[kwlug-disc] Preseed sensible default: automatic upgrades

[Chris Irwin]

On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 00:07, Paul Nijjar <paul_nijjar at yahoo.ca> wrote:
> What would be the most sensible default for this answer? I am torn
> between "none" (which means people don't get breakage happening under
> their feet) and "unattended-upgrades" (because despite the blinkyicons
> people tend not to do their upgrades, and security upgrades don't
> break things often).

Ubuntu doesn't do a blinky icon any more (by default). If I remember
the logic, if you haven't run a package manager in $x days and there
are pending updates, a non-focus stealing window is opened in the
background. The user should come across it at some point, rather than
ignoring a tiny icon somewhere.

Interestingly, these kinds of popups are the similar to the OS X
update dialogs that my significant other dismisses whenever she sees
them. So making them noticeable does not really help actually getting
the updates installed.

Regarding unattended-upgrades, the package description implies that it
only applies security updates, so it should be safe.

"This package can download and install security upgrades automatically
and unattended, taking care to only install packages from the
configured APT source, and checking for dpkg prompts about
configuration file changes."

http://packages.ubuntu.com/lucid/admin/unattended-upgrades

-- 
Chris Irwin
<chris at chrisirwin.ca>