<span>Hi!</span><div><br></div><div><span>For Ubuntu LTS 20 and 22, I
noted that packages for FlightGear Flight Simulator use an incorrect unstable version, <span>or used a version that was out of date</span> at time of Ubuntu LTS 1st release<br></span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://packages.ubuntu.com/flightgear">https://packages.ubuntu.com/flightgear</a></span></div><div><br></div><div><span>> focal (20.04LTS) (games): Flight Gear Flight Simulator [universe]</span></div><div><span>1:2019.1.1+dfsg-2: amd64 arm64 armhf ppc64el s390x</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>> jammy (22.04LTS) (games): Flight Gear Flight Simulator [universe]</span></div><div><span>1:2020.3.6+dfsg-1build1: amd64 arm64 armhf ppc64el riscv64 s390x </span></div><div><br></div><div><span>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. </span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span><br></span></div><div><span>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
:</span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="http://msolab.xyz/resources.html">http://msolab.xyz/resources.html</a> </span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://www.mathworks.com/help/aeroblks/introducing-the-flight-simulator-interface.html">https://www.mathworks.com/help/aeroblks/introducing-the-flight-simulator-interface.html</a> . </span></div><div><br></div><div><span>So the situation has wider ramifications, as scientific software for academia.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Some info on FlightGear:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear</a></span></div><div><span>>
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. </span></div><div><br></div><div><span>>
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]</span></div><div><br></div><div>> <span><i>FlightGear</i> started as an online proposal in 1996 by David Murr, living in the United States. He was dissatisfied with <a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprietary_software" title="Proprietary software">proprietary</a>, available, simulators like the <a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Flight_Simulator" title="Microsoft Flight Simulator">Microsoft Flight Simulator</a>, citing motivations of companies not aligning with the simulators' players ("simmers")..</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>>
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</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">---</div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div><span>The unstable Ubuntu versions
are more up-to-date. But the LTS version are the ones that are actually
used by most people, apparently:</span></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://ubuntu.com/about/release-cycle">https://ubuntu.com/about/release-cycle</a></span></div><div><span>>
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.</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>---</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>Correct versions</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>FlightGear has LTS versions similar to Ubuntu, with bug fix and minor update releases. These are what should be used.<br></span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://wiki.flightgear.org/Release_plan#General_release_concept">https://wiki.flightgear.org/Release_plan#General_release_concept</a></span></div><div><br></div><div><span>> At any given time there are two release "stream":</span></div><div><span>>
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.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span><br></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span>> A "preview" release, based on the development branch "next". [And unstable nightlies]<br></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Based on the Ubuntu LTS release timeline, at <span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases">https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases</a></span> , the correct FlightGear LTS version would have been:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div><span>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.</span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2018.3">https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2018.3</a></span></div><div><br></div><div><span>For
Ubuntu 22, released April 2022, the the correct LTS would have been
FlightGear 2020.3.12 LTS (released Feb 2022) or later</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span><br></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span><span>Instead, it's 2020.3.6
which was released in January 2021, at least 6 updates out of date! </span><br></span></div><div><span> </span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">See:<br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://www.flightgear.org/category/releases/">https://www.flightgear.org/category/releases/</a></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div><span>There were some big changes in 2020.3.7 (and later) which missed being included in the LTS:</span></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3#2020.3.7">https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3#2020.3.7</a></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">---</div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The fix:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div><span>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. </span></div><div><br></div><div><span>For Ubuntu20LTS, the latest 2020.3 LTS should be used.</span></div><div><br></div><div><span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3">https://wiki.flightgear.org/Changelog_2020.3</a></span></div><div><br></div><div><span>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.<br></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span><br></span></div><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span>If you have any questions, FlightGear people can be reached at their "flightgear-devel" mailing list on sourceforge: <span><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener" href="https://sourceforge.net/p/flightgear/mailman/">https://sourceforge.net/p/flightgear/mailman/</a></span><br></span></div><div><span>---</span></div><div><br></div><div><span>Please remedy this situation thanks,</span></div><div><span>cheers<br></span></div>