Ubuntu is the most widely used Linux distribution on the desktop. And, like any other operating system, it is very important to always have it updated to be able to take full advantage of it and, in addition, to be able to connect safely to the Internet. The LTS versions of this distro are characterized by having 5 years of support, unlike the normal versions that are only updated for 9 months . And, as part of its maintenance, Canonical has just released major new updates for two of the 3 LTS versions that are currently supported: 16.04 and 18.04.
The latest version of Ubuntu is 20.04 . A week ago, Canonical released the first update for this version, 20.04.1, focused on fixing bugs and improving performance and the overall user experience. Today Canonical is back in the news by also releasing new maintenance updates for the two LTS versions that were left behind.
Ubuntu 16.04.7, taking advantage of the last year of support
16.04 was the LTS of this distro released in April 2016. Since then, this distro has received 7 major updates to continue offering users the maintenance they expect from this Linux. As with 16.04.6, this new version brings users mainly security fixes. Canonical no longer bothers to include other types of enhancements. And, of all the corrections that this version brings, it is worth highlighting the patch for the BootHole vulnerability in GRUB with which any operating system installed on the PC can be compromised.
We remember that this distro will continue to have updates until next 2021. From then on, if we still use this Linux, we must think about updating to a newer version in order to continue receiving security updates.
Ubuntu 18.04.5, more security and stability
Along with 16.04, 18.04 has also received its share of fixes. This version is more recent, released in April 2018, and to this day it is still one of the most used versions, even more than 20.04, the last extended support version released this year. Therefore, Canonical has paid more attention when launching this new version and, in addition to fixing a long list of vulnerabilities and security flaws, the company has also included stability and compatibility improvements.
The highlight of this release is the new HWE (hardware enablement) support that provides compatibility with the newest hardware and kernels, as well as X servers.
Download and update
These new versions are already, in ISO format , on Canonical’s main website. If we want to download either of these two, we can do it completely free of charge from the following link . These releases include all security and stability patches released to date. Therefore, if we install any of them, we will not have to update them to keep them up to date.
If we already have either of these two LTS installed , we can update them manually to bring them up to date. No need to format and reinstall, just open a terminal and run the following command:
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade && sudo apt dist-upgrade
When the process is finished, we will have Ubuntu with the latest patches to date and the latest version of the Kernel installed. And, if we check it, we will see that we have both 16.04.7 and 18.04.5 .
