So a while back I threw Ubuntu 22 LTS on an old Surface Pro 3 and gave it to my Dad.
He loves it, but he’s the type who’s been burnt by updating software in the past, so he basically refuses any whenever prompted.
Been thinking about throwing Debian with Gnome on it for a while, and wondering if it’s stable enough to just let updates happen automatically in the background?
I got no experience with Debian I basically jumped right on EndeavourOS as my main distro when I started using Linux full time.
I’ve been running Debian stable on my decade-old desktop for about 3 years, and on my ideapad that’s just as old for about 5. During that time I had an update break something only once, and it was the Nvidia driver what did it. A patch was released within a three days.
Debian epitomizes OS transparency for me. Sure, I can still customize the hell out of it and turn it into a frankenix machine, but if I don’t want to, I can be blissfully unaware of how my OS works, and focus only on important computing tasks (like mindlessly scrolling lemmy at 2 am).
Debian Stable - yes.
Debian Testing or Sid - 😈
I’ve diverged from Debian for desktop use for a few years now (no particular good reason, just for fun) but I have extended family with about the same affinity to updates as your dad.
I think automatic updates for regular end users are nice nowdays, especially if you don’t customise stuff too much (DEs, wm, things like that). And even if some issues ever occur in return you get a continuously up-to-date and safer system (imho worth it). And its not like not-updating os solves the issues, it just postpones them, potentially snowballs them (and in that case I just reinstall it).
I switched my dad to Tumbleweed like 3 years ago & set weekly automatic updates, literally no issues with it.
As for serves, Im all for automatic updates in home environment, since my kinda worst case scenario is rolling back to a previous snapshot.
Maybe I could set backup services on a separate node with delayed updates … but I need more motivation (a clusterfuck) for that.
I sympathise with your Dad - everyone’s had updates go bad, and it’s easy to assume the “don’t fix what ain’t broke” mantra. But to do so is being willfully ignorant of basic computer security. And to be fair, Debian-stable is one of the least troublesome things to just let automatically update.
Debian and Ubuntu have the unattended-upgrades package which is designed to take a lot of the sting out of automatic updating. I’d recommend setting that up and you won’t have to touch it again.
There’s also the crontab way - “apt-get update && apt-get upgrade” at frequencies that suit you. (A check for reboot afterwards is a good idea).
I understand having updates go south on you, I do use a rolling release on my own PC, Annnnd Windows 10 before that.
But I’m paranoid about security, increasingly so in recent times. So I at least want him on an updated web browser.
For the crontab I think maybe: “apt-get update && apt-get upgrade --assume-yes”
But what about flatpaks?
Beware that Surface computers need a custom kernel for some features to work. It depends on the distro and the features you use, but I’d suggest you see the linux-surface project for more info. As for updates, standard Debian has a stable release model, and is one of the more stable Linux distros in general, so I don’t think he would have issues with any automatic updates. I’d just say that you should try to be on standby for tech support, as Linux has many differences and is naturally a bit more prone to issues than Windows.
