Updating from Kubuntu 17.04 to 19.10/20.04?

[siabost]

Hi,

Is possible to upgrade from Kubuntu 17.04 to 19.10 (or 20.04 if available) without reinstalling?
If so, what's the best way to do it?
All updates have been made to 17.04 on a regular basis.

Many thanks.

[oshunluvr]

You should be able to, but I think you have to go to 17.10, then 18.04, then you should be able to jump to 20.04 from there. Got your data backed up yet?

One obstacle might be that 17.04 and 17.10 have been EOL for 2 years or more, but you can try:

Make sure all updates to 17.04 are installed. Open a konsole and type "sudo do-release-upgrade". See what it says/does.

If it upgrades you to something other than 20.04, you'll have to do it again and again. If at the end it doesn't offer you 20.04, then add "-d" to the above command "sudo do-release-upgrade" -d


Good luck. You might seriously consider just installing 20.04 fresh and spending some time getting it arranged to your liking. It would take less time.

[claydoh]

Hi,

Is possible to upgrade from Kubuntu 17.04 to 19.10 (or 20.04 if available) without reinstalling?
If so, what's the best way to do it?
All updates have been made to 17.04 on a regular basis.

Many thanks.

You would have to upgrade to 17.10, then 18.04, then to 20.04 Problem is, both 17.04 and 17.10 are long dead, so it will probably be difficult at best to get to 17.10. I do not think the upgrader is capable of upgrading to an EOL release, due to the removal of the repos from the official archives. They have been moved so the packages are available, but I don't think upgrading is possible using these relocated archives, and you can't skip releases on non-LTS upgrades.

With three years of system level changes, it will be easier and safer to do a clean install, and restore your specific configs etc from backups.


If you are willing to experioement, you might look at this to set up your system to be able to use the relocated repos for your version
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/EOLUpgrades
But I do think that there is a 95% chance that you won't be able to upgrade to 17.10, in order to be able to upgrade to 18.04

[siabost]

Thanks oshunluvr & claydoh,

It's a cousin's laptop and about 400 miles away and he's a complete novice so talking him through a fresh install might be difficult. Could try it over Skype, mind you...
I'll get him to back up his data in any case. Then if the in-situ OS upgrade doesn't work, we can try a fresh install. Or he can mail me the laptop :-)

Many thanks.

[oshunluvr]

For giggles, I installed Ubuntu 17.04 (can't find Kubuntu) and ran the release upgrade:

[jglen490]

Thanks oshunluvr & claydoh,

It's a cousin's laptop and about 400 miles away and he's a complete novice so talking him through a fresh install might be difficult. Could try it over Skype, mind you...
I'll get him to back up his data in any case. Then if the in-situ OS upgrade doesn't work, we can try a fresh install. Or he can mail me the laptop :-)

Many thanks.

I would think with that degree of separation, you may as well just have your cousin download 20.04, backup his current data, and walk him through a clean install exactly once!