Update Manager - Green Tick/Blue Info Circle conditions

[mattmatician]

I have the "Let me review sensitive updates" policy on the Update Manager. So typically, after performing a software upgrade I am left with only the Linux Kernel to update.

Given my policy, would this not be sufficient to earn the Green Tick on the update manager logo in the menu bar? But since, the kernel has an outstanding update, I have the Blue Info Circle instead.

Part of my thinks that this has only started happening since the update to 18.3 Sylvia, I may be mistaken in my memory though.

My concern is that people will start to ignore the Update Manager's Blue Info Circle if it appears to exist even after updates are carried out.

[Cosmo.]

There are in the options part of the preferences settings for security and kernel updates. If they are activated, they will overwrite the level settings for those updates. It sounds, as if you have them ticked.

[gtmaskall]

I'm not sure that really answers the question. I've just upgraded to 18.3 and seem to see the same thing. I only have a handful of level 4 updates (including mesa, nvidia-graphics-drivers-384, systemd). They are not selected, just shown. Normally I would consider them for future selection, close the update manager, and the shield would change to display a tick with the green background ("You have seen updates and there's nothing new" kinda thing). Now it stays blue. If a new level 3 update were to come out, I'd miss seeing a notification.

For me, this boils down to "What's a good strategy for managing updates?" Checking periodically and reviewing? But why change so that the blue circle remains pretty much all the time (unless you select every level 4 update available). This does seem different behaviour since 18.2. How are we meant/encouraged to use the update manager and its notifications?

[mwbworld]

I'm not sure that really answers the question. I've just upgraded to 18.3 and seem to see the same thing. I only have a handful of level 4 updates (including mesa, nvidia-graphics-drivers-384, systemd). They are not selected, just shown. Normally I would consider them for future selection, close the update manager, and the shield would change to display a tick with the green background ("You have seen updates and there's nothing new" kinda thing). Now it stays blue. If a new level 3 update were to come out, I'd miss seeing a notification.

For me, this boils down to "What's a good strategy for managing updates?" Checking periodically and reviewing? But why change so that the blue circle remains pretty much all the time (unless you select every level 4 update available). This does seem different behaviour since 18.2. How are we meant/encouraged to use the update manager and its notifications?

Yup. I noticed that as well. it's a definite change from 18.2. There are two level 4 that I'm not installing because they carry a warning that they either not for more current systems like mine or for a different processor.

[gtmaskall]

My current approach to keeping the update notification "tidy" is to deselect the view of level 4 and kernel updates. Even if such updates are available, this then turns the notification icon back to a green tick. This means "hiding" certain levels of update so you have to go explicitly looking for them. You can't ignore some but then get notification of future updates to different packages.

[Sir Charles]

I have all the update levels toggled but I have disabled the Update Manager to run at upstart. I run it manually once or twice a day to check if any updates are available. After each check and possible updating, I turned it off once again.

[jsb]

I'm not sure that really answers the question. I've just upgraded to 18.3 and seem to see the same thing. I only have a handful of level 4 updates (including mesa, nvidia-graphics-drivers-384, systemd). They are not selected, just shown. Normally I would consider them for future selection, close the update manager, and the shield would change to display a tick with the green background ("You have seen updates and there's nothing new" kinda thing). Now it stays blue. If a new level 3 update were to come out, I'd miss seeing a notification.

For me, this boils down to "What's a good strategy for managing updates?" Checking periodically and reviewing? But why change so that the blue circle remains pretty much all the time (unless you select every level 4 update available). This does seem different behaviour since 18.2. How are we meant/encouraged to use the update manager and its notifications?

Yup. I noticed that as well. it's a definite change from 18.2. There are two level 4 that I'm not installing because they carry a warning that they either not for more current systems like mine or for a different processor.

Thanks at least I know this is a (poor, imo) new feature, not a bug. If we're meant to install all level 4 updates and all kernal updates, then shouldn't the update policy for everyone be to always update everything?

Recently upgraded a laptop from 17.3 to 18.3 and was wondering if something had gone wrong with that, due to the update manager icon never changing to a check mark. Due to this change I've also chosen to deselect the view of level 4 and kernel updates.

[gm10]

If we're meant to install all level 4 updates and all kernal updates, then shouldn't the update policy for everyone be to always update everything?

Yep, that's why the levels aren't even shown by default in LM 19 and all the filter options are getting removed in LM 19.2.

[jsb]

If we're meant to install all level 4 updates and all kernal updates, then shouldn't the update policy for everyone be to always update everything?

Yep, that's why the levels aren't even shown by default in LM 19 and all the filter options are getting removed in LM 19.2.

Interesting, so it'll be "always update everything" for everyone. After some further reading, I see the idea is to use "timeshift" to fix problems that occur after updates. I've not used that, I guess it's time to start doing so.