PureOS was originally conceived as a rolling release.

A rolling release receives periodic updates in a “rolling” fashion–they just keep rolling in. This is good, as you get the latest cutting edge changes to applications and system libraries. But unfortunately there is a side effect to rolling releases: they are bad for stability, because the changes they bring are often not yet widely used, or tested, in real world situations. This issue is inherent to any fast moving body of code, and PureOS is no different; we attempt to solve it by putting the user at the center of our design choices. With this in mind, we polled our forum and worked internally to devise a pragmatic solution that follows best practices, while continuing to provide options for users.

Our solution is straightforward; we’re making our PureOS release a stable release, and creating a new rolling release. In addition to this stable release, we’re adding two complementary suites–amber-security and amber-updates–which work together to bring a rock solid release. We will also build and release a rolling release just like the one our users are used to, meant for those who are willing to use, and test, the latest software from upstream. Both releases will receive security updates, of course, but the rolling release will lack real-world testing, by design.

How do I get the new stable release?

You likely already have the new stable release. We’ve tested it for a while, and are now adding it as a normal update to PureOS base files. It should be an uneventful update–but if there are any issues at all, please let us know via bug report in our tracker system. We’ll announce our new rolling release in the near future. We will continue working on it, and during the period where our upstream has moved from stable to a new testing release there will likely be a bit of churn. Waiting for that to settle will likely benefit the quality of the new rolling release.