About the Kubuntu 20.10 beta

[Rattlehead]

I'm not sure if this is the right spot to be asking this so if its not I'm sorry.

If I install Kubuntu 20.10 when 20.10 comes out does it become the LTS version or do you keep in the beta so it'll basically be like a rolling distro that will beta into 21.04 and so on?

I'm just curious how the beta of a Linux distro would work. I know a beta programs and the beta you keep getting beta releases. I think with Windows when they had betas (well they do but they don't call them betas) you just became Windows 7 Gold (for instance) when it went out of beta. I can't remember how it went.

[Snowhog]

20.10 is not/will not be an LTS, no matter how long you have/use it.

If you install/use a version of Kubuntu Linux that is 'beta', and you regularly perform system upgrades, it will become 'Final' and no longer be in beta status. A non-LTS release will never itself become an LTS, but you would be given the opportunity (if your settings are set accordingly) to perform a 'Release Upgrade' when the next LTS version has been finalized and released into the wild.

[jglen490]

Kubuntu 20.10 is not an LTS, it is one of the "in-between", short term releases that come out on six month cycles and are supported for nine months.

The actual LTS releases have a 2 year cycle (i.e., 16.04, 18.04, 20.04) and have a longer period of support. Kubuntu does not use a rolling release style of development. You have choices in that you can go with the six month new release cycle and get a new distro and app versions, or you can go with the LTS cycle and have a stable release for about 3 years. There are lots of users here who install the in-betweens and others who do LTS.

So if you install 20.10 right now, understand that it is a "beta" version, at least until the end of the this month when it becomes a final. The recent "beta" releases of Kubuntu have been pretty good, and at this point in time 20.10 is almost final, so it should be a good experience for the next nine months.

[Rattlehead]

Kubuntu 20.10 is not an LTS, it is one of the "in-between", short term releases that come out on six month cycles and are supported for nine months.

The actual LTS releases have a 2 year cycle (i.e., 16.04, 18.04, 20.04) and have a longer period of support. Kubuntu does not use a rolling release style of development. You have choices in that you can go with the six month new release cycle and get a new distro and app versions, or you can go with the LTS cycle and have a stable release for about 3 years. There are lots of users here who install the in-betweens and others who do LTS.

So if you install 20.10 right now, understand that it is a "beta" version, at least until the end of the this month when it becomes a final. The recent "beta" releases of Kubuntu have been pretty good, and at this point in time 20.10 is almost final, so it should be a good experience for the next nine months.

Thank you for explaining. I knew Kubuntu wasn't LTS, I don't know why I said it. I'm running Kubuntu now, just wondering how the beta works. Instead of installing 20.10 over 20.04 I might as well stay with 20.04 since its only a short time until the update. I do have in my update setting to get regular updates I just didn't do the unstable program updates.

[Rattlehead]

20.10 is not/will not be an LTS, no matter how long you have/use it.

If you install/use a version of Kubuntu Linux that is 'beta', and you regularly perform system upgrades, it will become 'Final' and no longer be in beta status. A non-LTS release will never itself become an LTS, but you would be given the opportunity (if your settings are set accordingly) to perform a 'Release Upgrade' when the next LTS version has been finalized and released into the wild.

Thank you for the reply. Since it so close to 20.10 going gold I'll stay at 20.04. I'm more curious about KDE 5.20.04 and if w're going to get the 5.9 kernel since I hear there are vulnerabilities with pre 5.8 kernels (but I hear for someone to use the vulnerabilities on you they have to be using your computer directly or remotely so its not a big concern.

[jglen490]

Yep, 20.04 is an LTS, so it's good until about April 2023.

[Rattlehead]

I just realized something. I saw a photo of the info screen of Kubuntu 20.10 and it won't get KDE 5.20 and KDE Neon has KDE 5.20 but won't get Ubuntu 20.10. That's kind of a bummer. You never get the best of KDE or Ubuntu together.

[acheron]

I just realized something. I saw a photo of the info screen of Kubuntu 20.10 and it won't get KDE 5.20 and KDE Neon has KDE 5.20 but won't get Ubuntu 20.10. That's kind of a bummer. You never get the best of KDE or Ubuntu together.

Even if we could provide 5.20, (we can't as it requires a version of Qt no available on Ubuntu/Debian yet), we would not.

5.20 Plasma release was 7 WEEKS after the Groovy 20.10 feature freeze, and 2 DAYS before the absolute FINAL FREEZE.

Even then, in some weird mad universe where where we might try to get freeze exceptions, there is no chance EVER that we would try to ship a release with only the initial .0 release of a desktop, or the .1 bugfix release. Plasma release have 5 bugfix releases for a very good reason.

Shipping the 5.20.0 or 5.20.1 would NOT be the VERY BEST of ubuntu or KDE. It would be the exact opposite.

[Rattlehead]

Ok, that makes sense. Thank you for explaining that. I figured since KDE Neon has 5.20 that since it's based on Ubuntu you'd get it as well. I'm pretty new to Linux (I tried it many years ago when it was a mess) so to have people nice enough to explain things is col and I'm grateful for it.

I found a video that showed how to upgrade the current version to 20.10 and I did it and it seemed worked. I decided to do it as a learning thing, if it didn't work then I would have re-installed.