FlightGear packages on 20/22 LTS incorrect&unstable / out of date, respectively

[snix]

Hi!

For Ubuntu LTS 20 and 22, I noted that packages for FlightGear Flight Simulator use an incorrect unstable version, or used a version that was out of date at time of Ubuntu LTS 1st release

https://packages.ubuntu.com/flightgear

> focal (20.04LTS) (games): Flight Gear Flight Simulator [universe]
1:2019.1.1+dfsg-2: amd64 arm64 armhf ppc64el s390x

> jammy (22.04LTS) (games): Flight Gear Flight Simulator [universe]
1:2020.3.6+dfsg-1build1: amd64 arm64 armhf ppc64el riscv64 s390x

I'm surprised at this. FlightGear is one of the really big open source projects, and one of the big examples where the open source philosophy has succeeded in surpassing closed source proprietary code, in that it is used by data to set a standard for future.

Even though it's listed as a game in packages, it is often used as a scientific simulation in universities e.g. it has Sci-lab/Xcos (FOSS) or Matlab/Simulink integrations :

http://msolab.xyz/resources.html

https://www.mathworks.com/help/aeroblks/introducing-the-flight-simulator-interface.html .

So the situation has wider ramifications, as scientific software for academia.

Some info on FlightGear:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear
> FlightGear is an atmospheric and orbital flight simulator used in aerospace research and industry. Its flight dynamics engine (JSBSim) is used in a 2015 NASA benchmark to judge new simulation code to the standards of the space industry.

> The FlightGear project has been nominated by SourceForge, and subsequently chosen as project of the month by the community, in 2015, 2017, and 2019.[9][10][11]

> FlightGear started as an online proposal in 1996 by David Murr, living in the United States. He was dissatisfied with [proprietary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprietary_software), available, simulators like the [Microsoft Flight Simulator](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Flight_Simulator), citing motivations of companies not aligning with the simulators' players ("simmers")..

> FlightGear incorporated other open-source resources, including the LaRCsim flight dynamics engine from NASA, and freely available elevation data. The first working binaries using OpenGL came out in 1997. By 1999 FlightGear had replaced LaRCsim with JSBSim built to the sims' needs, and in 2015 NASA used JSBSim alongside 6 other space industry standards to create a measuring stick to judge future space industry simulation code

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The unstable Ubuntu versions are more up-to-date. But the LTS version are the ones that are actually used by most people, apparently:
https://ubuntu.com/about/release-cycle
> LTS or ‘Long Term Support’ releases are published every two years in April. LTS releases are the ‘enterprise grade’ releases of Ubuntu and are used the most. An estimated 95% of all Ubuntu installations are LTS releases.

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Correct versions

FlightGear has LTS versions similar to Ubuntu, with bug fix and minor update releases. These are what should be used.

https://wiki.flightgear.org/Release_plan#General_release_concept

> At any given time there are two release "stream":
> A Long Term Support (LTS) release stream. This is a stable release to which bug fixes are applied, and will be active for up to two years. Most users and aircraft developers use this release. Currently 2020.3.

> A "preview" release, based on the development branch "next". [And unstable nightlies]

Based on the Ubuntu LTS release timeline, at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases , the correct FlightGear LTS version would have been:

For Ubuntu 20, released April 2020 the correct LTS would have been FlightGear 2018.3.6 LTS, as 2020.3 LTS was released later in 2020.

https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2018.3

For Ubuntu 22, released April 2022, the the correct LTS would have been FlightGear 2020.3.12 LTS (released Feb 2022) or later

Instead, it's 2020.3.6 which was released in January 2021, at least 6 updates out of date!

See:
https://www.flightgear.org/category/releases/

There were some big changes in 2020.3.7 (and later) which missed being included in the LTS:
https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3#2020.3.7

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The fix:

For Ubuntu 20LTS, the version should be switched to FlightGear 2018.3.6 LTS at least, or preferably, the latest 2020.3.x LTS version. FlightGear 2019 is currently used, and is an unstable preview.

For Ubuntu20LTS, the latest 2020.3 LTS should be used.

https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3

Preferably, the FlightGear LTS package repos should be kept updated with the latest bug fix releases from FlightGear LTS versions. Newer non-LTS Ubuntu releases like mantic have almost up-to date FlightGear LTS bugfix releases (2020.3.18 LTS) and using these are an immediate improvement.

If you have any questions, FlightGear people can be reached at their "flightgear-devel" mailing list on sourceforge: https://sourceforge.net/p/flightgear/mailman/

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Please remedy this situation thanks,
cheers
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