Focal/20.04 is out for quite a while now. You still use Xenial/16.04? I would like to know what stops you from upgrading?
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Focal is out for about 1 year now. Xenial has reached it's end of life cycle and is not developed any further. The same applies for some apps as well.
We know that there are still many users running Xenial on their devices. It would be good to find out why. Please drop your reasons below.
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@danfro hi Daniel, good question. I'm still on xenial with my Pixel 3a foremost because of one simple reason: it seems to be a bit troublesome to pass from xenial to focal, due to the fact that apparently if you update on the fly from the system updater you'll end up with a not quite stable OS with few annoying quirks, according to some users reports; best option would then be to use the Ubports installer which is easy to use, but it would require to completely wipe your phone to start-up focal from scratch in order to have a clean installation, which is not ideal for my use case. The aforementioned for me is the main road-blocker to focal, not mentioning the lack of few apps that I use and since this phone is my daily driver and I have no backup phone, prior to make that big leap I'm waiting that focal will become stable enough. Hope it helped. Regards. Matteo
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N5 (or another device) is so good with Xenial. No need to change.
Donate anonymously 1€/$ by year to UBports, all Ubuntu Touch users can do it ! Demonstration:
https://forums.ubports.com/topic/1262/donate-anonymously-1-by-year-to-ubports-all-ubuntu-touch-users-can-do-it-demonstration/ -
@matteo Thanks for explaining your troubles. Would you mind sharing which apps you really miss? As a first step maybe we can at least gather a "most wanted" list.
Yes, updating can cause some troubles. Just for anyone having trouble after migrating, I may as well share this here. I wrote some instructions to get core apps (possibly other apps too) working again. Some manual work involved though: https://t.me/ut_troubleshooting/19
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@libremax Glad to hear you are at least a happy Xenial user.
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@matteo Hi Daniel, I puchased my BQ Aquaris M10 HD when it was first launched. It is still on xenial
wifi only and works perfectly, if a little slow by today's standards.
All of my disasters with other devices have resulted from attempting to upgrade, so I avoid it like the plaque!
I use it frequently for looking up recipes, wikipedia articles etc.
Also for reading emails and reading abd commenting ubports stuff on teleports. -
@danfro I'm steeling myself to upgrade my og pinephone from xenial, but I'm really nervous.
My Lenovo M10 tab used to work fine with xenial, but has remained bricked for months as a resukt of an upgrade that didn't work.
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@danfro Hi Daniel, I am still running xenial on my BQ Aquaris M10 HD which I purchased new whhen they first became available. Wifi only, no phone calls. Has always worked perfectly,
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@dtarrant sad to hear about this bad experience. I am running my OP5T as daily and a dev device Xperia X with focal. I don't even remember what Xenial might look like.
Focal was definitely a bit of a rough ride early last year, but is considered stable now. I personally would always suggest do a backup and a clean new install. But yeah, some devices may work better than others.
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@danfro My OP5T is still on xenial and works fine. I use it for phone calls and love it. No need to upgrade, everything works! Camera, rotation, screenshots.
I'm writing this on a Galaxy A51 and it's absurdly complicated. Not intuitive. -
nexus5
also apps like https://open-store.io/app/wifiscanner.arubislander could be upgraded -
Unfortunately, you have to be aware that morph-browser under xenial will become more and more deprecated due to the fact that qtwebengine is no longer updated at all: more and more sites will become difficult if not impossible to consult. Going under focal is inevitable.
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@matteo I think the main known quirk is with reinstalling or updating apps. It can be a hassle especially if it affects many apps and you have many apps but once you fix them, they'll always work. The reliable way to fix them is to uninstall first and/or reboot. App data are retained when uninstalling. Aside from that, I'm not aware if any annoying issues.
As for apps, I guess it really depends how much you need them. But if you really need them, it might even be possible to compile or request someone to do it.
In my opinion, it is worth y
upgrading especially if you use it for browsing since QtWebEngine isn't updated anymore and sites will start to stop working. I mean even in focal, some sites are already acting up like kickstarter
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@danfro I have multiple devices, some are on focal, some still on Xenial.
Xenial just works on some of them and works well. A good example is the OPO, it is very good on Xenial OTA-25.
Likewise I am not binning older devices such as the Nexus 7 (deb and flo) as, again it is a working tablet on Xenial and won't make the jump to focal without a lot of work.
There are others and it is much the same.
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@matteo I moved my 3a to Focal using the installer some time ago. If you Do Not select the wipe option and then use the reinstall all apps option from system settings after you are on Focal the 3a works very well on Focal. It's been quite a time so can't remember if there many glitches that needed fixing but it is really great.
The main thing is not to go back to Xenial later. That does cause issues. You could copy all your files music etc to a pc/laptop first to be really sure then copy them back should you need to. -
@danfro , some of my old buddies like Meizu (MX4, PRO5 - what a nice one!-) and N5 will stay on Xenial obviously.
Since Waydroid support on UT was a game changer I moved to RN9P.
As @matteo said, because some nice apps that I use daily were not available on Focal, it's only recently I've migrated to Focal. About mid January, after I could compile a successful version of "Indicator Weather" and my MR for it has been approved.
I've also raised MR for other apps like CryptoPrice and Activity Tracker, the app's Dev still need to approve it though
@usah I'm currently working on upgrading Wifiscanner. I might have some outcome soon or later -
Hi @usah glad to hear you use and like the wifi scanner app. I am not the original creator of the app. I simply recompiled it for Xenial when that came out. And that turned out to work perfectly
Unfortunately the same trick did not work going to Focal. The app does compile and start up, but it is not able to show any signal. I have also not been able to investigate the issue.
I might need to make a dedicated forum post asking for help with this. -
@danfro said in Focal/20.04 is out for quite a while now. You still use Xenial/16.04? I would like to know what stops you from upgrading?:
I am running my OP5T as daily
So am I, and I upgraded to Focal through the updater; unfortunately, all is not well. The system is buggy and unstable. I will probably need to do a clean installation to fix that and I'm slowly gathering courage to bite the bullet and reinstall. The current lack of a good and GUI based backup method is my main issue here.
Is currently using an Op5t
Also owns an Op1, a BQ E4.5 and an Xperia X, as well as a BQ tablet and a Pinetab2. Please, someone... make it stop. -
Hi, thanks for the question. I am still using Xenial on Volla 22. I have not yet upgraded to Focal, because I use the phone as a daily driver and I am lacking information what will be not working anymore after the upgrade. Lack of information is the main problem for me.
There are at least three sources to figure out what will not work with the Volla 22 on Focal [1],[2],[3] and they are not encouraging, although I am not sure whether some information is outdated.
For example, source [1] tells me that on Focal "Cellular data is not available on SIM 2 when two are inserted". If this is still correct, this would be a problem for me.
For example, source [2] did not give much information whether it is safe to upgrade to Focal, and I am not sure whether the problem with Telegram still exists that messages / settings do not get transferred correctly to Focal.
For example, source [3] does not yet give information on OTA-4 and it is unclear what of the "Known Issues" still exist.
Additionally to that, I have data in the "Notes" app which has not yet been ported to Focal.
[1] https://devices.ubuntu-touch.io/device/mimameid
[2] https://forum.volla.online/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=997
[3] https://github.com/HelloVolla/ubuntu-touch-beta-tests/wiki/Release-notes -
None of my devices have a focal port.
