[lxc-users] LXD Official PPA deprecation

[Thomas Ward]

Uhm... I think you're confused here Jeff.  Allow me to explain.

In Standard Ubuntu releases, Backports is *actually enabled* but set at
a lower pin priority by default.  That is, you can have backports
enabled and then only *selectively* install from Backports.  This is a
standard 16.04 system and its corresponding Backports priority data from
`apt-cache priority`:

 100 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-backports/universe i386
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-backports,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=universe,b=i386
 100 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-backports/universe amd64
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-backports,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=universe,b=amd64
 100 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-backports/main i386 Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-backports,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=main,b=i386
 100 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-backports/main amd64
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-backports,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=main,b=amd64

This indicates it's a lower priority than the updates or other
repositories, such as the standard xenial-updates, which is shown here
below:

 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/multiverse i386
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=multiverse,b=i386
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/multiverse amd64
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=multiverse,b=amd64
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/universe i386
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=universe,b=i386
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/universe amd64
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=universe,b=amd64
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/restricted i386
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=restricted,b=i386
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/restricted amd64
Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=restricted,b=amd64
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/main i386 Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=main,b=i386
 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu xenial-updates/main amd64 Packages
     release
v=16.04,o=Ubuntu,a=xenial-updates,n=xenial,l=Ubuntu,c=main,b=amd64


The priority of 100 is lower than the priority of 500; ultimately, the
version pinning *by default* sticks backports as an optional,
you-must-specify-to-install-from-backports option.  Therefore, you do
***not*** need extensive version pinning in Ubuntu releases to use
backports alongside standard system packages, as the system by-default
deprioritizes Backports unless you've installed something specifically
from Backports.  (PPAs actually operate completely differently, and get
the 500 priority which can actually result in clobbering of data between
repos)

Ultimately, this is ***not*** going to need extensive version pinning. 
Trust me on this, as someone who's done this myself on four separate
environments and actively uses LXD to run multiple production-level
services actively via the four boxes - backports being enabled don't
impact things like you think it does.

(I had this same misconception in the 14.04 era, but after talking with
the release team and other server team members, this is no longer the case).


Thomas
Ubuntu Server Team Member
LP: ~teward


On 12/27/2017 11:57 AM, Jeff Kowalczyk wrote:
> When updating LXD 2.20 on Ubuntu 16.04, I noticed the PPA deprecation
> notice, included below [1].
>
> I'd like to respectfully ask that the PPA not be deprecated and
> continue to see new package versions. Or at the very least, see
> deprecation deferred until after the next LTS 18.04.1 is widely deployed.
>
> PPAs are well supported with our existing tooling (saltstack, etc) and
> allow granular access to only the desired package (LXD) and its
> dependencies. Snap packages are not an option for my company at this time.
>
> If I understand correctly, enabling the backports repository on LTS
> production systems to obtain new LXD versions may require extensive
> version pinning to keep existing installed packages at their current
> versions.
>
> Given that LXD is a major project of Canonical, continuing to provide
> an existing official PPA is helpful to users, consistent with other
> projects publishing debian packages, and worth the effort to continue
> maintenance going forward.
>
> Thanks for considering the request.
> Jeff
>
>
> [1] Deprecation notice:
>
> LXD PPAs to go away by end of year
>
> We are deprecating all LXD PPAs at the end of 2017.
>
> Existing users should move to the LXD snap as the preferred way to get the
> latest LXD feature release on older Ubuntu releases.
>
> You can do so by first installing snapd on your system if it's not there
> already. Once snapd is installed, installing the LXD snap and
> migrating your
> existing data can be done with:
>
> snap install lxd && lxd.migrate
>
> Alternatively, we do still provide a .deb version of LXD for older Ubuntu
> releases through the official -backports archive pocket.
>
> Those packages are identical to what's available through our PPAs but
> benefit
> from additional testing on our part. To switch over to those backport
> packages,
> use:
>
> apt install -t <release>-backports lxd lxd-client
>
> Replacing "<release>" with the codename of your Ubuntu release (e.g.
> xenial).
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> lxc-users mailing list
> lxc-users at lists.linuxcontainers.org
> http://lists.linuxcontainers.org/listinfo/lxc-users

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.linuxcontainers.org/pipermail/lxc-users/attachments/20171227/277e4302/attachment.html>