Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Shahrukh Merchant wrote: > Mmm, OK. If I see the version column on the left at the *Debian* version > tracker link http://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gddrescue indeed the current > STABLE seems to be 1.23 and the previous stable 1.21 (and there is a "To Do" > list that notes that 1.25 is available as you state). Note that those labels of unstable, testing, stable, oldstable, refer to the *Debian release suites* for the entire OS distribution and not to the package upstream. > And the link that Timothy provided > https://packages.ubuntu.com/bionic/gddrescue shows that at least the Ubuntu > 18.04LTS distribution has 1.22, unfortunately the one with the bug. But > indeed that same page (clicking on "disco" and "eoan" respectively) shows > that 19.04 and the current 19.10 (and I guess the upcoming 20.04LTS?) did in > fact update to 1.23. I think the information here might be useful to you as a Mint user, which is downstream of Ubuntu. There is extensive description of the package release lifecycle. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates Bob
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Hi Shahrukh, Shahrukh Merchant wrote: Note that (from the link above) Ubuntu seems to be distributing 1.23 also. OK, I'm still figuring this out, so bear with me. The link you refer to is the Debian link, so not sure where you infer that Ubuntu is also distributing 1.23. At the bottom of http://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gddrescue there is a link to http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gddrescue Antonio.
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
> From: "Shahrukh Merchant" > Hi António, > >> I guess that by "Linux" you mean "a given distribution". > > Or I suppose I meant "a given repository," which then affects all > distributions that use that repository ... though as I mentioned I'm > still trying to figure out the correlation between those two. :-) Each distribution (well, each release of each distribution, but it's generally the same person) has a role called Release Configuration Manager, whose job is to select the packages and versions that will be in that release, building test versions of the distro and running them (hopefully) through distro-level test scaffolding to make sure everything builds and all dependencies are fulfilled. That's the person -- or one of zir deputies -- who is generally responsible for making sure the most recent version of a package is in the distro... but "the most recent" generally means "in our repo". That person is generally called a "maintainer" or "packager" -- and they might be on the distro side or they might be on the package developer side; different combinations of distro and package approach it different ways, usually for hysterical raisins. Finding out who the maintainer is for the combination of package and repo is the important part -- sometimes developers know who their packagers are, sometimes RCM's know who *their* packagers are, and sometimes it's just some random person with commit access to the repo, and someone's gotta look it up. This google search looks to have some informative data: https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d=ALeKk03TeSpmd8E_fcx81ut8hI6ujK7hRw:1587413591635=ddrescue+%22packager%22=X=2ahUKEwi2sPa56PfoAhWBUt8KHf4eB2gQ5t4CMAB6BAgCEAk=1184=561 Cheers, -- jra -- Jay R. Ashworth Baylink j...@baylink.com Designer The Things I Think RFC 2100 Ashworth & Associates http://www.bcp38.info 2000 Land Rover DII St Petersburg FL USA BCP38: Ask For It By Name! +1 727 647 1274
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Hi António, I guess that by "Linux" you mean "a given distribution". Or I suppose I meant "a given repository," which then affects all distributions that use that repository ... though as I mentioned I'm still trying to figure out the correlation between those two. :-) ... For example, Ubuntu depends on Debian, which currently distributes ddrescue 1.23, and has the packaging of ddrescue 1.25 as a pending task (Mika, are you reading this?) ;-) http://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gddrescue In fact, Debian updated (or skipped) ddrescue 1.22, which is a good thing because 1.22 is one of the few versions with a potentially serious error ... Mmm, OK. If I see the version column on the left at the *Debian* version tracker link http://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gddrescue indeed the current STABLE seems to be 1.23 and the previous stable 1.21 (and there is a "To Do" list that notes that 1.25 is available as you state). Note that (from the link above) Ubuntu seems to be distributing 1.23 also. OK, I'm still figuring this out, so bear with me. The link you refer to is the Debian link, so not sure where you infer that Ubuntu is also distributing 1.23. Even though Ubuntu is based off Debian, everything I read seems to says that the software repositories are different, notwithstanding their using the same package manager (apt). And the link that Timothy provided https://packages.ubuntu.com/bionic/gddrescue shows that at least the Ubuntu 18.04LTS distribution has 1.22, unfortunately the one with the bug. But indeed that same page (clicking on "disco" and "eoan" respectively) shows that 19.04 and the current 19.10 (and I guess the upcoming 20.04LTS?) did in fact update to 1.23. But since Linux Mint uses the latest Ubuntu LTE, which for the last 2 years happens to be the one that has ddrescue 1.22, all versions of Linux Mint for the last 2 years would have been based on that version, it would appear. (Indeed, as I confirmed yesterday when I installed ddrescue from the Linux Mint 19.3 default repository, "ddrescue --version" shows 1.22.) Just seems a shame that with ddrescue 1.25 available for a month and a half now (and 1.24 for over a year), it appears Ubuntu 20.04LTE will be released in 3 days with 1.23, and so all Linux Mint versions through June 2022 will consequently be "stuck" at ddrescue v1.23? At least it's not 1.22, looking at the bright side ... Shahrukh
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Hello Shahrukh, Shahrukh Merchant wrote: - Which version of software gets incorporated into a particular release (LTS or not) of Linux? Or, as I speculated above, are the software repository updates really independent (in their timelines) of the OS updates? I guess that by "Linux" you mean "a given distribution". AFAICT, it all depends on the package maintainer of the base distribution of the "distribution" in question. For example, Ubuntu depends on Debian, which currently distributes ddrescue 1.23, and has the packaging of ddrescue 1.25 as a pending task (Mika, are you reading this?) ;-) http://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gddrescue Note that (from the link above) Ubuntu seems to be distributing 1.23 also. In fact, Debian updated (or skipped) ddrescue 1.22, which is a good thing because 1.22 is one of the few versions with a potentially serious error, as you can see in ddrescue-1.23/NEWS: "A bug has been fixed that sometimes marked the wrong block as non-scraped when running in reverse direction. (Bug introduced in 1.22)." Apart from the above, I really don't know how each distro works internally. Too many distros, too little time. Best regards, Antonio.
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Thanks Timothy (and Tom too for your earlier reply). Great, your instructions were exactly what I needed! I had googled around and came across these instructions at https://tinyapps.org/blog/201609300700_ddrescue_ubuntu.html for a manual install to address a similar version situation a few years ago, but yours are more detailed and well explained, so I'm going to try that. Speaking of Linux Mint vs. Ubuntu vs. package versions, since I've recently been delving into all this (yeah, a quarantine project ...): I happen to have seen that Ubuntu 20.04 LTS is due out literally any day now (23 Apr 2020), and I learnt that Linux Mint typically has their update based on that in 2 months, i.e., end-June 2020. But there seems no evidence that that will contain a more recent version of ddrescue (how would one find out?) as I assume the software repositories run in parallel and are not specifically tied to a particular OS release. So what is not clear to me, not just for the gddrescue package but really for any third-party software package: - Which version of software gets incorporated into a particular release (LTS or not) of Linux? Or, as I speculated above, are the software repository updates really independent (in their timelines) of the OS updates? - Who decides this and based on what? - What is the minimal regression testing that needs to happen to "certify" a new version of a package gets the green light, and who does this? The software developer (António in this case) if he wants to see his updated versions get more widespread use? Anyone? No one? I looked around some more and came across MOTU, the package maintainers' group, which I guess partially answers some of my questions above. So how does one contact the ddrescue "person" in MOTU to encourage him or her to update it? Just getting my feet wet (again) with how Linux ecosystems currently work after being away from Unix for more time than I'd care to admit, so sorry if these questions seem somewhat basic. Shahrukh On 2020-04-20 11:59 AM, Timothy Beryl Grahek wrote: Wow, this is pretty remarkable. I wonder if the package maintainer can be contacted to get this ironed out. By the way, Linux Mint and Ubuntu share the same packages, so the software repository for Linux Mint is actually the same one as Ubuntu and there are no differences. Note that Linux Mint 19.3 is based on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. Until a new LTS comes out (20.04), Linux Mint will continue to be based on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. https://packages.ubuntu.com/bionic/gddrescue ...
Re: Linux Mint 19.3 has 3-year-old ddrescue!
Hi Shahrukh, On Sun, Apr 19, 2020 at 11:31 PM Shahrukh Merchant wrote: > > Hello, I just installed Linux Mint 19.3 (latest version) and to my > disappointment find that its software repository has ddrescue 1.22 from > 2017 when the current version is 1.25 from 2020! Wow, this is pretty remarkable. I wonder if the package maintainer can be contacted to get this ironed out. By the way, Linux Mint and Ubuntu share the same packages, so the software repository for Linux Mint is actually the same one as Ubuntu and there are no differences. Note that Linux Mint 19.3 is based on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. Until a new LTS comes out (20.04), Linux Mint will continue to be based on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. https://packages.ubuntu.com/bionic/gddrescue > So how do I get the latest version installed on my Linux Mint 19.3 > system? Thanks! Generally speaking, whenever I need to install a newer version of a package on Linux, I just compile the latest version from source. Since ddrescue 1.22 is already in the Ubuntu repositories, it should be pretty straight-forward to do this for ddrescue 1.25 since the dependencies are likely already met. Please, follow these instructions: 1. Remove ddrescue 1.22 from your machine if you happen to have it installed. 'apt remove gddrescue' should be sufficient. 2. Download the latest ddrescue package from this link http://gnu.mirrors.hoobly.com/ddrescue/ 3. Extract the folder from the archive. To do this, you must have lzip installed. Install lzip from the Ubuntu repositories; it is one version behind the latest, but it should do for now. Invoking 'sudo apt install lzip' should do. 4. Now that you have lzip installed, simply invoking 'tar -xf ddrescue-1.25.tar.lz' should be sufficient to extract the archive. 5. You may also need tools to compile with. The simplest way to get all the tools without hassle is to invoke 'sudo apt install build-essential'. 6. Now, if you go into the folder ddrescue-1.25, you should see a text file that says INSTALL. Read this file. Once you've read it and understand it, try compiling ddrescue using the instructions from the file. Best regards, Timothy Beryl Grahek
