Welcoming myself to Ubuntu, but I have some questions

[Derek Broughton]

albi wrote:

> On Wed, 12 Oct 2005 20:58:11 +0000 (UTC)
> <johnny.kastropf at runbox.com> wrote:
> 
>> Right now I have the preview version of 5.10 installed. However, I see
>> that the update manager has continuously updated packages. Am I right to
>> assume that there is no formal action required when the final version is
>> released tomorrow?
> 
> after you're using the official breezy-branch, there will (normally)
> only be security-updates to install afaik

I suppose it depends what you consider "formal action".  When the final
version is released, you will still need to do an "aptitude
dist-upgrade" (in your case, using the update manager) to get those
updates.
> 
>> The question is how upgradable are Ubuntu releases? I read about
>> dist-upgrade and read pages ? like
>> http://ubuntuguide.org/#upgradehoarytobreezy which detail that you can
>> change the sources to upgrade to 'breezy', but there is a huge warning
>> somewhere that it could "break your system".

Those warnings are for wimps :-)  Seriously, you should never have a problem
upgrading to a stable version.  You will _rarely_ have a problem upgrading
to the beta version - once in a while you'll catch it in a state of flux,
particularly when there's a libc upgrade in-process.
> 
>> So what's the deal here? Can you upgrade or not?  Will I be able to
>> upgrade in the future?
> 
> you can safely upgrade after breezy is officially out

Absolutely.

>> 5. How do I resize partitions with information on it without destroying
>> my data?
>> 
>> I remember I used to use FIPS in my days.
> 
> (fips is only for splitting FAT-partitions)

parted, qt-parted

You mentioned being able to upgrade within major versions on redhat.  Note
that 5.04 and 5.10 are NOT minor releases of the same major version.  Those
release numbers are strictly calendar dates - 2005.04 and 2005.10
-- 
derek