I usually use apt-get update && apt-get upgrade
to run my updates and upgrades instead of the GUI because it seems to run more quickly.
However, I've noticed lately that I often get a message that one of my upgrades was held back. I then usually run dist-upgrade
to run it through and it works fine. As far as I can tell after reading this question and its answers, dist-upgrade
does all the same things and then some.
So, my question is: Why use apt-get upgrade
at all? Why not use apt-get dist-upgrade
all the time? Why does apt-get upgrade
even exist?
Best Answer
I typically upgrade my machines with:
Below is an excerpt from
man apt-get
. Using upgrade keeps to the rule: under no circumstances are currently installed packages removed, or packages not already installed retrieved and installed. If that's important to you, useapt-get upgrade
. If you want things to "just work", you probably wantapt-get dist-upgrade
to ensure dependencies are resolved.To expand on why you'd want upgrade instead of dist-upgrade, if you are a systems administrator, you need predictability. You might be using advanced features like apt pinning or pulling from a collection of PPAs (perhaps you have an in-house PPA), with various automations in place to inspect your system and available upgrades instead of always eagerly upgrading all available packages. You would get very frustrated when apt performs unscripted behavior, particularly if this leads to downtime of a production service.