Odd updates

[ShadYoung]

I am sitting here looking at the list of current updates that just came down the pipe, and I do not recognize what I am seeing. Currently there are 59 updates waiting, but I am seeing some from sources I do not understand.

libqt5gui5: 5.15.8+p22.04+tunstable+git20230113-0 -> blah blah blah

What concerns me is "tunstable", and Git. Then later on, there is a Kernel "generic-hwe", again, not in a format I am used to seeing. It almost seems like I am on the wrong branch. Is this a normal Neon thing?

[claydoh]

linux-image-generic-hwe-22.04 or similar is a standard Ubuntu LTS kernel meta-package, that simply depends on the latest version of their 'hardware-enablement-stack' kernels, as LTS releases do see kernel bumps throughout their lives.

libqt5gui5's funky file naming is basically an unfortunately poor naming scheme for human-readability purposes, but is there mostly for version purposes, as well as identification, time-stamping, etc, from the build system they created. Even stable software is sourced from git repositories. In this case, I believe that Qt5 receives some patches from KDE, so it is no longer the 'stable' or official Qt code as released by them. I think most of what you are seeing will be these Qt library packages, though there will be other things that might be similar in scope.

tl;dr it is perfectly normal, and you are not on the wrong track.

If you look, you can and very likely will find non-Neon packages in Ubuntu's repos that you may use every day that are like this, but may not have these scary looking naming conventions.

[ShadYoung]

Thanks claydoh. I had just never seen those names before, so it threw me. When I checked the kernel itself I discovered it is tuned for rolling release, which made me think it was a Neon thing. The question now is, why does it want to replace the existing non-HWE kernel with the HWE? They are the same version. Or does it, because its not showing a "-->" to it? Is it just a descriptor?

[claydoh]

It's a meta-package. A Debian thing. Most distro packaging systems use similar things for similar purposes.

It doesn't contain anything other than dependency info. Right now it depends on 5.15., and later on an updated version of it will depend on 5.19 packages. When an updated kernel package is released, or a security fix, the metapackages need to be updated to pull the new stuff in reliably and consistently.

To make things even more confusing, there are going to be multiple layers of metapackages, too. Quite normal .

Debian 's packaging is a complex looking beastie, but it is highly flexible and robust. It allows for a rock solid system like Debian Stable, mixed repos for Unstable/Experimental , and eventually custom distros like Ubuntu etc al.