[ubuntu-za] Upgrade to new Ubuntu OS every 6 months?

[Bill Cairns]

On Tue, Mar 2, 2010 at 7:33 PM, Anton Binedell <abinedell at vodamail.co.za> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Thanks for the help with my last dilemma.Ubuntu is now running as my
> only OS. I however have an open question about how users upgrade on
> Ubuntu, do you upgrade every 6 months to a newer version of Ubuntu or do
> you stay with the OS until the end of the OS lifespan (18 months)? And
> what would be the best option: upgrade every 6 months; 12 months or 18
> months?
>
> Regards
> Anton
>

An interesting question and I am looking forward to hear what others
think. I started off with Ubuntu, yonks ago, in 1974 (or was is 2004?)
and kept on updating every six months and having to reload all my
stuff and forgetting the good stuff that I had downloaded and so it
went on.

In April 2008 I said "Enough! a plague on all your updating!" Besides
which it was a Long Term thingee. So I have been running 08.04 ever
since.

And very happily too. But there are problems.

My most commonly used applications include Open Office and Gimp. The
official repositories for those are still stuck in the dark ages. So I
have to venture forth and do non-Ubuntu stuff to be able to use the
version of OO that I have been using on Microsoft for the past however
long. The same thing applies to Gimp and some others.

I will be moving to 10.04 sometime - about June I suspect. This time I
will try and install properly so that my home directory is sitting on
a different partition. That should relieve some of the hassles of new
versions.

But the other - and more important - way of looking at it is "If ain't
broken don't fix it!" If there is no reason to update, don't. If you
are a newest system junkie, by all means go and play with the latest
OS. (I do this on my other machine I must confess). But if the "work"
that you do - email, browsing, writing python programs, writing, and
so on - works then why upgrade?

I live in a retirement resort and spend far too much time helping
oldies use computers. (If your parents are in a retirement resort do
not, repeat DO NOT, give them your old Pentium 3. You can afford to
give them a decent computer). Windows XP is still the OS of choice.
Because it works. I am doing my best with Ubunbtu, but have only one
vistory so far ...

Bill