Kernel updates in Ubuntu

[Fraser Campbell]

John McGregor wrote:

> I recently switched to Ubuntu 5.1 on my laptop (from Mandriva) and the
> kernel updates offered have me a bit confused. The auto update function
> of Ubuntu lists these three possibilities:
> 
> linux-386
> complete linux kernel on 386
> new version 2.6.12.16.1
> 
> linux-image-2.6.12-10-386
> linux kernel image for version 2.6.12 on 386
> new version 2.6.12-10.28
> 
> linux-image-386
> linux-kernel-image on 396
> new version 2.6.12.16.1

Try this:

   apt-cache show linux-386 | grep ^Depends
   apt-cache show linux-image-386 | grep ^Depends
   apt-cache show linux-image-2.6.12-10-386 | grep ^Depends

My guess is that linux-386 depends on linux-image-386 which depends on 
linux-image-2.6.12-10-386.  The chain of dependencies is to provide an easy 
upgrade path for apt if you eventually upgrade to Ubuntu versions beyond 
5.10 ... at that point linux-image-386 might depend on 
linux-image-2.6.16-10-386 instead of linux-image-2.6.12-10-386.

I use amd64 on my ubuntu so my dependencies are slightly differenty.  Like 
someone else said you may want to install linux-686 or similar instead ... 
though it's not a sure performance gain.

-- 
Fraser Campbell <fraser-Txk5XLRqZ6CsTnJN9+BGXg at public.gmane.org>                 http://www.wehave.net/
Georgetown, Ontario, Canada                               Debian GNU/Linux
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