On Thu, Dec 08, 2011 at 10:32:20AM +1100, Glenn McIntosh wrote:
Moreover, packages cannot be backported indefinitely for old releases, it would require too much work.
it would also be pointless because you'd end up with the next debian release or sid anyway. and from the user's POV, it would be a lot more trouble because it wouldn't be used by anywhere near as many people so would be less tested that testing or sid. and it would defeat the purpose of a 'stable' release too. 'stable' and 'bleeding edge' are pretty much mutually exclusive. debian makes it easy to run a mostly-stable release with a few selected packages from sid or testing, but if you have too many such updated packages you eventually get to the point where you're better off just upgrading the entire system to testing or sid. so, - use stable if you don't ever want any surprises - use testing if you want near bleeding edge but with other people being the alpha testers - use sid if you want bleeding edge and are willing to be the discoverer of occasionally hilarious surprises (don't forget to report bugs)
If you have a package that you need to upgrade, then you have several options: 1) upgrade to the latest release of Debian (might involve some down time) 2) get the package from backports.org (assuming someone has taken the trouble to backport it) 3) recompile from source and resolve any dependency issues yourself 4) get the package from a newer release by adding in both repositories, and prioritizing the older one so that everything else doesn't get upgraded too 5) just grab the .deb file from a later release in packages.debian.org and install it (this assumes all the dependencies will 'just work')
yep. there are several variations on those themes, but they're the basic choices. craig -- craig sanders <cas@taz.net.au> BOFH excuse #205: Quantum dynamics are affecting the transistors