--- title: Testing Unsupported Release Upgrades description: This article originally appeared on Brian Murray’s blog Earlier I wrote about how it is possible to upgrade, with the upgrade prompt set to normal, from Ubuntu 16.04 (Xenial) to Ubuntu 17.04 (Zesty) and that this is a supported upgrade path. There is an unsupported method to upgrade from Ubuntu 16.04 to Artful Aardvark, which […] url: https://canonical.com/blog/testing-unsupported-release-upgrades --- 1. [Blog](https://canonical.com/blog) 2. Article --- [Canonical](https://canonical.com/blog/author/canonical "More about Canonical") 29 August 2017 # Testing Unsupported Release Upgrades --- Share the article *This article originally appeared on [Brian Murray’s blog](http://www.murraytwins.com/blog/?p=151)* Earlier I wrote about how it is possible to upgrade, with the upgrade prompt set to normal, from Ubuntu 16.04 (Xenial) to Ubuntu 17.04 (Zesty) and that this is a supported upgrade path. There is an unsupported method to upgrade from Ubuntu 16.04 to Artful Aardvark, which will become Ubuntu 17.10. I say unsupported because the upgrade path is not necessarily safe and it should not be used on production systems, however it is useful for testing part of the LTS to LTS upgrade path. As I mentioned previously, update-manager uses a meta-release file from changelogs.ubuntu.com to determine what upgrades are allowed. This meta-release file is cached in: `~/.cache/update-manager-core/` If we want to test an upgrade from Ubuntu 16.04 to Artful, with `Prompt=lts`(found in `/etc/update-manager/release-upgrades`) we’ll want to create our own `meta-release-lts-development` file. The meta-release file has `lts` appended because of the prompt setting and `development` because we will use the -d switch to perform the upgrade. This `meta-release-lts-development` file will contain the release we are upgrading from and release to which we are upgrading e.g.: `bdmurray@clean-xenial-amd64:~$ cat .cache/update-manager-core/meta-release-lts-development` ``` Dist: xenial Name: Xenial Xerus Version: 16.04.2 LTS Date: Thu, 21 April 2016 16:04:00 UTC Supported: 1 Description: This is the 16.04.2 LTS release Release-File: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/xenial/Release ReleaseNotes: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/xenial-updates/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/ReleaseAnnouncement ReleaseNotesHtml: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/xenial-updates/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/ReleaseAnnouncement.html UpgradeTool: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/xenial-updates/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/xenial.tar.gz UpgradeToolSignature: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/xenial-updates/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/xenial.tar.gz.gpg ``` ``` Dist: artful Name: Artful Aardvark Version: 17.10 Date: Thu, 19 October 2017 17:10:00 UTC Supported: 0 Description: This is the 17.10 release Release-File: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/artful/Release ReleaseNotes: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/artful/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/DevelReleaseAnnouncement ReleaseNotesHtml: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/artful/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/DevelReleaseAnnouncement.html UpgradeTool: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/artful/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/artful.tar.gz UpgradeToolSignature: http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/artful/main/dist-upgrader-all/current/artful.tar.gz.gpg ``` I created this by making a mash-up of the meta-release and meta-release-development files at changelogs.ubuntu.com. With this I can now upgrade from Ubuntu 16.04 to Artful by running: `do-release-upgrade -d Checking for a new Ubuntu release Get:1 Upgrade tool signature [836 B] Get:2 Upgrade tool [1,270 kB] Fetched 1,271 kB in 0s (0 B/s) authenticate 'artful.tar.gz' against 'artful.tar.gz.gpg' extracting 'artful.tar.gz'` If you run into any bugs when testing this unsupported upgrade path please report them using ‘ubuntu-bug ubuntu-release-upgrader’. [Get in touch Interested in running Ubuntu in your organization?](https://ubuntu.com/about/contact-us/form) ## Sign up for our newsletter Get the latest Canonical news and updates in your inbox. Work email: \*I agree to receive information about Canonical's products and services. In submitting this form, I confirm that I have read and agree to [Canonical's Privacy Notice](https://canonical.com/legal/data-privacy/contact) and [Privacy Policy](https://canonical.com/legal/data-privacy). 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