Ubuntu 23.04 Lunar Lobster scuttles into public view

Ubuntu 23.04, codenamed Lunar Lobster, has crawled out of beta and onto public release today. The latest reincarnation of Canonical's widely used Linux operating system brings with it a number of added features and some refinements ranging from improvements to the standard desktop interface and Snap package manager to some …

[David 132]

"Pause" updates?

FTFA: "But if you're worried about a silent update bricking your apps, there is a toggle to pause these updates if desired.

Pause? But not "disable"?

Is this Ubuntu's version of Microsoft's "You can turn off the firewall / Defender / Updates for a short time, but don't worry, we'll automatically turn it back on for you" - to which the response from me is usually along the lines of "Not while I bloody well draw breath, you won't, you arrogant tw_ts, if I turn it off I am perfectly capable of turning it back on when I, and only I, want to do so" ?

Apart from that, LL looks interesting. I may well check it out. Thanks for the heads-up.

[Gene Cash]

Re: "Pause" updates?

That's ok, it's got systemd which is an infestation of a different kind.

I noticed that Raspberry Pi OS no longer lets you disable systemd and install sysv-init. It bricks it.

So I now have half a dozen Pis in a drawer, and one on my garage wall that's not going to get updated.

[David 132]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Bricks? In the literal, "the hardware is unrecoverable" meaning of the term?

Wow. That's a new low for systemd if so.

[jgarbo]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Guess I'll stay with MX21, no systemd, no snap, flatpak if I ask, Plasma on top, Debian under the hood. ;-)

[coredump]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Echo this. I'm still mostly running Debian but my foray into MX Linux (after reading Liam's review write-up) was a good experience. It's a good combination of the better parts of Debian without the worst bits.

It's also very pretty. :-) Almost too much so.

[cookieMonster]

Re: "Pause" updates?

“ So I now have half a dozen Pis in a drawer, and one on my garage wall that's not going to get updated.”

Sounds like a good thing, considering the alternative

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Fwiw rpi4 is reasonably well supported by BSD too. I'm running FreeBSD 13.2 on an rpi4/8GB now and it's a nice little server.

Whether it's a fit for you depends on your needs, e.g. I'm using the pi as DNS, NTP, SMTP, etc. server, same sort of duties I have for small x86 with FreeBSD around the home network. No systemD, not even an option.

If OTOH you're using the pi as a gadget driver with cameras and Lego's and other fun stuff, BSD might not be the best OS for your projects. Some of the HAT's just work as expected, maybe even a lot, but I've personally only used the Serial HAT so ymmv. Other stuff like onboard wifi isn't there yet.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Well, there's a reason why Ubuntu is known as "Windows amongst Linuxes". And that's not just because of the often stupid bugs.

On the other side, if you come from Windows then the Ubuntu experience might be a lot more "Windows" like than with other Linux distros.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "Pause" updates?

Yes. IME some of the grousing about Ubuntu is more properly called grousing about Canonical and their attempts to market, lock-in, etc. like Microsoft has historically done.

[Kevin McMurtrie]

Desktop versus server

Every Ubuntu desktop major update: Start update, Wait a few minutes, Reboot, Use computer

Every Ubuntu server major update: Start update...

What do you want to do about the modified configuration file [everything in /etc/]?

- install the package maintainer's empty template

- keep the local version that no longer works

- show the differences between the versions with incomprehensible markup and line wrapping

- do a 3-way merge between available versions and crash

...spend rest of day fixing server.

[David 132]

Re: Desktop versus server

Shudder... if ever a comment needed a trigger warning...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Desktop versus server

... spend the next morning re-installing from scratch with Debian and never looking back.

[Sudosu]

Re: Desktop versus server

Agreed, I have been running Ubuntu servers since Breezy Badger and have so many that are "stuck" at old versions pending a rebuild.

I've been using Debian for those and so far have far fewer upgrade issues, though now I am looking at OpenBSD instead.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Desktop versus server

"- show the differences between the versions with incomprehensible markup and line wrapping"

1. If you don't understand basic Git syntax, what are you doing anywhere near a server?

2. If you don't have backups of your configs to do a merge later, what are you doing anywhere near a server?

3. If you don't have QA systems on which to test upgrades and work out the kinks, what are you doing anywhere near a server?

Applies pretty much to any OS, not just GNU/Linux

[nijam]

Re: Desktop versus server

> 1. If you don't understand basic Git syntax, what are you doing anywhere near a server?

What? Ubuntu downloads updates from git? Surely not!

Not that I care, I switched to Debian when they were trying to make Ubuntu into a mobile phone OS.

> 2. If you don't have backups of your configs to do a merge later, what are you doing anywhere near a server?

OP clearly had the old configs to hand - presumably via a backup - and was only pointing out that they weren't compatible with the latest software. Which for some reason isn't backward compatible, and certainly doesn't automate the conversion.

[Jakester]

Snap Is Crap

I tried a couple Snap applications with Ubuntu 20.04. Not a pleasant experience as the text editor would only allow a save into my home directory tree and not anywhere else, including my home server. I removed all Snaps and snapd from my Ubuntu desktop installs, but left them in on my server, just in case removing the Snaps broke things. Well, a couple years later and a total of 32 mount points all related to Snaps were present as well as the current and previous versions of the default Snaps that Ubuntu installed, which I don't use. I am still testing MXLinux 21 and Debian 11. I am now using those on my desktop and laptops and will be switching to one of those within the next year on my home server. My server needs are very modest and I can use the default samba server in MXLinux and slightly modifying the smb.conf file to not have to change anything on my Windows and Linux desktops and laptops. Ubuntu was great until about 2016 when it became less user friendly, less compatible with hardware (specifically video cards in 2016), started forcing Snaps on the users. Sure, Snaps makes it easier for Canonical, but it is a pain in the ass to us end users trying to actually use the crappy Snaps.

[Tom Chiverton 1]

Re: Snap Is Crap

There's a bug about 4 years old for Snap not sharing /tmp for instance.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Snap Is Crap

After 4 years (!!) calling it a "bug" hardly seems sufficient. "Serious design flaw, start again...."

[The BigYin]

Re: Snap Is Crap

If you use a home location other than "/home/<name>", Snap breaks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Snap Is Crap

What is the Snap devs' response to this issue? Hopefully better than the systemD people's "you're doing it wrong".

Making (hardcoded?) assumptions about how people configure their systems seems rather poorly considered.

[Lon24]

Bad Update

I have updated three Kubuntu desktops this morning. The first one (the oldest machine) went swimmingly. Within 15 minutes we were back in business after clicking a couple or so OKs. It's what I come to expect.

Confident I went on to the second. Update failed and here's the reason why: A BLANK BOX. Well that matched my mind. So where do you start debugging? I had been a good boy and when an apt update/upgrade and I happened luckily to have noticed there was a repository that didn't support the architecture but it was just ignored and apt carried on. Goodness knows how that got there but it had updated to 22.10 with it.. Anyway dropped it and the update went through swimmingly. Now to number three.

Update failed and here's the reason why: A BLANK BOX. Christ - disabled every non-mandatory repository. Rinse, repeat: Update failed and here's the reason why: A BLANK BOX. Let's do another apt update/upgrade - oops I hadn't done one since last week. Great, that fixed it. Three working boxes but that took too much time and effort. Ok it was not unexpected operator error. However, someone who was just a plain user would have been defeated. All because when it encountered issues while checking the configuration - it failed to give a clue why. Worse it had a box to give that reason but didn't.

A bug methinks.