[kwlug-disc] Ubuntu LTS future

[Doug Moen]

I'm deciding how to upgrade my Ubuntu 18.04 LTS desktop.

One issue is that I use ZFS and rely on Ubuntu's ZFS packaging. Most distribution don't support ZFS, so you have to roll your own. Another issue is that I have an nvidea GPU.

Options:
 Ubuntu 20.04, but remove Snap.
 Pop OS 20.04. No support for ZFS on root or automatic filesystem snapshot on package install. But I could roll my own using BTRFS on root. My existing ZFS array is supported. Pop has some features i'd like to try, such as tiling window mode, and a flat pack app store. No snap and good nvidea support.

Doug.

On Fri, Jun 26, 2020, at 11:39 AM, Khalid Baheyeldin wrote:
> In another thread, Paul said:
> 
> On Thu, Jun 25, 2020 at 8:51 PM Paul Nijjar via kwlug-disc <kwlug-disc at kwlug.org> wrote:
>> Clearly LTS is losing, which means a lot more cognitive burdens for
>>  sysadmins -- but at the same time Salt (and many other projects) that
>>  use the rolling release "move fast and break things" approach depend
>>  upon a stable Ubuntu onto which they can build THEIR software. They
>>  just don't want the people USING Salt to have the same experience.
>>  There is some kind of disconnect here.
>> 
>>  In this case the situation is worse. Ubuntu included the
>>  salt-master in its LTS release. Ubuntu 18.04 is still supported. But
>>  the LTS release promise is now broken, because if somebody installs
>>  Salt from the Ubuntu repos they will get software with a level 10 CVE. 
>> 
>>  Unfortunately, I think this means I ought to track upstream and use
>>  their repos, which is another administrative headache I wanted to
>>  avoid. It also means that I would now need to upgrade all my minions to
>>  track the latest release, and who knows what that will break.
> 
> Paul,
> 
> I am in complete agreement with you here. I don't use Salt, but I know
> that I want to stay with LTS releases, feeling secure. This depends on 
> repository governance and stewardship by those who maintain the 
> packages and the distro's security team. 
> 
> Lately, there have been cases where the ball was dropped (Salt is such
> a case). 
> 
> More worrying is that going forward, Canonical is forging ahead with snap.
> Snap freezes the dependencies of an app at a certain point. Moreover, it
> requires a cluttered file system, with each app having its own /snap/xxx 
> file system mounted!
> 
> On a new 20.04 LTS server install, I am getting these snap apps by default:
> 
> /dev/loop0 72M 72M 0 100% /snap/lxd/15682
> /dev/loop3 97M 97M 0 100% /snap/core/9436
> /dev/loop1 72M 72M 0 100% /snap/lxd/15766
> 
> And Canonical will be releasing Chrome/Chromium as a snap package, 
> encapsulated withing a .deb. This means Canonical is acting as an intermediary
> unnecessarily. 
> 
> Mint decided that enough is enough, and will not support snap anymore.
> 
> https://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-mint-dumps-ubuntu-snap/
> 
> All this makes me wonder whether Ubuntu should still be the favoured distro
> with LTS and rich maintained repos. Should I go with Debian stable and be
> done with it?
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