Upgrade Ubuntu Linux to Jaunty Jackalope the super-easy way

David M Williams
Tuesday, 17 March 2009 10:47

Opinion and Analysis

Actually, from the command line there’s only one thing you need to do! Fire up a terminal window and type
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

If you’ve been using Linux for a while you’ll be familiar with the apt-get command and its ‘upgrade’ parameter. That causes your system to check online repositories for newer versions of all the packages that you have.

However, the ‘dist-upgrade’ parameter goes further. This doesn’t merely upgrade the individual software items but the entire distribution just as Update Manager did.

More specifically, what dist-upgrade and Update Manager are doing are removing packages no longer used in the new distribution (because they have been superseded or for other reasons) and loading new packages that form part of the core of the new distro even though you did not have them previously.

That’s different to apt-get upgrade; by performing apt-get dist-upgrade you are assured of getting everything that makes up the new distribution and not just newer versions of individual components that you already have.

Although I’ve referred to Ubuntu, the principle is the same for any Debian-based system, and similar options exist in other Linux variants too. Really, the package manager is something natural to Linux users but is a prominent significant distinction between this operating system and its rivals which do not have such a centralised and integrated means to update all your apps in one hit, and as you’ve seen to even upgrade the entire operating system when a new version is available.

Of course, you still may want to download a Jaunty Jackelope ISO image to burn to disk for other computers, for safety and recovery, to give to friends, whatever the reason. Nevertheless, for your main, live, system the upgrade to Jaunty can be straightforward and trouble-free.