An 'unfortunate incident' hits latest Ubuntu 24.04 point release

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The Noble Numbat has been besieged with delays

Noble Numbat wallpaper with clocks
(Image credit: Canonical / Pexels CC BY-SA 4.0)

According to Canonical's Utkarsh Gupta, we'll have to wait a little longer for the next update to the current Ubuntu 24.04 release. It seems that the latest images are missing something beneficial to more recent hardware.

Originally scheduled for a February 13 release, Ubuntu 24.04.2 is a point release, a refreshed release that includes all of the latest updates, bug fixes and upgrades since the original Ubuntu 24.04 image was released. If you are using Ubuntu 24.04, then updating and upgrading your software packages will keep your install up to date. Point releases are more useful for those installing to a new machine, and not wanting to spend too long downloading updates, or for those with a slower internet connection.

Gupta reports that "Due to an unfortunate incident, it appears that some 24.04.2 images built this week did not include the HWE kernel. To be consistent across all images, we've decided to respin the images and delay the Noble 24.04.2 by a week.

The new release date for 24.04.2 will be 20th February 2025."

In light of the issue, Gupta states that the there will be a "a proper retrospective to prevent this from happening in the future."

So what is HWE kernel? Hardware Enablement is essentially a means for non-rolling release Linux distros to "catch up" with the latest hardware via an updated kernel. It has been almost a year since Ubuntu 24.04 was released, and in that time there has been a plethora of new CPUs and other PC hardware components.

So right now the team are rebuilding the ISO images with the correct kernel for HWE. This also means that they images will need to be retested before the February 20 release date.

Ubuntu 24.04 is the latest LTS (Long Term Support Release) of the popular Debian based Linux distro, and it has been plagued by delays. Codenamed "Noble Numbat", Ubuntu 24.04 first point update, 24.04.1 suffered a two week delay back in August 2024 due to a number of "high-impact upgrade bugs". Earlier in the release cycle, Noble Numbat's Beta release was delayed due to malicious code in the XZ compression tools. It seems that the Noble Numbat is unable to catch a break.

If you can't wait, then Ubuntu 24.04.1 is the current point release and it will be upgradeable to match 24.04.2 via the OS package management tools.

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Les Pounder
Les Pounder

Les Pounder is an associate editor at Tom's Hardware. He is a creative technologist and for seven years has created projects to educate and inspire minds both young and old. He has worked with the Raspberry Pi Foundation to write and deliver their teacher training program "Picademy".

5 Comments Comment from the forums
  • rustigsmed
    I mean it's a self imposed arbitrary release date long term support ubuntu users can wait and if they can't then they should probably consider an arch based option or ubuntu 24.10.
    Reply
  • Pierce2623
    rustigsmed said:
    I mean it's a self imposed arbitrary release date long term support ubuntu users can wait and if they can't then they should probably consider an arch based option or ubuntu 24.10.
    Virtually all release dates are arbitrary and self imposed. That still doest’t make missing them look any better.
    Reply
  • mercster
    rustigsmed said:
    I mean it's a self imposed arbitrary release date long term support ubuntu users can wait and if they can't then they should probably consider an arch based option or ubuntu 24.10.
    Unless you're not a newbie who has had "Arch is for experts so you should run it to feel smart!" into their heads, and doesn't want a rolling release of the latest upstream packages, maintained by tHe cOmMuNitY.
    Reply
  • C8724793
    Admin said:
    The Noble Numbat has been besieged with delays

    An 'unfortunate incident' hits latest Ubuntu 24.04 point release : Read more
    mercster said:
    Unless you're not a newbie who has had "Arch is for experts so you should run it to feel smart!" into their heads, and doesn't want a rolling release of the latest upstream packages, maintained by tHe cOmMuNitY.
    Agreed 24.10 has been very good for me.
    Reply
  • rambo919
    Delays happen in the real world.... as does pure tellanovella article headings.
    Reply