General | Drop Jessie support

[MichaIng]

Since all remaining Stretch related bugs are solved (mainly Odroid C2 Kodi HW acceleration + desktop Xorg start), we should take out all Jessie images from official download source. As well we should disable support in DietPi-PREP, only allowing to upgrate Jessie images to Stretch.

However they could be kept in e.g. legacy sub dir, but then with a README.txt that they are not recommended and support might be dropped.

We should then keep an eye on existing Jessie install count (survey) and encourage users to switch to a Stretch image, e.g. via notification in banner and/or on next update.

I suggest we either at timestamps to survey report or simply remove older uploads to have more current numbers.
Currently there are 1.2% (EDIT: <0.5%) Jessie installs.

Waiting for e.g. 3 months, checking Stretch vs Jessie counts on meanwhile uploads, then create final Jessie update and drop support from code, if numbers fall under certain percentage.

Feedback and suggestions on this are highly appreciated. We will definitely drop Jessie support by times, to free code from special handling and reduce testing effort, especially when it comes to official Buster release, expected in summer 2019.
But we want to make this change as smooth as possible for Jessie users.

[Atavic]

They should be kept for some time.

[MichaIng]

@Atavic
Thanks for suggestion.

Do you have a reason for that? Is there anything that works better on a certain Jessie setup, or works on Jessie only?

Of course DietPi code support for Jessie should stay longer, but the question is, if there is any reason to still ship Jessie on fresh images, which would further delay the possibility to move on with the code as well.

[Atavic]

No reasons except the doubt that you clarified:

Of course DietPi code support for Jessie should stay longer

Debian has this page: https://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/debian-installer/

So it could be fine to have it still available for a while, even if superseded by following versions.

[MichaIng]

@Atavic
Jep, code support is a different thing and should depend on the actual amount of Jessie users that we still have.

For now it's just about preventing new users from installing a fresh Jessie DietPi image. It is not only our code support, but also that support by other 3rd party software will be dropped by times. So there are other disadvantages rising by times, outside of our control, if one chooses to install Jessie now. Removing Jessie images and install option from DietPi-PREP also is a clear message that one should not use it anymore.

[Fourdee]

@MichaIng

For now it's just about preventing new users from installing a fresh Jessie DietPi image.

Yep agree, no benefit to Jessie over Stretch. And it increases our level of support effort which should be spent elsewhere (eg: buster).

My preference:

• Drop all Jessie images
• During update, if Jessie, update to latest version at time we drop (eg: v6.20), then prevent further updates (allows us to remove Jessie code in future updates). Might need a new branch, mmm, needs additional thought.
• Prompt users with existing installations that during update, Jessie support is no longer available. System will still function, but no future updates from our end.

[Atavic]

During update, if Jessie, update to latest version

Isn't the prompt warning enough?

[MichaIng]

@Atavic
When it's about removing Jessie support from code, a final update is required to prevent further updates of Jessie systems to unsupported code.

We did something similar when dropping wheezy support: https://github.com/Fourdee/DietPi/tree/wheezy-final-v120

• A last update was done to final wheezy branch, further updates from there blocked with information that a new image is required.

A separate branch has the advantage that we don't need to take care this anymore on future updates, when doing changes on update system or similar that somehow accidentally re-enable Jessie updates.
On this branch we can completely disable the branch system from dietpi.txt/dietpi-update, as failsafe. Old wheezy-final branch can be removed then 😄.

[MichaIng]

One issue:

• For Odroid C1 we only have a Jessie image, because also Meveric offers only a Jessie image: https://forum.odroid.com/viewforum.php?f=114
• About mali drivers and Kodi support on manually distr-upgraded Meveric Jessie image: https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=114&t=30053
  • It could be tested, if new required packages are in Meverics repo, but I doubt.

---

• Moved all other Jessie images to legacy subdir
• PR up to remove Jessie support from DietPi-PREP, but keep possibility to dist-upgrade Jessie => Stretch+: https://github.com/Fourdee/DietPi/pull/2341

[MichaIng]

@Fourdee
I think we should upload an Odroid C1 Stretch image. Meveric does not offer one, but the related forum thread includes users reporting successful distro upgrade. With DietPi-PREP we have best chances that this will work, however the system should be tested, perhaps added as experimental/beta state first.

Related new issue: https://github.com/Fourdee/DietPi/issues/2561

[MichaIng]

amd64 packages from the Debian main repo are not available anymore, similar to what happened to the security repo some time ago: #2665

[MichaIng]

Issues with Jessie are growing, leading to testing and workaround effort that we can not handle much longer, e.g.: #2665

We will support Jessie for at least one version longer (until v6.24, at least) but move systems to the dedicated jessie-support branch already with v6.23. It is better to start with this earlier than later since we don't know how long users wait with the update. This should also raise attention and be a warning/push for Jessie users to migrate to Stretch as soon as they can.

Jessie systems are less than 0.5%, constantly decreasing: https://dietpi.com/survey/#distro

I am most sorry for Odroid C1 users, where we cannot ship a Stretch image due to major limitations kernel and firmware-wise: #2561

---

Related PR: #2742

[Fourdee]

C1:

• Image fails to update correctly as jessie-backport fails:
• Reach DietPi-Software, unable to continue, stuck in loop.

@MichaIng

I'll update the image as a final image with new jessie branch.

[MichaIng]

@Fourdee
Jep jessie-backports and jessie-updates branches do not exist anymore in Debian repo. I already added a pre-patch and DietPi-PREP fix for this. New image required since the existing one does not load pre-patches yet.

[MichaIng]

Okay, v6.25 is the last version with Jessie support. Jessie-support branch has been created already and systems moved to this branch since v6.23 automatically.

v6.26 will have all Jessie related code removed completely. The Jessie-support branch will stay, most likely until Stretch support is about to be dropped (~2 years from now) and may receive very important bug fixes, when reported or some slight Jessie tailor when someone is in mood to do so.

However again I recommend to switch to Stretch, where possible, also for security reasons.

[MichaIng]

PR up for dropping Jessie support and related code cleanup: #2963