Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model [LWN.net]

Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model

Posted Mar 1, 2013 12:34 UTC (Fri) by fdrs (subscriber, #85858) [Link]

I guess that's a very strong point.
I think the new user should really be using LTS, but, they to need to find a way to keep applications updated. Not the whole stack, but things like Inkscape, Gimp, Firefox, Chromium, Blender, etc...
Nowadays, if a graphics enthusiast comes to Ubuntu, and wanna try the latest version of Gimp, for example, he must:
- Get away from LTS
- Search for a PPA (too much work, lots of options.. which one do I choose)
- Download tarball from gimp.org website (completely bypass the package manager and makes things harder).
LTS users should have an 'oficial' way to use new applications. They already have the tools for that: ppa´s ..
They just need to sort things out
It´s doable, and, a rolling release + LTS (with updated _applications_) is a way better way (and more natural to users that don´t wanna update the system each 6 months)

Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model

Posted Mar 1, 2013 17:38 UTC (Fri) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link]

The LTS model puts Canonical in a bit of a pickle strategically.

If Canonical really was competing with Red Hat on server iron, LTS made some sense.

But for a push into mobile? Working with OEMs who are pushing new devices into the retail market every year? Competing with Android which is revving out production capable releases on a yearly basis.

I really don't think mobile OEMs are going to want to sit on LTS releases.
I realise that Canonical is gearing up for the next LTS release to be very important for their mobile push...but then what. That LTS release is going to show its age within a year and OEMs moving new product will expect interface enhancements to keep showing up. I don't think the LTS model is geared to deliver what OEMs need.

We sort of saw this happen in their netbook push. OEMs didn't sit on the LTS release.

Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model

Posted Mar 2, 2013 10:21 UTC (Sat) by jospoortvliet (subscriber, #33164) [Link]

This is how openSUSE solved it: software.opensuse.org + one-click-install. A bit similar to PPA but better integrated as it is a part of our development workflos (oS builds its distro in a kind of github way).

Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model

Posted Mar 3, 2013 8:18 UTC (Sun) by misc (subscriber, #73730) [Link]

Yeah, everybody want to have up to date userspace, because there is some percentage of the user base who want it. Then, you also want newest kernel, because, there is new hardware to support. And of course, some new software requires new libraries, so you have to update them. So in the end, you end up updating almost everything, except glibc, and some low level plumbing.

Ubuntu discussing moving to LTS + rolling release model

Posted Mar 3, 2013 17:44 UTC (Sun) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]

That's not necessarily a bad thing. I think the fear of version number updates should be continuously re-evaluated to see if it makes sense, for a lot of software it doesn't. Software can have regular stable updates without breaking the world, browsers have been pretty successful and I'd argue that the kernel is fairly successful as well. Just because it's a "rolling release" doesn't mean that the version updates have to be uncontrolled, and what gets updated depends on how well the upstream community values stability.

If there aren't too many regressions and ABI stability then why not update and get the most bug-fixes rather than aggressively back-porting changes just to keep the number the same? Keeping ABI stability might also help protect you from dependency hell where everything is constantly being churned and broken, since it limits the amount of change you can do.