Xamine and Xperience - Xenial Kubuntu 16.04

[NoWorries]

I was quite surprised when I went to the daily build site and found that Xenial Xerus was there.

While it is very early days in the development cycle, I decided to download the 7-Nov-2015 iso and see what happened. I found that I could try "Kubuntu 16.04" on my Laptop and my first impression was that it is currently Wily re-badged. This is not surprising at this stage but I am sure the divergence will start very soon.

I then tried to install it on my "Sacrificial Desktop" but I was met with a boot failure, ie SYSLINUX 6.03 EDD . . . . Peter Alan et al boot Error. I think that I will have to wait for a few days before this problem is fixed.

In the meantime, I am wondering if anyone has had any positive xperience with Xenial.

[ronw]

Changed wily to xenial in sources.list in a VM. 422 packages upgraded. Boots and Plasma starts.

Not too surprising. As you say, this is Wily plus a little at this point.

[NoWorries]

I finally got Xenial installed on my "Sacrificial Desktop".

I found that creating a bootable usb with either both UNetbootin or Startup Disk Creator on Wily both failed with my desktop. However good old Trusty worked well to produce a bootable usb.

[Qqmike]

I found that creating a bootable usb with either both UNetbootin or Startup Disk Creator on Wily both failed with my desktop. However good old Trusty worked well to produce a bootable usb.

If you are in Wily, can you produce a bootable usb using the dd method (instead of UNetbootin or Startup Disk Creator)?

This dd method:
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...712#post378712

[NoWorries]

I have just tried the approach you suggested and it did not go to the installation menu options. The dd line that I used was:

:~$ sudo dd if=xenial-desktop-amd64.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=16M

The iso image was in my home directory and the usb disk, that was written to, was given the name Kubuntu 16.04 LTS amd64 with the files:


When I used the usb as the boot device, it went and booted up my installed Xenial system on the SSD.

When I looked at the disk with KDE Partition Manager, it reported that there was no valid partition table. The size of the disk is 29.19 GiB and the Dolphin properties for the above files gave 1.3GiB and no free space.

So I will be interested to know what I have done wrong with this approach.

[Qqmike]

sudo dd if=xenial-desktop-amd64.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=16M

So, the iso image is located at the top-level of
your home; and /dev/sdb should be how your Wily sees the
flash drive you are using for a live USB installer (issued from
within your running Wily, lsblk should show this sdb). (Obviously, the "if=" worked because
otherwise dd would have informed you it couldn't find the iso file.)

When I used the usb as the boot device,
it went and booted up my installed Xenial system on the SSD.

Now that is worrisome! I'm thinking of the sdb
being a dedicated flash drive--the USB flash drive you are using as
the "live USB installer." It doesn't matter what was
previously on that flash drive, as dd will over-write everything and
place the iso image on it properly.

Also, dd will not show you its progress, but
when it finishes, it will tell you something like this (printed to your screen):

65+1 records in
65+1 records out
1093238784 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 149.653 s, 7.3 MB/s

Don't worry so much about this part:

When I looked at the disk with KDE Partition Manager, it reported that there was no valid partition table. The size of the disk is 29.19 GiB and the Dolphin properties for the above files gave 1.3GiB and no free space.

That's another story that will not affect how the live USB flash drive should run. See this discussion on it: https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...aller-using-dd

[NoWorries]

As you say, the dd command does not give any feedback on progress which I find frustrating. I think that after a period of no output, I hit the enter key which stopped the progress of the dd command. So that is why the USB failed to start the install process correctly.

When I let it go to completion I got the output, ie

sudo dd if=xenial-desktop-amd64.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=16M
[sudo] password: 
86+1 records in
86+1 records out
1448214528 bytes (1.4 GB) copied, 302.663 s, 4.8 MB/s

It is worth noting that this took 5 minutes! The USB this time, progressed correctly to the options menu.

[Qqmike]

OK, good you got it. Yes, these dd tasks can take 5 minutes, or 10, or 15!

dcfldd is a dd that has a progress meter with it.

Or, to get progress monitoring, do some piping with pv:
How Do You Monitor the Progress of dd?
http://askubuntu.com/questions/21550...progress-of-dd
(Note: Answer #19, TheNano mentions dcfldd)

[Qqmike]

NoWorries, incidentally,

Yes, these dd tasks can take 5 minutes, or 10, or 15!

I just ran this to clear out a 16 GB flash drive and happen to remember this thread.

As an example:

sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb bs=10M
...
15552479232 bytes ([B]16 GB[/B]) copied, [B][COLOR=#ff0000]1931.6 s[/COLOR][/B], 8.1 MB/s

That writes zeros to every bit of the flash drive.
It took 1931.6 seconds, or more than 32 minutes.
This is on a fairly decent machine, USB3 flash drive, and

inxi -Fxx
System:    Host: mike-desktop Kernel: 3.13.0-68-generic x86_64 (64 bit, gcc: 4.8.2) Desktop: KDE 4.13.3 (Qt 4.8.6) dm: lightdm Distro: Ubuntu 14.04 trusty
Machine:   System: ASUS product: All Series [B]Mobo: ASUSTeK model:[/B] [B]H97-PLUS[/B] version: Rev X.0x Bios: American Megatrends version: 2306 date: 10/09/2014
[B]CPU[/B]:       [B]Quad core Intel Core i5-4570[/B] CPU (-MCP-) cache: 6144 KB flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx) bmips: 25541.6 ; Clock Speeds: 1: 800.00 MHz 2: 800.00 MHz 3: 2300.00 MHz 4: 800.00 MHz

[NoWorries]

I must confess that I only use the dd command as a last resource. To clear out a USB drive I use the KDE Partition Manager to create a new partition and that goes through in seconds.

[Qqmike]

To clear out a USB drive I use the KDE Partition Manager to create a new partition and that goes through in seconds.

Yes, that's a good way to start over with a new partition table; I often do the same thing. Just an fyi on this, a couple things:

Sometimes you have a partition scheme that--for some reason--is really obstinately putting "stuff" all over the place. A GPT does that, puts stuff at the beginning, right after the beginning, and particularly at the end of the drive. To really get rid of all those artifacts, you have to dd the drive. Or, say, a hidden Windows partition at the very end of a drive. And, sometimes you can simply just repartition, as you say, and none of these things becomes an issue, no errors, no strange warnings.

Another issue is your data. When you simply repartition a drive, that just changes the data structure and some pointers. Your data is still right there on the drive--documents, pics, vids, whatever. In fact, even after repartitioning, you can probably still retrieve much of that old data using PhotoRec (maybe in combination with TestDisk which will try to restore even your old partitions).

When you zero-out a drive using dd, you basically restore the drive to factory-like condition; you even "refresh" it by writing to, "activating," every bit. In fact, if your drive came with some crap on it, say from the manufacturer or a software provider, dd will wipe that stuff out, too.

My how-to on dd, The dd Command,
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...The-dd-Command

[NoWorries]

For some time now I have been including unsupported updates in my muon package manager.



I have not had any problems with this selection and have found my system quite stable. So it looks like this release is definitely on the way to its LTS status - well done!!!

I was pleasantly surprised this morning when I got Plasma 5.4.3 packages installed. So if you have not selected the pre-release options, you can look forward to these changes coming soon.

[Snowhog]

I'm running 16.04 on my iMac Retina in an Oracle Virtualbox VM; a distribution upgrade from 15.04 (15.04 > 15.10 > 16.04). It's working fine and I've had no issues with it. I'm backing up my 15.10 on my HP laptop in preparation of upgrading it to 16.04.

Keep in mind, that in the early phases, 16.04 is the newer kernel with mostly 15.10 (?) packages. Pre-released and Unsupported updates will most likely be empty at this point.

[NoWorries]

I am impressed that you have it working on an iMac Retina - well done.

Regarding the Packages from Pre-released and Unsupported updates, I get many packages that I thought were related to these updates and the Plasma 5.4.3 packages came from the sources for xenial-proposed.

Edit:

I was in a bit of a rush when I gave the above reply. Since then I have removed the option for the Pre-released and Unsupported Updates and after doing an apt-get update, I did not see any listing from xenial-proposed. So I am now convinced that the options I had selected give the packages being readied for release.

[NoWorries]

After more investigations, I have found more differences by using the Pre-release and Unsupported updates. I hope others are willing to take the risk. If problems arise, there is always the option to remove these extra updates.

For the record, if I just use the "Safe" ones, I get:

Get:1 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial InRelease [218 kB]
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates InRelease                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security InRelease
Get:2 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Sources [1,119 kB]                                      
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial InRelease                                                                 
Get:3 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Sources [7,228 B]                 
Get:4 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Sources [7,472 kB]         
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner Sources                        
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner amd64 Packages                              
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner i386 Packages
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner Translation-en
Get:5 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Sources [178 kB]                                                                                   
Get:6 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main amd64 Packages [1,442 kB]                                                                                
Get:7 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted amd64 Packages [15.8 kB]                                                                           
Get:8 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe amd64 Packages [6,972 kB]                                                                            
Get:9 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse amd64 Packages [138 kB]                                                                            
Get:10 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main i386 Packages [1,440 kB]                                                                                
Get:11 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted i386 Packages [16.1 kB]                                                                           
Get:12 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe i386 Packages [6,955 kB]                                                                            
Get:13 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse i386 Packages [139 kB]                                                                            
Get:14 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Translation-en_AU [2,667 B]                                                                             
Get:15 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Translation-en [842 kB]                                                                                 
Get:16 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Translation-en_AU [69.4 kB]                                                                       
Get:17 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Translation-en [108 kB]                                                                           
Get:18 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Translation-en_AU [2,763 B]                                                                       
Get:19 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Translation-en [4,302 B]                                                                          
Get:20 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Translation-en_AU [1,114 B]                                                                         
Get:21 http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Translation-en [4,708 kB]                                                                           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main Sources                                                                                            
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted Sources                                                                                      
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe Sources                                                                                        
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse Sources                                                                                      
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main amd64 Packages                                                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted amd64 Packages                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe amd64 Packages                                                                                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse amd64 Packages                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main i386 Packages                                                                                      
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted i386 Packages                                                                                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe i386 Packages                                                                                  
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse i386 Packages                                                                                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main Translation-en                                                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse Translation-en                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted Translation-en                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe Translation-en                                                                                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main Sources                                                                                           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted Sources                                                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe Sources                                                                                       
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse Sources                                                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main amd64 Packages                                                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted amd64 Packages                                                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe amd64 Packages                                                                                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse amd64 Packages                                                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main i386 Packages                                                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted i386 Packages                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe i386 Packages                                                                                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse i386 Packages                                                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main Translation-en                                                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse Translation-en                                                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted Translation-en                                                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe Translation-en

There are a total of 60 lines in this list. By comparison, there are 90 in the list when I include the Pre-released and Unsupported updates,ie:

Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial InRelease                             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates InRelease                                           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security InRelease                                          
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed InRelease                                          
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports InRelease                                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Sources                                                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Sources                                                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Sources                                                           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Sources                                                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main amd64 Packages                                                        
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted amd64 Packages                                                  
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe amd64 Packages                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse amd64 Packages                                                  
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main i386 Packages                                                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted i386 Packages                                                   
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe i386 Packages                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse i386 Packages                                                   
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Translation-en_AU                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/main Translation-en                                                             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Translation-en_AU                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/multiverse Translation-en                                                       
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Translation-en_AU                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/restricted Translation-en                                                       
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Translation-en_AU                                                      
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial/universe Translation-en                                                         
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main Sources                                   
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted Sources                             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe Sources                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse Sources                             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main amd64 Packages                                                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted amd64 Packages                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe amd64 Packages                                                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse amd64 Packages                                              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main i386 Packages                                                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted i386 Packages                                               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe i386 Packages                                                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse i386 Packages               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/main Translation-en                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/multiverse Translation-en              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/restricted Translation-en              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-updates/universe Translation-en                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main Sources                          
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted Sources                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe Sources                      
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse Sources                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main amd64 Packages                   
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted amd64 Packages             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe amd64 Packages               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse amd64 Packages             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main i386 Packages                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted i386 Packages              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe i386 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse i386 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/main Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/multiverse Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/restricted Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-security/universe Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/multiverse amd64 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/restricted amd64 Packages              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/universe amd64 Packages                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/main amd64 Packages                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/multiverse i386 Packages               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/restricted i386 Packages               
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/universe i386 Packages                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/main i386 Packages                     
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/main Translation-en_AU                 
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/main Translation-en                    
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/multiverse Translation-en_AU           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/multiverse Translation-en              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/restricted Translation-en_AU           
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/restricted Translation-en              
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/universe Translation-en_AU             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-proposed/universe Translation-en                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/multiverse amd64 Packages             
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/restricted amd64 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/universe amd64 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/main amd64 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/multiverse i386 Packages
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial InRelease                
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/restricted i386 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/universe i386 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/main i386 Packages
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/main Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/multiverse Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/restricted Translation-en
Hit http://mirror.internode.on.net xenial-backports/universe Translation-en
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner Sources          
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner amd64 Packages
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner i386 Packages
Hit http://archive.canonical.com xenial/partner Translation-en

I find it interesting that the list includes both xenial-proposed and xenial-backports sources. So if you want a bit of Xcitement and Xploration, you will Xperience this with Xenial.