Since using Ubuntu Mate, I have learned to occasional open Synaptic Package Manager, Mark All Upgrades, then Apply for any packages that need upgraded. Surprisingly upgrades are occasionally found. I am curious why Software Updater is not sufficient to keep Ubuntu Mate up to date. Also, are there any other maintenance procedures that should be occasionally run?
In a Terminal Ctrl +t or f12 (unless changed)
sudo apt update
updates all repos
sudo apt list -a --upgradable
List whats upgrade-able
sudo apt update && sudo apt -y upgrade
Updates & upgrades anything needed updating
sudo apt update && sudo apt -y dist-upgrade
dist-upgrade in addition to performing the function of upgrade,
also intelligently handles changing dependencies with new versions
of packages; apt-get has a "smart" conflict resolution system, and
it will attempt to upgrade the most important packages at the
expense of less important ones if necessary. The dist-upgrade
command may therefore remove some packages. The
/etc/apt/sources.list file contains a list of locations from which
to retrieve desired package files. See also apt_preferences(5) for
a mechanism for overriding the general settings for individual
packages.
sudo do-release-upgrade -d (Never used this before so research is needed to be sure, I do have it in my .alias file that is why I posted it here)
UpGrade to next Version ie. v17.04 to v17.10
you night look into fstrim if your using ssd and these commands will keep you out of synaptic for upgrades. You can replace && with just ;
ex.
sudo apt update; sudo apt -y upgrade
difference is the ; ignores any errors and will move onto the next command whereas the && will wait and make sure the command runs correctly before moving on to the next command and the -y tells the OS to install anything needed without prompting you whether or not you want to upgrade said packages
2 Likes
Hi @jaybo, here’s how I understand it and have observed it on 16.04.
First, I use synaptic, only synaptic, and nothing but synaptic to perform actual updates. I like the searchable history it maintains. Several years back, Update Manager was a synaptic application and it also updated that history but this is no longer the case. The synaptic history has gaps if I use another method.
So why some differences at times? Synaptic seems to be the bare-metal and reports every update as they come out. But Update Manager, on non-security updates, throttles users over time, probably randomly. I’m sure it’s for bandwidth reasons on non-critical updates only and occasionally, these will show up as a difference. My observations of 16.04 since day 1 has supported this is how it works.
I also use Ubuntu Server 16.04 and while they do not use the update-manager GUI it does an identical spread of non-critical updates. On the updates that coincide with Ubuntu-MATE I see this randomness how it picks and chooses.
At the moment, I’m sad to see synaptic degrading from neglect. 
5 Likes
I agree with @Blank’s replay. I use apt for all my software package needs.
What version of Ubuntu-Mate are you using? Software Updater no longer starts on my installation of 16.04.3.
My version is Release 16.04.3 LTS (Xenial Xerus) 64-bit