here -- I've been running them since 6.06, and will probably keep doing so as long as they continue to work out.

A rolling release model between LTS releases. Basically, a two-year release cycle, while keeping things more up-to-date than what we see now with LTS releases. If that's the case, I think it would be a good idea.

[bimsebasse]

All for it. The interesting thing will be how it affects Mint's Cinnamon edition.

A new OS every 6 months is daft, and always was. There's a 3 year gap roughly between major Windows releases and a 1-2 year gap between OS X releases - much saner.

But it won't be rolling in the strictest sense, it'll just be rolling between LTS editions.

[Suo_Eno]

@bimsebasse
Agreed. I've always wondered about the same "what's with the LTS and the other 6 month release base?" dilemma. Plus how hard would it be to just reorg the same 2 way into proper same release numbering w/ LTS (needs better and improved bugs solving than the current situation obviously) and the roller just as periodically built ISOs like the way those ArchBang or Manjaro guys do things?

[Brahim]

I saw this this morning and I kind of like the idea.

http://arstechnica.com/information-tech ... ase-cycle/

Ubuntu has gotten much better lately at providing updated software for their releases and I kind of like the idea of a rolling release until the next LTS arrives. I understand that this is only in the discussion stages right now but it would be nice if it became a reality. Canonical is going to update the kernel for the 12.04 LTS, this is a first for them and it suggests to me that a rolling release is possible.

This could also be good for distributions that are built from Ubuntu like Mint. Also, this could make upgrading from one release to another less problematic because everything would not be so out of date. At any rate, what are your thoughts on this?

You mean like LMDE that would deliver a death blow to Linux!! Rolling releases are not stable enough for average users!Ihave tried LMDE and Debian and gave up on them. I converted to Linux Mint main edition because it is rock-solid and reliable Now I think this rolling thing is a killjoy! I think I'll have to say goodbye to Linux forever

[bimsebasse]

Brahim, the LTS releases will still be there and they will be the proper releases, with names. The rolling in between is for testers, developers and people who want the newest.

[Monsta]

Well, no wonder they're thinking about it - they've got only eight letters left until the end of the alphabet!

[MALsPa]

You mean like LMDE that would deliver a death blow to Linux!! Rolling releases are not stable enough for average users!Ihave tried LMDE and Debian and gave up on them. I converted to Linux Mint main edition because it is rock-solid and reliable Now I think this rolling thing is a killjoy! I think I'll have to say goodbye to Linux forever

I don't know about LMDE, but Debian Stable is not "rolling," and it's about as rock-solid and reliable as it gets, so no worries about this being a death blow to Linux.

PCLinuxOS is considered a "true" rolling-release distro, right? Seems to work out fine, or it did for me. Seems to be good for "average users" (whatever an "average user" is).

I've been running Sabayon, another rolling-release distro, here for several months; it seems to be holding up fine so far.

[MALsPa]

If this comes to pass, I wonder how Clem will see it, and if he'll want to finally move Mint away from being based on Ubuntu.

[KBD47]

but my understanding is, if they do it, starting about 14.04 they would be using a rolling release model with no 6 month releases, those updates would be pushed into the regular release. Right now Ubuntu breaks constantly with updates, check their forum at any hour any day of the week. My own experience is last week regular updates to my 12.04 install broke Unity. There is no way more updates can mean less breakage with Ubuntu. Consider my 12.04 install was only supposed to get safe updates as an lts but it still broke--how can more updates make that situation better? I just don't see it for a future Ubuntu.
If Ubuntu does this, I hope for main Mint the devs are keeping in mind the word "fork" or just going with a very polished, updated stable version of Debian.
I suspect Canonical are going to do it, and are testing the waters for reaction: http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/379507/u...e-only-an-idea

[viking777]

Ubuntu breaks constantly with updates

Neither Ubuntu nor Mint have broken with an update for years on my systems and I suck in every single update I can find. Anyway there is a simple rule with Linux - all versions - even debian stable:

disk/partition images = bye bye breakages

If you don't want to follow that rule you'll just have to live with the breakages you're so adept at finding.

[KBD47]

Ubuntu breaks constantly with updates

Neither Ubuntu nor Mint have broken with an update for years on my systems and I suck in every single update I can find. Anyway there is a simple rule with Linux - all versions - even debian stable:

disk/partition images = bye bye breakages

If you don't want to follow that rule you'll just have to live with the breakages you're so adept at finding.

Ahh, one of the lucky few Have you tried running Debian Sid/Unstable? How did that work out for you? Take Sid and add in Ubuntu's own issues and you will have a pretty good picture of the suggested idea.

[viking777]

I ran LMDE for a long time, so I would never quibble with the argument that rolling releases are less stable than point releases, it just depends on your luck, your strategy for using linux, your definition of stability, and your ability to fix things, and that varies enormously between individuals. But if you follow my rule above it doesn't matter how unlucky or unskilled you are, you NEVER experience breakages for longer than about 3 minutes - which is how long it takes to reload a disk image with qt4-fsarchiver.

I just don't know why people don't get this, the tools are there, they are free, and in the case of qt4, pretty easy to use (less so for clonezilla). If people choose not to take advantage of them then they either don't understand Linux or they are using debian stable and believe me I have done that as well and you don't want to be doing that.

The other simple strategy for using Linux is dual booting - and I don't mean with windows. If one distro breaks you use the other in the meantime or you use the other to fix the broken one.

Personally I recommend both strategies in parallel.