I realize, with everything else I’ve written, that I have never actually outlined how to upgrade your machine between releases. I know I’ve posted about how NOT to upgrade, or how to upgrade during beta but never complete steps to upgrading your machine. For those of you that aren’t familiar with these steps read on. For the rest of you, I hope you’re about ready to upgrade to Feisty in just a few short weeks!
You can upgrade your machine in just a few short steps.
First, you’ll want to make sure that your machine is completely up-to-date on your current release. To do this you can run the following: (note: see my previous posts about automagic upgrading.)
sudo aptitude update && sudo aptitude upgrade && sudo aptitude dist-upgrade && sudo aptitude autoclean
Once this is finished your machine should be completely up-to-date and you’re ready to upgrade. To start the upgrade process you can try one of the following methods:
ALT:F2 - gksudo "update-manager -c -d"
or you can do things manually by:
sudo aptitude install ubuntu-desktop (or kubuntu-desktop depending on your main GDM)
sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list
find/replace every instance of [current] (ie; dapper) with [future] (ie; edgy)
It might be helpful, if you missed it, to see my previous post on find/replace using Vim.
Once all instances of [current] are replaced with [future] (and remember you can only upgrade one version at a time) you can run the following:
sudo aptitude update && sudo aptitude upgrade && sudo aptitude dist-upgrade && sudo aptitude autoclean
This will then check for the latest available versions, upgrade to them, upgrade to any additional packages and dependencies and then clean up after itself. This will take a while depending on your network connection!
Once these steps have finished you may also want to run the same command again, to make sure you haven’t missed anything. I have often found that I have needed to run the command 2x-3x after a reboot to get everything just the way it should be. Ooh, and as usual be safe and back your critical files up before you do something like this. You never know if you might run into trouble, and its a good idea to back things up anyway.
Its often wise to suggest one should backup or try the upgrade to Feisty on a non-critical machine first.
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Nice explanation, thanks for this :-).
aussiebear – you are right (and I believe I did mention it) that backing up is *always* a good idea. I regularly backup my /home to an external USB drive.
Also, Feisty is very much non-production at this point so don’t anyone rush ahead too quickly and run into trouble. The latest I would suggest for anyone (unless you REALLY know what you’re doing) is Edgy.
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Tried to upgrade from Breezy to Dapper and from Dapper to Edgy. It never worked. I have to install software that can not be installed using apt (sometimes .deb files, sometimes software that i have to compile), so i think that is the reason for my problems.
But there is a way that ALWAYS worked for me. Using a dedicated partition for /home. With that i can just format my /boot /root partition (backup /etc first), do a fresh install of the new version, install the additional software that i need, edit a few files in /etc and everything is up and running again. Because all personal data and configuration files are stored in my home dir, all applications are configured and ready to run. This process never failed me, it gives me a fresh system and takes only half an hour of my time (plus an hour or so for Ubuntu to install; time to play with the kids).
Ciao,
scameronde
Upgrade from Dapper to Edgy does not work for. I’ll stick to long-term supported Dapper (3 yrs for Desktop).
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I wanted to thank you for posting how to do an upgrade between distos of Ubuntu. I think all of the information you post is needed to help people like myself who are new to Linux and Ubuntu make the transition. I had some problems figuring out how to use vi, but after reviewing your directions and googling some information about vi, I am now able to follow your directions without any problems so far. I’m upgrading Kubuntu 6.06 to 6.10 via your directions and it is running without any problems. I will definitely subscribe to your email list and RSS feeds. Do you have a podcast? I would like to request if you could publish a recommended book list for newbies who want to find out about Linux and Ubuntu in particular.
I’m switching from OSX as my primary OS to Ubuntu and so far I have nothing but good things to say about Ubuntu. I’ve tried Fedora and SuSE and both do not compare to the ease and power of Ubuntu.
I particularly like your site because you take the time to explain things. I read a few Linux magazines like Linux Journal and Linux Format, and Linux Format is the only magazine that is written with the new Linux user in mind.
Long live Ubuntu!
eha1990 – I’m glad I could help and I’m glad you’re enjoying Ubuntu so much. I absolutely love it (as I’m sure is obvious). I hope you can find the time to contribute back in any way you can as well. Pay It Forward 🙂
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Great article. Took a long time to upgrade but mostly painless.
thanks
I tried to install Xubuntu 6.10, instead of installing Ubuntu 6.06.1. Installing Xubuntu 6.10 on a PIII with 128MB RAM failed with anthy.
So, using the Ubuntu 6.06.1 Alternate Install CD, I installed a Server. After the server was installed, the computer rebooted.
Next, I edited the sources.list in /etc/apt and changed dapper to edgy as mentioned above.
And then, I did the following (as root):
apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade
shutdown -r now
Ubuntu 6.10 Release now installed!
As root:
apt-get autoclean
apt-get install xubuntu-desktop
After a few hours, I have Xubuntu 6.10 running.
This process worked for me.
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