This is my original Ubuntu 23.10 installation that I allowed Ubuntu itself to update to 24.04. I already had written about installing 24.04 fresh onto SanDisk Extreme PLUS V30 128 GiB micro SDXC card, and that’s what I’d been using since 24.04’s release in late April. Then Ubuntu announced that they were allowing 23.10 users to update, in place, to 24.04. I swapped the older micro SDXC card back into my Raspberry Pi 5 and kicked off the update process. All told it took about two hours.

When I got back into my Raspberry Pi again I had to make three minor tweaks (so far) to get it back to my original settings. The minor tweaks weren’t out of anything nefarious Ubuntu did, it was update changes that were to be expected, especially when you consider all the changes that took place between 23.10’s release and 24.04. Never believe anyone on the internets who babble that changes are minor between Ubuntu’s last interim release and the following LTS release.

The minor changes that had to be corrected where due to Python being upgraded from 3.11 to 3.12. That meant I had delete the EXTERNALLY-MANAGED file from /usr/lib/python3.12, then reinstall powerline-status to get my shell and vim prompts back, luma.led_matrix (and all its dependencies) to get my matrix clock back on the external GPIO pins, and gpiozero to support additional GPIO functionality. Then I had to change my icons back to Papirus-Dark via gnome-tweaks because Ubuntu’s update changed them to Yaru. As I said, not much to twiddle with.

What I found extremely interesting is that I got my desktop clock back (lower left corner) and that the extension manager which provides the desktop clock is working correctly.

While I’ll keep my clean-installed 24.04 as a backup, I’m glad I was able to move back to my 23.10 installation and update it to the latest Ubuntu release. When 24.10 arrives in October I may just move on up to it.

The website 9to5linux ( https://9to5linux.com/ ) posted an article on 17 May about how you could update the Linux kernel in Ubuntu 24.04 to the latest version, 6.9.1. Ubuntu 24.04 ships with Linux kernel 6.8.0, which means it’s still quite fresh. But because I like to tinker I decided to install the GUI Mainline Kernels and install the latest kernel. The directions are in the article and the link to the story is at the bottom of the post. Once installed I fired up the utility.

After installing mainline ( sudo apt install -y mainline ), I opened it on my desktop. The layout is sparse and crowded, but can be decoded rather quickly. For instance you can see the version of the kernel I’m running because it’s marked as running and installed, and the Canonical logo is next to the 6.8.0-1004.4_raspi entry. And that’s the only kernel entry that contains raspi as part of the kernel name.

The rest of the kernel names don’t follow the installed kernel that came with Ubuntu 24.04. I eventually discovered that if the mouse pointer hovers over an entry, you’ll get a popup that lists all the entries for a given kernel. As an example, if I hover over the 6.9.1 entry I’ll see;

linux-image-unsigned-6.9.1-060901-generic_6.9.1-060901.202405171038_arm64.deb

linux-modules-6.9.1-060901-generic_6.9.1-060901.202405171038_arm64.deb

linux-headers-6.9.1-060901_6.9.1-060901.202405171038_all.deb

linux-headers-6.9.1-060901-generic_6.9.1-060901.202405171038_arm64.deb

Hovering over the either 6.9.1 or 6.9.1_64k produces the same list of files. I chose to install 6.9.1_64k. The installation failed, as you’ll note below:

Fortunately the failed kernel installation didn’t break the full Ubuntu installation. After a reboot of the Raspberry Pi to fully check the system, I uninstalled the 6.9.1 kernel with the tool.

Mainline Kernels might work just fine for x86-64-based systems, but I can’t speak to that. Right now it appears not to work for Ubuntu on Raspberry Pi 5.

Links

You Can Now Install Linux Kernel 6.9 on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, Here’s How — https://9to5linux.com/you-can-now-install-linux-kernel-6-9-on-ubuntu-24-04-lts-heres-how