I just wanted to add these comments from OMG Ubuntu to this thread as I really think this shows the degree of frustration that exists around this bug. The subscribers to this bug repport would obviously like to see a resolution as this both benefits us and Canonical. How can we now escalate this to Mark Shuttleworth directly or the desktop team to really look and understand what this means for Ubuntu adoption long term. This bug report was opened two and a half years ago and is rated as critical, when will we see something finally get done or do we just have to live with this broken update process indefinitely?
http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/12/vlc-2-0-5-released-ready-for- ubuntu#disqus_thread James Harking • 5 days ago Where is the Ubuntu 12.04 support? Surely effort should be made to support the so called 'advocated' release of Ubuntu, you know like Valve are doing with Steam. 11 •Edit•Reply•Share › Brandon Watkins James Harking • 4 days ago I just noticed this: https://launchpad.net/~n-muenc... For some reason he's got two ppa's, one with quantal/precise/oneric packages and one with oneric/precise packages for some reason only this one seems to have 2.0.5 for precise, even though both ppa's have precise packages. 1 •Reply•Share › Joey-Elijah Sneddon Moderator James Harking • 5 days ago You'd have to ask the packagers who package VLC about that. If you're on an LTS I suspect you value tried and tested stability over 'assumed stability' of a newer release, in which case sticking with the Ubuntu version is the smart thing to do. 6 1 •Reply•Share › Sicofante Joey-Elijah Sneddon • 4 days ago I stay on an LTS because I value _system stability_, not applications being ancient AND I don't want to upgrade all of the systems I administer (which are a big bunch) every six months. It's about time we separate the concepts of desktop stability and server stability. A server may happilly live with 2 year old applications. A desktop, hardly. Especially a home oriented desktop like Ubuntu. I know I sound like a broken record, but someone at Canonical needs to urgently address the decoupling of system updates and application updates. You just can't compete with OS X or Windows and maintain the current situation. 17 •Reply•Share › Brandon Watkins Sicofante • 4 days ago ppa's aren't perfect, but they do the job fine for me. IMO they are what makes ubuntu infinitely more usable than other distros, and are the only reason I can stand sticking with an LTS release. I too am sticking with 12.04 LTS, because I've found gnome 3.6 to be by far the buggiest gnome release I've ever used, especially gnome-shell which has a giant infinately reproducible memory leak /rant. But I've been able to find good ppa's for everything that I want updated in 12.04. Don't get me wrong I do agree with you, I think this is a problem that needs to be addressed, but at least ubuntu has a good stop-gap solution with ppa's, its a much worse situation in a lot of other distros. Its worth mentioning that its not as easy as you might think to "decouple" system updates from application updates, due to the way package management works. Linux heavily uses shared libraries, so many applications depend on the same shared library. Updating applications to their newest versions may often necessitate updating the shared libraries that they depend on. The problem is that this can potentially break other applications which can be a big issue. Because of this this decoupling will sadly never happen unless the way ubuntu's package management works is radically changed. 3 •Reply•Share › Sicofante Brandon Watkins • 3 days ago 1. How do you update LibreOffice? It's stuck on 3.6.02 for 12.04.1 and I wouldn't call it a niche app, but probably the second most important one after Firefox, for many seats. 2. I don't think decoupling apps and system updates is easy _with the current package manager_. However, there are other solutions out there. The need for shared libraries is highly debatable these days and it is by no means indispensable when it comes to desktop apps. There's at least one very simple solution, and it's already implemented in OS X and Gobolinux: self-contained apps. I haven't researched it too much, but there's a new package management system called Guix (https://savannah.gnu.org/proje... ) that makes some promises too about this issue. Creating an entirely new desktop environment can't be considered "an easy task" either, but it was addressed by Canonical (and it's still unfinished...). I think decoupling system and apps updates should be a priority as high as improving Unity performance (which is probably Ubuntu's biggest issue now) in order to compete with mainstream OSs. 1 •Reply•Share › James Harking Sicofante • 2 days ago I have to agree here Sicofante, the current upgrade process in Ubuntu is so clearly broken that Canonical must be really drinking their own Kool aid to not realise this. For more than 10% (and I think I am being generous here) of average desktop users there is simply no will to completely upgrade their working desktop every six months. Readers of OMG ubuntu are not the mass market target desktop audience Canonical are interested in getting. We are told by Canonical that we should stay on LTS releases because these are tested and the most stable. Hmm... maybe if I want an ancient version of Libre Office or Krita or Gimp etc, etc, etc... This view is so frustratingly backwards compared to how modern app stores work today from Microsoft, Apple and Google. Yet no real effort is put in to resolving this issue. There is an open bug report that MPT has been assigned for months and months, it is rated as critical but nothing happens. https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubu... We know this is frustratingly broken, Canonical do too but there appears no desire to fix it. I could not recommend a new user from Windows or the Mac use Ubuntu realistically. I would have to either install lots of possibly insecure PPAs or upgrade their machines every six months just so they can remain up to date with their favourite software. For the amount of hand holding and work it takes I might as well tell them to stay with what they know. Ubuntu doesn't just need to be better than the incumbents to make an impact on the desktop they have to be 10X better or you just won't see the switch in any meaningful way. If Canonical are unwilling to fix this issue then at least work on making their backports better or allow an easy way to find PPAs in the software centre that we can subscribe to.Until this issue is resolved Ubuntu will continue to flounder in the mass market. 3 •Edit•Reply•Share › Sicofante James Harking • a day ago − I was already subscribed to that bug. I just posted a long post tonight trying to make it look as serious as it is. It amazes me that this is not being taken seriously by Canonical. There should be a dedicated team force to find a solution to this (I mean, trying the solutions others have already devised; they don't need to invent anything). It's definitely the biggest showstopper for Ubuntu adoption. How can't the developers see it? How can Shuttleworth expect 200 million users to swallow not being able to update apps? It's just crazy. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/578045 Title: Upgrading packaged Ubuntu application unreasonably involves upgrading entire OS To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/software-center/+bug/578045/+subscriptions -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs
