Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Mi, 15 sep 21, 09:54:29, John Hasler wrote: > The Wanderer writes: > > In theory you could, but in practice it would break well before that. > > I run Sid on my desktop. It's been years since I've had any breakage. > I suspect that it's because I run FVWM, avoid anything connected with > freedesktop.org or Gnome, and am careful about when to upgrade. While my desktop of choice is currently LXDE, things "connected with freedesktop.org or Gnome" are installed, usually (but not always) because there is no LXDE equivalent of that particular piece (e.g. network-manager-gnome). Having one or another DE installed in parallel was not uncommon for me, even if just to show it of to others. These certainly add complexity, but as far as I'm concerned never did create any major issues with mostly daily updating of sid. In my opinion the one thing that makes running sid a rather painless experience[1] is adopting major changes as they roll in. Sure, those changes bring their own problems with them, but over all it saves a lot of energy to swim with the stream rather than against it. [1] besides *good* familiarity with APT and aptitude. Kind regards, Andrei -- http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On 9/15/2021 6:45 AM, Brian wrote > I was also rather hoping Tanstaafl would contribute a few words on how > the unstable model contrasts with Gentoo's rolling release model. Well, it's been many years, but basically, you could select what 'branch' you were on using keywords (stable, testing, etc), and could override at the package level if desired. It worked really well, and was mostly problem free. Of course there were a few major changes that caused a bit of pain, but the situations were well documented, and as long as you were careful, very rarely did anything actually ever break. The most pain would happen to those who didn't keep things updated regularly. I'm probably going to do a clean install of both, and play around a bit before deciding... Although, for Debian you've already convinced me not to use SID, and just go with stable. Thanks to all who responded!
Re: LTS versions - confusion
The Wanderer writes: > In theory you could, but in practice it would break well before that. I run Sid on my desktop. It's been years since I've had any breakage. I suspect that it's because I run FVWM, avoid anything connected with freedesktop.org or Gnome, and am careful about when to upgrade. -- John Hasler j...@sugarbit.com Elmwood, WI USA
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On 2021-09-14, Brian wrote: >> >> Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated >> regularly? > > Why not? Update when you want to. How does this differ from Gentoo's > rolling release aspect? Go for testing if you want to be a little > conservative? > >> Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? > > I do. > How many dance parties where you had to strum the ukulele all night rather than play DJ?
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On 2021-09-15 at 06:45, Brian wrote: > On Tue 14 Sep 2021 at 22:42:12 -0400, The Wanderer wrote: > >> On 2021-09-14 at 16:33, Tanstaafl wrote: >>> Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it >>> updated regularly? >> >> In theory you could, but in practice it would break well before >> that. >> The guiding principle of running a system that tracks sid is "if >> it breaks, you get to keep all the pieces". >> >> It is NEVER advisable to track sid on a computer you're not willing >> to blow away and reinstall on demand if necessary. (As distinct >> from installing specific selected packages from sid on a >> case-by-case basis - but be careful even about that, as the >> dependencies of those packages might pull in enough other things to >> lead to a hybrid Debian system and potentially break things.) >> >> I would advise against tracking sid on any computer other than one >> you're running specifically to contribute to the process of testing >> the contents of sid before they migrate into testing. >> >>> Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') >>> servers? >> >> I certainly hope not. (And am mildly horrified that someone who >> posts as much good advice here as I believe I've seen from Brian >> has said that he does.) > > I am in agreement with what you say as regards stable vs unstable. > For the avoidance of doubt, I would always advise stable for a user. > It has been thoroughly tested, gets timely security upgrades and is > supported by the images team with point releases. What is there to > dislike about it? There are a few possible reasons; the primary one is that new packages, and new package versions with new features, don't appear for a long (potentially *very* long) time. For myself, I recommend stable for anything you aren't willing to do active maintenance on (the way Tomas referenced doing with an unstable machine), and testing - with, optionally, fallback to stable - for anything else that's even vaguely a production machine. My daily driver is the latter configuration; a server-ish machine I run at work is the former. > My response was simply to indicate that some users do run unstable, > hopefully knowing what they are doing. I see it as a way of > contributing to a future stable and would not use it on an important > machine. Someone has to watch out for Debian and upstream bugs in > packages of interest to the user. Agreed, and appropriate. I sometimes regret that I'm not in a position to be able to afford the workflow that would make "eh, just reinstall" a viable model for any of my computers, because that would make tracking sid and helping test it viable. (Helping test sid was, IIRC, the primary reason why I decided to track it at one point in the past.) > I was also rather hoping Tanstaafl would contribute a few words on > how the unstable model contrasts with Gentoo's rolling release > model. That could be interesting, too. My understanding is that the closest Debian equivalent to rolling release is the sometimes-discussed but never-really-implemented possible goal of "continuously usable testing", i.e. a model in which there's never a release freeze of testing (and releases are done through some other avenue) and - I think - library transitions etc. are handled in a sufficiently atomic fashion that you don't wind up with some packages temporarily unable to satisfy their listed dependencies. I think there's still an interest in principle in achieving that goal, but if there's any movement towards getting closer to a point where it actually happens I'm not aware of that. -- The Wanderer The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Tue 14 Sep 2021 at 22:42:12 -0400, The Wanderer wrote: > On 2021-09-14 at 16:33, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > On 9/13/2021 11:02 AM, Brian wrote > > > >> On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > >> > >>> Hello, > >>> > >>> So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want > >>> to set up, but it depends... > >>> > >>> I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling > >>> release aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases > >>> with other distros. > >> > >> About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable > >> distribution (sid). > > > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it > > updated regularly? > > In theory you could, but in practice it would break well before that. > > I used to track sid on my primary computer; the system developed warts > and instabilities under my feet, became partly broken and if not > irreparable then at least more trouble to repair than the benefit would > have been worth, and drove me to build a replacement computer to migrate > away from the broken setup. > > The guiding principle of running a system that tracks sid is "if it > breaks, you get to keep all the pieces". > > It is NEVER advisable to track sid on a computer you're not willing to > blow away and reinstall on demand if necessary. (As distinct from > installing specific selected packages from sid on a case-by-case basis - > but be careful even about that, as the dependencies of those packages > might pull in enough other things to lead to a hybrid Debian system and > potentially break things.) > > I would advise against tracking sid on any computer other than one > you're running specifically to contribute to the process of testing the > contents of sid before they migrate into testing. > > > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? > > I certainly hope not. (And am mildly horrified that someone who posts as > much good advice here as I believe I've seen from Brian has said that he > does.) I am in agreement with what you say as regards stable vs unstable. For the avoidance of doubt, I would always advise stable for a user. It has been thoroughly tested, gets timely security upgrades and is supported by the images team with point releases. What is there to dislike about it? My response was simply to indicate that some users do run unstable, hopefully knowing what they are doing. I see it as a way of contributing to a future stable and would not use it on an important machine. Someone has to watch out for Debian and upstream bugs in packages of interest to the user. I was also rather hoping Tanstaafl would contribute a few words on how the unstable model contrasts with Gentoo's rolling release model. -- Brian.
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Wed, Sep 15, 2021 at 10:06:47AM +0300, Andrei POPESCU wrote: > On Ma, 14 sep 21, 16:33:55, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > > regularly? > > Technically, yes. > > > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? > > I used to run sid as the main system on my daily driver laptop. > > Having it break before a (non-work) presentation, or even just game > night and later dance party with friends was definitely not fun, so I > started running a stable install in paralel (shared /home, which brought > its own set of complexity). > I feel for you. It's worth thinking that sid is where you'll get package churn, packages built with different compilers / libc versions potentially, churn of desktop packages while you wait for KDE or GNOME to settle - it's not an environment that's settled day to day, necessarily. You might wait months for a major desktop to work, for example, as packages move in. > > With the amount of 0-day vulnerabilities found on regular basis I would > be extremely wary of running sid for any public facing services. > This too. You've no way of knowing what you're exposed to with a large rate of package churn. All best, Andy Cater > Kind regards, > Andrei > -- > http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Ma, 14 sep 21, 16:33:55, Tanstaafl wrote: > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > regularly? Technically, yes. > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? I used to run sid as the main system on my daily driver laptop. Having it break before a (non-work) presentation, or even just game night and later dance party with friends was definitely not fun, so I started running a stable install in paralel (shared /home, which brought its own set of complexity). Eventually I realised it requires too much time to maintain, in a period when I had very little spare, so I settled with stable only. Lately I've been using testing or unstable only due to lack of hardware support and to monitor the progress of such for very specific devices. With the amount of 0-day vulnerabilities found on regular basis I would be extremely wary of running sid for any public facing services. Kind regards, Andrei -- http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Ma, 14 sep 21, 23:18:48, Brian wrote: > On Tue 14 Sep 2021 at 16:33:55 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > > regularly? > > Why not? Update when you want to. How does this differ from Gentoo's > rolling release aspect? Go for testing if you want to be a little > conservative? Except that testing has worse security support as all updates go to unstable first, by definition. While security updates[1] are prioritised as much as possible, they could get entangled in some library transition. [1] provided there are any timely security updates, as in unstable these are up to the package Maintainer, whereas for stable and oldstable there are dedicated teams. Kind regards, Andrei -- http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Tue, Sep 14, 2021 at 04:33:55PM -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > On 9/13/2021 11:02 AM, Brian wrote > > On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > >> Hello, > >> > >> So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want to set > >> up, but it depends... > >> > >> I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > >> aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > >> distros. > > About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable > > distribution (sid). > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > regularly? > > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? If you have the oomph and the bandwith, go for it! Let's say you have, say, 1K servers and can afford a sizeable team validating and testing changes on a small test farm before opening the flood gates to the rest of your installed base... go for it! Alternatively: if the stakes are low enough, i.e. when things break it's "sigh" and a short hour of tinkering to get your work computer again into a working condition... go for it! Don't forget to contribute back. The rest of the Debian community will thank you. That is, after all, what makes Debian thrive. The more people shaking Sid the better Testing and Stable we get. Don't go for it if you are in one of those (unfortunately frequent) situations where you barely know what you are doing and will have 1K customers yelling at you whenever things go south. While you are trying to sort out the mess. Stick with stable, then. IOW: you can do whatever you want, provided you know what you are doing ;-) Cheers - t signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On 2021-09-14 at 16:33, Tanstaafl wrote: > On 9/13/2021 11:02 AM, Brian wrote > >> On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: >> >>> Hello, >>> >>> So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want >>> to set up, but it depends... >>> >>> I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling >>> release aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases >>> with other distros. >> >> About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable >> distribution (sid). > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it > updated regularly? In theory you could, but in practice it would break well before that. I used to track sid on my primary computer; the system developed warts and instabilities under my feet, became partly broken and if not irreparable then at least more trouble to repair than the benefit would have been worth, and drove me to build a replacement computer to migrate away from the broken setup. The guiding principle of running a system that tracks sid is "if it breaks, you get to keep all the pieces". It is NEVER advisable to track sid on a computer you're not willing to blow away and reinstall on demand if necessary. (As distinct from installing specific selected packages from sid on a case-by-case basis - but be careful even about that, as the dependencies of those packages might pull in enough other things to lead to a hybrid Debian system and potentially break things.) I would advise against tracking sid on any computer other than one you're running specifically to contribute to the process of testing the contents of sid before they migrate into testing. > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? I certainly hope not. (And am mildly horrified that someone who posts as much good advice here as I believe I've seen from Brian has said that he does.) -- The Wanderer The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Tue 14 Sep 2021 at 16:33:55 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > On 9/13/2021 11:02 AM, Brian wrote > > On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > >> Hello, > >> > >> So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want to set > >> up, but it depends... > >> > >> I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > >> aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > >> distros. > > About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable > > distribution (sid). > > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > regularly? Why not? Update when you want to. How does this differ from Gentoo's rolling release aspect? Go for testing if you want to be a little conservative? > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? I do. -- Brian.
Re: LTS versions - confusion
Greg Wooledge wrote: >> Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? > > I'm sure someone does, but it's not *wise*. yes indeed. server + sid is contradicting somehow unless you do development of server software -- FCD6 3719 0FFB F1BF 38EA 4727 5348 5F1F DCFE BCB0
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Tue, Sep 14, 2021 at 04:33:55PM -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated > regularly? > > Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers? I'm sure someone does, but it's not *wise*.
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On 9/13/2021 11:02 AM, Brian wrote > On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > >> Hello, >> >> So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want to set >> up, but it depends... >> >> I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release >> aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other >> distros. > About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable > distribution (sid). Hmmm... ok, so, I could run sid 'forever', as long as I keep it updated regularly? Anyone do this for important (maybe not 'mission critical') servers?
Re: LTS versions - confusion
Hi, 14 sept. 2021, 16:35 de amaca...@einval.com: > Debian 11 - Bullseye - released on 14th July 2021 will have [at least] five > years > support as stable/oldstable. > > Three years between releases > ~ two years ;) > plus a year after the next release plus usually > two years LTS support after that. > Best regards, l0f4r0
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Tue, Sep 14, 2021 at 02:33:23AM +0300, Andrei POPESCU wrote: > On Lu, 13 sep 21, 10:18:54, Tanstaafl wrote: > > > > I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > > aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > > distros. > Debian 11 - Bullseye - released on 14th July 2021 will have [at least] five years support as stable/oldstable. Three years between releases plus a year after the next release plus usually two years LTS support after that. Hope this helps, All the very best, as ever, Andy Cater
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Lu, 13 sep 21, 10:18:54, Tanstaafl wrote: > > I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > distros. You already received good answers for your questions, so I'll just add that one of Debian's strengths is the smooth in-place upgrade[1] from one stable release to the next. It is quite well documented[2] and tested, and mostly just works. Just check the archives of this list for the past month (since bullseye was released). There were some issues, but most upgrades just went smooth. The major benefit[3] of this approach is that in the approximately 2 years between stable releases there is very little to do worry about other than applying security updates in due time (and even that can be easily automated). Even if you do choose to use unstable instead, it's still recommended to keep a stable install ready, just in case. [1] sometimes called a "dist-upgrade", for historical reasons [2] https://www.debian.org/releases/bullseye/releasenotes or the very short summary https://wiki.debian.org/NewInBullseye [3] or downside, because it can be quite boring :p Hope this helps, Andrei -- http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Mon, Sep 13, 2021 at 10:58:26AM -0400, Greg Wooledge wrote: > > 6) After that year, the release goes into "long-term support" mode, and >received security bug fix support from a different team. The LTS >team may choose to support only server packages, not desktop packages. > A slight correction: the LTS team supports all the packages that were part of the stable release, with a few specific exceptions. For example, if the Security Team declared a particular package unsupported during the time the release was stable, the package remains unsupported [*]. Occasionally, similar action is taken regarding a package that can no longer be supported by the team. For instance, this happend with enigmail [0]. That said, any Debian system, whether running old-old-old-stable or unstable, can make use of the debian-security-support package for current information regarding the support status of any packages installed on the system (or any particular package, whether or not installed on the system). Regards, -Roberto [*] This happened some time ago with MySQL because of Oracle's policy around CPUs and their refusal to assist distro teams with backporting security-specific fixes. [0] https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2019/02/msg2.html -- Roberto C. Sánchez
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Mon 13 Sep 2021 at 10:18:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > Hello, > > So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want to set > up, but it depends... > > I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > distros. About the closest in Debian to this concept is the unstable distribution (sid). -- Brian.
Re: LTS versions - confusion
On Mon, Sep 13, 2021 at 10:18:54AM -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > distros. > > So... what is the current LTS version and when is its EOL, and when will > the next one be released, and what will be its EOL? Debian doesn't have "LTS versions" in the way you're thinking. Every Debian release goes through the same lifecycle: 1) Prior to release, a given version undergoes a period as "testing". Users are free to install it and play around with it and report bugs. 2) After a while of that, a release date is chosen. The release goes into "freeze" (varying stages, actually), and no new stuff is allowed in. Bugs are fixed, or if a package can't be fixed up, it's removed. 3) When the release date arrives, the version goes from "testing" to "stable". Celebrations happen, etc. 4) During its time as "stable", a release gets no new versions of software (except in special situations), and no bug fixes other than security or major bugs. 5) When a new stable release happens, the previous release becomes "oldstable". It still receives security bug fix support for a year. 6) After that year, the release goes into "long-term support" mode, and received security bug fix support from a different team. The LTS team may choose to support only server packages, not desktop packages. 7) After about 2 years of LTS support, the release reached end of life, and is no longer officially supported.
Re: LTS versions - confusion
> > So... what is the current LTS version and when is its EOL, and when will > the next one be released, and what will be its EOL? > In Debian world "stable" version created every several years, so you can move from one stable to another. Here is info about current versions https://wiki.debian.org/DebianReleases You can also read about lifecycle here (this book is very useful, really): https://debian-handbook.info/browse/stable/sect.release-lifecycle.html > >
LTS versions - confusion
Hello, So, I'm considering Debian for a new homebrew MX gateway I want to set up, but it depends... I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other distros. So... what is the current LTS version and when is its EOL, and when will the next one be released, and what will be its EOL? Thanks, -- Charles
