t0m5k1 wrote:I used ubuntu for quite some time & moved to xubuntu once unity came along, I then left it looking for a distro which did not use meta packages as I hated having to install a bunch of items I had no need for.
Just FYI, Arch LInux has meta-packages too (albeit very few). Furthermore the restrictions of a metapackage can be worked around by simply uninstalling it.
Yes I know & sometimes metapackages can be great but for me personally ubuntu place far far too many packages into their metapackages.
In my situation I ended up having to remove x/ubuntu-desktop which as I worked out pretty much strips out everything & it was at that point I decided if I have to reinstall what I want I will change distro to Arch
]]>I had a feeling that they wouldn't switch.
]]>I used ubuntu for quite some time & moved to xubuntu once unity came along, I then left it looking for a distro which did not use meta packages as I hated having to install a bunch of items I had no need for.
Just FYI, Arch LInux has meta-packages too (albeit very few). Furthermore the restrictions of a metapackage can be worked around by simply uninstalling it.
]]>Since being with Arch I don't see me leaving for quite some time.
I care not if canonical are profit driven or not, I do like what they are doing here in SA & absolutely love that when I go to banks & other institutions out here I see more & more people using a form of linux (ubuntu) in the work place.
]]>If Ubuntu does actually become rolling release then it will definitely get another try out of myself. How about you?
Good for them!
and for U: the doors and windows are wide open!
]]>Read about it here:
http://arstechnica.com/information-tech … ase-cycle/
I can say with full certainty that the main reason I use Arch is because it is a rolling release distribution. I found out that I wanted that after running Debian for quite the while. Debian is great but it quickly becomes annoying when you don't have access to updated packages.
If Ubuntu does actually become rolling release then it will definitely get another try out of myself. How about you?
Rolling release ideas became quite popular lately. For example, people at Fedora discussed it: http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermai … 73397.html, and now ubuntu.
These discussions seem to originate from the fact that the release cycle of 6 or 8 months is too rapid: there simply not enough "shiny" features in each new version to be advertised on the front page, while under-the-hood work tends to delay the releases, like in the case of OpenSUSE 12.2 or Fedora 18. Actually, Ubuntu was the only large distro which could "stay on schedule", IMHO.
That said, I think Ubuntu will only benefit from a steadier release model which requires less reinstalls.
]]>A rolling release will not mean cutting edge version updates. My impression of Arch is that they chose a rolling release model because that was the simplest way to maintain a bleeding edge distribution. Ubuntu is looking into going to a rolling release to ease the pressure of their biannual release schedule decision making. You could still have a rolling release and not update software as quickly as Arch does.
Being so used to Arch, I fail to consider that there are differences.
Anyways even if Ubuntu did become more bleeding-edge AND rolling release, I probably wouldn't switch back. I cannot help but wonder how things would have ended up different had they implemented this when I first used Linux though.
I would think it wouldn't be that big a change from what they already do, only without the six month deadline hanging over them regarding whether or not to put out an update or not. Now, they'll just update stuff when they feel it's ready.
With a rolling release, I find upgrading a smaller number of packages more frequently is less problematic than trying to update a whole OS every 6 months. With all that can go wrong in doing an OS upgrade, I always tend to do clean installs which is annoying when your OS is upgraded every 6 months.
]]>But then they're going to have the worst of both worlds: rolling release on a huge repository of software, meaning hard work staying up-to-date on all the latest versions; while with a slower release schedule, they'd still have to busy themselves with backporting essential security fixes and other patches.
I would think it wouldn't be that big a change from what they already do, only without the six month deadline hanging over them regarding whether or not to put out an update or not. Now, they'll just update stuff when they feel it's ready.
]]>If Ubuntu does actually become rolling release then it will definitely get another try out of myself. How about you?
Nope, not me... I have no interest in Ubuntu whatsoever, regardless of how it is released.
]]>Perhaps, not being to able to announce a new release every half year and drawing some media attention, might be a drawback from a marketing point of view. Personally I wouldn't care, but trying to draw in new users I could see this being an issue for canonical.
]]>A rolling release will not mean cutting edge version updates. My impression of Arch is that they chose a rolling release model because that was the simplest way to maintain a bleeding edge distribution. Ubuntu is looking into going to a rolling release to ease the pressure of their biannual release schedule decision making. You could still have a rolling release and not update software as quickly as Arch does.
But then they're going to have the worst of both worlds: rolling release on a huge repository of software, meaning hard work staying up-to-date on all the latest versions; while with a slower release schedule, they'd still have to busy themselves with backporting essential security fixes and other patches.
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