Good Morning from my Robotics Lab! This is Shadow_8472 with a side project of the week. Let’s get started!
The Linux Development Cycle
System76 released PopOS 2022.04 LTS for April, 2022. Both PopOS and its upstream distributions Ubuntu and Debian, follow a release cycle where software changes accumulate over time until they are bundled and published together so end-users aren’t bothered with little updates potentially breaking sensitive applications all the time. Ubuntu (and subsequently PopOS) release new versions every six months with very little overlap.
LTS releases are special because support for them lasts far longer. This makes for a more stable platform for developers and end-users, and a larger base of compatible software grows as a result. All this is at the cost of some applications being sorely outdated toward the release’s end of life.
Derpy’s Upgrade
Derpy Chips, one of my desktop workstations, runs PopOS on an LTS release. While Canonical may support several Ubuntu LTS versions at once, System76 does not extend the same policy to PopOS. And so, I went along with the upgrade.
Based on my father’s difficulties installing Discord on Debian 11, I expected it might not work with the new PopOS either. My difficulties were elsewhere. MultiMC was all but gone, I had a few things to re-customize, and the sound stopped working for Nodecore a block game I’ve been playing that runs on the Minetest engine. I originally had to install it from a snap package for version compatibility reasons, but the new repositories had the same version I was already using before the upgrade, and moving away from the Snap fixed my sound issues. I moved my game files around, but it was nothing I wouldn’t trust an adventurous, new Linux user to figure out within a couple hours.
Changes to KDE, my desktop environment, were the most noticeable. The upgrade introduced a number of useful features I’ve been enjoying on Manjaro like split terminals and annotations for screenshots, while also bringing over a wider style of panel menu I don’t particularly care for, but don’t hate enough to revert myself.
Takeaway
Major upgrades carry the potential to break software, but this time has been painless besides reinstalling a couple programs. I was able to upgrade on my own terms
Final Question
Are there any features you’ve been excited to find after an update? I look forward to reading your answers in the comments or on Discord.