Clarification needed for access to package versions in repositories

[Bret Busby]

On 31/3/24 01:47, Ian Bruntlett wrote:
> Hi Bret,
> 
> On Sat, 30 Mar 2024 at 17:43, Bret Busby <bret at busby.net 
> <mailto:bret at busby.net>> wrote:
> 
>     So, the experts on the  Ubuntu users mailing list, see no reason for
>     concern, for a novice to be running a hybrid system combining Ubuntu
>     22.04 and Ubuntu 23.10, with the repositories being used for
>     maintaining, including updating the system, being the repositories for
>     Ubuntu 22.04, as such a system is regarded as being stable and secure?
> 
> I'm no expert. However, I am curious to know - how did the novice end up 
> running a hybrid system?
> 
> TIA,
> 
> 
> Ian

What the person had posted, is this:

"
When I was running Mint 20.2 I would always look at the updates that
popped up in the Update Manager and individually decide what I wanted
to add and WHEN. For example, I typically would not immediately update
the kernel for a few days just in case someone found a problem and that
kernel was quickly corrected.

Of course this required a reboot. Not a big deal in my experience. And
it allowed me to keep track of kernels and remove old ones.

Well around end of October last year I discovered quite by accident
that I was no longer being given the option to choose what and when to
update. Instead the system was automatically updating without my
knowledge. Yikes!

My good friend who knows Linux told me he had also just noticed
the same and discovered that:

The Update Manager>Edit>Preferences>Automation Tab was turned on to
"Apply updates automatically."

Further, "Remove obsolete kernels and dependencies" under "Automatic
Maintenance" was also turned on.

Well, neither he nor I ever knowingly turned either of those on.
Somehow the system was now automatically updating.

So I turned both to the "off" position.

About the same time Claws-Mail which had for years been the "native"
  v3.17.5 suddenly became v4.1.1

I did not knowingly do this update. The system just did it.

So it seems (?) as if the Mint developers may have initiated an
automatic update system by default. My friend wrote to me that:

 > "Rebooting" after kernel updates might be becoming a thing of the past,
 > by the way. My understanding is this behavior is considered an
 > anachronism and the engineers have been working their way towards
 > implementing a seamless "update and resume" capability.

Again to clarify, this update to Claws-Mail v4.1.1 occurred while I was
running Mint 20.2 and it came over in the update to 20.3 and then 21.1.

Now, does any of that give you an indication as to why I have v4.1.1
after an upgrade that occurred while using Mint 20.2 and you can only
see v4.0.0 with a much more recent version of Mint?
"

Now, the version of Linux Mint that the person is running, is supposedly 
Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon.

That runs on top of Ubuntu 22.04 LTS; Linux Mint uses the latest Ubuntu 
LTS version for its underlying system.

The version of Claws Mail, and, the version of the kernel 
(linux-image-generic), bot belong in Ubuntu 23.10 , from what I 
previously posted, and, they do not belong in Ubuntu 22.04.x .

The person's repository list uses the Ubuntu 22.04 repositories - the 
"jammy" thingies.

 From what I can make out of the circumstances, the person's computer 
has, without the person's knowledge, updated itself to a hybrid system, 
with the underlying system being a hybrid of Ubuntu Linux versions 22.04 
and 23.10, whilst retaining, as its repositories, the repositories for 
Ubuntu Linux 22.04.

The person is several thousand kilometres from where I am located, so I 
cannot physically inspect that system.

....
Bret Busby
Armadale
Western Australia
(UTC+0800)
.................