Simply installing New Releases

[hebelwirkung]

Well, as I have been warned, after doing this I got lots of errors trying to update!
You know why I am doing all this! I strongly believe doing something will teach you much better than just studying it.

Not very surprised you got "lots of errors" - but yes, getting errors by doing something teaches more - and more effectively - than reading about possible errors and fearfully remaining idle

[Buck Fankers]

Well, as I have been warned, after doing this I got lots of errors trying to update!
I better stick with the "official" procedures

Hey, it is fun to experiment. Have one install as your main, workforce, and another for testing, learning and having fun.

I too wanted to have rolling system when I discovered Linux. But over time I figured out, I was way too noob for occasional glitches, that can and will happen sooner or later on rolling systems. I was always waiting few days before I updated my system, so I could see other's users problems and solutions. More users had a problems, longer I was waiting with updating my own system.

Then I realized, I don't need this headache. I'm too lazy to go over few 100 posts every time, before I want to update my system. Many of the problems and solutions I didn't even understand! So I decided I'm too green for this and went to safer more stable flavors of Linux such as Mint etc... When I found out about MX and it's tools, I was hooked. I can't go anywhere else now. Snapshot tool is one of the reasons. Simplicity, stability and bunch of very useful tools that make my day. What else I could want...

Plus, there are some apps, that are newer versions than, if I would have stock Debian. Win-win!

And I hope MX never goes unstable rolling part, since I'm staying noob. Not tinkering with the system, just using it

[limotux]

Not very surprised you got "lots of errors" - but yes, getting errors by doing something teaches more - and more effectively - than reading about possible errors and fearfully remaining idle

Neither me @hebelwirkung ! I just wanted to see it myself.

Hey, it is fun to experiment. Have one install as your main, workforce, and another for testing, learning and having fun.

I too wanted to have rolling system when I discovered Linux. But over time I figured out, I was way too noob for occasional glitches, that can and will happen sooner or later on rolling systems. I was always waiting few days before I updated my system, so I could see other's users problems and solutions. More users had a problems, longer I was waiting with updating my own system.

Then I realized, I don't need this headache. I'm too lazy to go over few 100 posts every time, before I want to update my system. Many of the problems and solutions I didn't even understand! So I decided I'm too green for this and went to safer more stable flavors of Linux such as Mint etc... When I found out about MX and it's tools, I was hooked. I can't go anywhere else now. Snapshot tool is one of the reasons. Simplicity, stability and bunch of very useful tools that make my day. What else I could want...

Plus, there are some apps, that are newer versions than, if I would have stock Debian. Win-win!

And I hope MX never goes unstable rolling part, since I'm staying noob. Not tinkering with the system, just using it

Well @Buck Fankers I can I understand what you are talking about. I've been there myself worried of the idea of a rolling release and getting "untested" updates.
I have been on Linux since 2000, but yet I can't call myself an expert or a techie. I am just a user!
My experience, after I got retired I had enough time to try new things as I am always doing. So I started 2 years ago distrohopping like crazy for a full year. I tried everything out there, RPM, DEB, Gentoo, BSD,... rolling releases, and "long term" releases...
After a year of distrohopping I discovered (well just my point of view, and I hope I won't get banned) Arch based distros have one good thing I liked (my taste), they come as just a basic operating system, a desktop environment, a browser (usually firefox) and a minimal set of "essential" apps. I noticed the performance was much faster and lighter than other distros.

The most important point (your concern) I discovered that having updates from a rolling release does not mean by any way they are not tested. They are tested for sure. Maybe not long enough like other distros but they fit the bill. Simply speaking, I agree with you and all of you here that non rolling distros are sort of bullet proof. But for me I thought why would I need a bullet proof car if I am not driving in a war zone! I have glass windows, wind shields that are working fine in blocking heat or cold, or dust. But why would I need the glass to be bullet proof?! (unless I am so unlucky and get a bullet somehow)

I have been on a specific and only one rolling release after distrohopping for a year, that is almost full year now . I just installed only once and that's all. I am getting updates same as non rolling releases get updates but more frequently without a glitch, not a single glitch for a year. Just a few days ago I encountered something a bit funny, I was updating, and just pressing "Enter" to give the defaults in the prompt (I generally prefer to go with defaults) to end up with an error message. But this never caused anything to stop working, it was just a message that an app was not updated. I asked at the forum (this was the first "error" I encountered in a year) and in a few minutes I got the solution, he asked me to read the message that was saying something like "Do you want to keep the old version" and the default was "Y" not "n", so I just repeated and read the prompt and answered "n" and things went fine.

Honestly I did not have any serious problem or even a trivial problem in a full year, even if you call the just mentioned issue a problem nothing really stopped working, it was just simply working as expected. Again, why would I need a bullet proof glass if I am not in a war zone. For sure I have to admit having a bullet proof glass is a plus and better for sure, but what is the point.
Honestly as far as I think and know sometimes NVIDIA may need special attention (but it is not difficult) I am not using any NVIDIA stuff so I can't tell. But I see some users having questions there about NVIDIA. If graphics is Intel it just works.
And honestly what I like about MX is how user friendly it is and the tools it give the users. It is impressive actually, especially the ease of fixing Grub breakage, creating a bootable snapshot from the current installed system... I love those.

This is why I am posting this from another MX fresh install of MX! But I promise I will "try" and not be naughty again and mess up my system agin.
(oops! though I promised I am going to change the default boot to systemd)

[asqwerth]

I didn't follow the development thread, so I don't know if that's because it uses features only available in MX 21 and up, or just hasn't been packaged for MX 19.

No idea. @fehlix ?

Will do an translation refresh together with an adjustment to have it also run on MX19, asap.

Just to report that user-installed-packages (UIP) is now in the MX19 repo. I installed it in my MX19 system on my laptop, and it works to generate the list of packages I'd installed. Thanks, fehlix!

I think this will be very helpful for those who are still on MX19 and need to consider installing either MX21 or MX23 when MX19 is EOL in April 2024. [IMO, unless your hardware is very old, you should go for MX23 and give yourself a full 5 years of use].

[hebelwirkung]

I agree with you and all of you here that non rolling distros are sort of bullet proof.

Not sure anyone here suggested non-rolling was "sort of bullet proof". It isn't. In Linux, as in life, nothing is. (Even MX 19 had an update glitch recently, resulting in a system that wouldn't boot. And MX, in my experience, is as safe and sound as any distro out there.) Just saying. It's wise not to let wishful thinking get the better of the facts.

What definitely is covered by observable facts though is that a rolling release far more frequently offers many more opportunities for stuff to break than a carefully maintained stable one. And with that in mind, it's up to the individual to what extent he's happy to live in danger land...

[Jakob77]

I agree with you and all of you here that non rolling distros are sort of bullet proof.

Not sure anyone here suggested non-rolling was "sort of bullet proof". It isn't. In Linux, as in life, nothing is. (Even MX 19 had an update glitch recently, resulting in a system that wouldn't boot. And MX, in my experience, is as safe and sound as any distro out there.) Just saying. It's wise not to let wishful thinking get the better of the facts.

What definitely is covered by observable facts though is that a rolling release far more frequently offers many more opportunities for stuff to break than a carefully maintained stable one. And with that in mind, it's up to the individual to what extent he's happy to live in danger land...

In my opinion very well written. One year of success with rolling upgrade in one distro doesn't in itself proof anything significantly at all.
If anyone think it does it is likely just reveling the uncertainties and doubts they for good reasons have to live with all the time below.


From here thanks to the developers for participating in the discussion.
I don't think rolling upgrade needs a very high priority but discussing it now and then can perhaps help clearing the road for it sometime in the future.

[Duliwi]

Just to report that user-installed-packages (UIP) is now in the MX19 repo. I installed it in my MX19 system on my laptop, and it works to generate the list of packages I'd installed. Thanks, fehlix!

Although I got some updates in the meantime, (and today again), I can not find it in my MX-19 installation:

k20230620-093514.png

What do I miss?

Code: Select all

Snapshot created on: 20221106_1515
System:    Kernel: 4.19.0-24-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 8.3.0 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.19.0-24-amd64 
           root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet 
           Desktop: Xfce 4.14.2 tk: Gtk 3.24.5 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm 4.14.0 vt: 7 
           dm: LightDM 1.26.0 Distro: MX-19.4_x64 patito feo November 06  2022 
           base: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) 
Machine:   Type: Desktop System: Hewlett-Packard product: HP ProDesk 600 G1 TWR v: N/A 
           serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 6 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Hewlett-Packard model: 18E7 serial: <filter> BIOS: Hewlett-Packard 
           v: L01 v02.77 date: 04/17/2019 
CPU:       Info: Quad Core model: Intel Core i5-4570 bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Haswell family: 6 
           model-id: 3C (60) stepping: 3 microcode: 28 cache: L2: 6 MiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 25541 
           Speed: 1485 MHz min/max: 800/3600 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1485 2: 1592 3: 1442 
           4: 1578 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: Split huge pages 
           Type: l1tf mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT disabled 
           Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT disabled 
           Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
           Type: mmio_stale_data status: Unknown: No mitigations 
           Type: retbleed status: Not affected 
           Type: spec_store_bypass 
           mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Retpolines, IBPB: conditional, IBRS_FW, STIBP: disabled, 
           RSB filling, PBRSB-eIBRS: Not affected 
           Type: srbds mitigation: Microcode 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics 
           vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: i915 v: kernel bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:0412 
           class-ID: 0300 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.4 compositor: xfwm4 v: 4.14.0 driver: 
           loaded: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa display-ID: :0.0 screens: 1 
           Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x285mm (20.0x11.2") 
           s-diag: 582mm (22.9") 
           Monitor-1: VGA-1 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 92 size: 531x299mm (20.9x11.8") 
           diag: 609mm (24") 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel Haswell Desktop v: 4.5 Mesa 18.3.6 compat-v: 3.0 
           direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor HD Audio 
           vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:03.0 
           chip-ID: 8086:0c0c class-ID: 0403 
           Device-2: Intel 8 Series/C220 Series High Definition Audio vendor: Hewlett-Packard 
           driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:8c20 class-ID: 0403 
           Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k4.19.0-24-amd64 running: yes 
           Sound Server-2: JACK v: 1.9.12 running: no 
           Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 12.2 running: yes 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Ethernet I217-LM vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: e1000e v: 3.2.6-k 
           port: f080 bus-ID: 00:19.0 chip-ID: 8086:153a class-ID: 0200 
           IF: eth0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter> 
           IF-ID-1: vboxnet0 state: down mac: <filter> 
           IF-ID-2: vboxnet1 state: down mac: <filter> 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 2.17 TiB used: 586.43 GiB (26.4%) 
           SMART Message: Unable to run smartctl. Root privileges required. 
           ID-1: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Silicon Power model: SPCC Solid State Disk 
           size: 238.47 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s type: SSD 
           serial: <filter> rev: T1.3 scheme: MBR 
           ID-2: /dev/sdb maj-min: 8:16 vendor: Silicon Power model: SPCC Solid State Disk 
           size: 119.24 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s type: SSD 
           serial: <filter> rev: 3A0 scheme: MBR 
           ID-3: /dev/sdc maj-min: 8:32 vendor: Toshiba model: HDWD120 size: 1.82 TiB 
           block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s type: HDD rpm: 7200 
           serial: <filter> rev: ACF0 scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw-size: 230.47 GiB size: 225.79 GiB (97.97%) used: 90.06 GiB (39.9%) 
           fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda1 maj-min: 8:1 
Swap:      Kernel: swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache-pressure: 100 (default) 
           ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 32 GiB used: 1.45 GiB (4.5%) priority: -2 
           dev: /dev/sdc1 maj-min: 8:33 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 29.8 C mobo: 27.8 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Repos:     Packages: 2780 note: see --pkg apt: 2752 lib: 1474 flatpak: 28 
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/enpass.list 
           1: deb https://apt.enpass.io/ stable main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-earth-pro.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/earth/deb/ stable main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb https://mx-linux.ethz.ch/mx-packages/mx/repo/ buster main non-free
           2: deb https://mx-linux.ethz.ch/mx-packages/mx/testrepo/ buster test
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/softmaker.list 
           1: deb http://shop.softmaker.com/repo/apt stable non-free
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/vivaldi.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] http://repo.vivaldi.com/stable/deb/ stable main
Info:      Processes: 315 Uptime: 9d 1h 6m wakeups: 159 Memory: 15.56 GiB 
           used: 10.21 GiB (65.6%) Init: SysVinit v: 2.93 runlevel: 5 default: 5 tool: systemctl 
           Compilers: gcc: 8.3.0 alt: 8 Shell: quick-system-in default: Bash v: 5.0.3 
           running-in: quick-system-in inxi: 3.3.06 

[DukeComposed]

What definitely is covered by observable facts though is that a rolling release far more frequently offers many more opportunities for stuff to break than a carefully maintained stable one.

In my opinion very well written. One year of success with rolling upgrade in one distro doesn't in itself proof anything significantly at all.

I first started using Linux as a daily driver on a machine onto which I'd installed Antergos, an Arch-based system. After five weeks and more spontaneous kernel upgrades than I can remember, I gave up and switched to Mint. Part of my reasoning was that I had DKMS modules that needed to be recompiled every time a kernel update happened, and those recompile sessions could last 20 minutes and potentially make my machine unusable if they failed.

Eventually, someone informed me that I could have switched to an LTS kernel to get fewer kernel updates but by then it was too late. The idea of a rolling release is pretty appealing -- I mean think about it. Install the distro once and never have to go through a major dist-upgrade ever again? That sounds amazing. But the counterpoint to that panacea is that any new update of a fresh package may not be thoroughly tested & could easily brick your machine and require manual intervention. One can pick a safer LTS channel for their kernel in a rolling release, but is there an LTS channel for graphics, sound, coreutils, network drivers, Python, compilers, and bootloader? Probably not.

[fehlix]

Just to report that user-installed-packages (UIP) is now in the MX19 repo. I installed it in my MX19 system on my laptop, and it works to generate the list of packages I'd installed. Thanks, fehlix!

Although I got some updates in the meantime, (and today again), I can not find it in my MX-19 installation:
k20230620-093514.png

What do I miss?

To be installed.

[Duliwi]

To be installed.

I see.
I have found it. Thank you.

I have 105 packages, that I have installed by myself.
(But it looks like Flatpaks are not in the list.)