Pre-upgrade warnings and advice?

[Neal McBurnett]

Ubuntu support for upgrades naturally depends on exactly what is being upgraded.  Use of software from outside the official Ubuntu repositories (PPA repositories or .deb files or tar.gz packages or the like) means upgrades may be more complicated for the user.

Is there anything in the official upgrade tools to remind users about use of ppas, non-repo packages, unofficial desktops or other potentially problematic bits of software like unofficial programs which "tweak" UI settings and the like?

I recall some warning about some such packages at upgrade time, but I forget when it happens, what it includes, and what advice it gives.  It would seem most convenient to have a safe, stand-alone application that would just look for such software and give good advice on what might not work, where folks might go or look for upgrade paths supported by PPA developers or other organizations, etc.  It would help a lot if it didn't spew out too much information, e.g. by combining warnings for a set of packages into an overall warning about a particular desktop or suite of related packages with similar upgrade issues.

Do things like that exist?

Cheers,

Neal McBurnett                 http://neal.mcburnett.org/