KDE 4.8x updates in 12.04

[Rainmaker]

A quick question regarding kde updates.
The 12.04LTS comes with KDE 4.8 by default.
I know using backports this can now be updated to 4.10.
But once KDE has moved on, ie to 4.9x & now 4.10. Does this mean that the 4.8 series is now no longer under development, & having bugs fixed?
Or will that carry on to the end of the LTS?

[dmeyer]

4.8 won't be developed further. It has nothing to do with it being an LTS and everything to do with the way KDE develops.

[claydoh]

This new 5 year LTS cycle may be different, the previous long term support releases seldom if ever saw any major KDE version bumps in the official repos, as LTS is/was basically for security updates mainly; new software versions were seldom added, just fixes to existing ones.

Having 4.10 for Precise in the kubuntu-backports ppa is one sign it could be different down the road. Usage and bug reports could serve as a test bed for 12.04 updates.

[Rainmaker]

OK. So basically then kde 4.8 is now receiving no more work or bug fixed at all, As all development is now going into 4.10.
So anyone on the LTS, would probably be best upgrading to 4.10 via the backports ppa, unless the kubuntu devs, eventually upload it to the main repo.
It would be good to know what they intend doing, as 5 years is a long time to be stuck on 4.8.

[dmeyer]

OK. So basically then kde 4.8 is now receiving no more work or bug fixed at all, As all development is now going into 4.10.
So anyone on the LTS, would probably be best upgrading to 4.10 via the backports ppa, unless the kubuntu devs, eventually upload it to the main repo.
It would be good to know what they intend doing, as 5 years is a long time to be stuck on 4.8.

This has been discussed a hundred times on this forum and its simple. If you want newer KDE versions either take the backports ppa which might bring instability or accept what it came with. There are good reasons for this design choice and I am not going to repeat them when you could just search for them yourself. The current model is probably the best so lets just leave it at that. You have a choice, you are not stuck!

[Rainmaker]

This has been discussed a hundred times on this forum and its simple. If you want newer KDE versions either take the backports ppa which might bring instability or accept what it came with. There are good reasons for this design choice and I am not going to repeat them when you could just search for them yourself. The current model is probably the best so lets just leave it at that. You have a choice, you are not stuck!

Sorry you got so upset by my post, sounds like you're having a bad day.
I did search for threads regarding "backports", but found nothing that indicated whether or not a previous kde release was still being worked on.
However this seems to have been cleared up now, the answer being no.
Thanks for all the replies.

[claydoh]

KDE itself does not usually fix old versions, as they have point releases quite regularly for this purpose. But yeah what dmeyer said is accurate

Also THIS, though old is still quite valid. The only thing I would add to the blog post is that the official ubuntu backports repo (NOT a ppa) does not always have KDE or Kubuntu bits in it.