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I have some software packages customised for Ubuntu 10.04, 10.10 and 12.10, but now I have to install them on Debian Squeeze. I have been unable to Google for a mapping between specific Ubuntu and Debian versions. Can someone here help?

Specifically I want to know which Ubuntu version corresponds to Debian Squeeze.

Jacob Vlijm
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xkcd
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3 Answers3

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You can find the Debian version on which your Ubuntu version is based in the file: /etc/debian_version

Ubuntu Debian
22.10 kinetic bookworm/ sid - 12
22.04 jammy bookworm/ sid
21.10 impish bullseye/ sid - 11
21.04 hirsute bullseye/ sid
20.10 groovy bullseye/ sid
20.04 focal bullseye/ sid
19.10 eoan buster / sid - 10
19.04 disco buster / sid
18.10 cosmic buster / sid
18.04 bionic buster / sid
17.10 artful stretch / sid - 9
17.04 zesty stretch / sid
16.10 yakkety stretch / sid
16.04 xenial stretch / sid
15.10 wily jessie / sid - 8
15.04 vivid jessie / sid
14.10 utopic jessie / sid
14.04 trusty jessie / sid
13.10 saucy wheezy / sid - 7
13.04 raring wheezy / sid
12.10 quantal wheezy / sid
12.04 precise wheezy / sid
11.10 oneiric wheezy / sid
11.04 natty squeeze / sid - 6
10.10 maverick squeeze / sid
10.04 lucid squeeze / sid

Sid is the development distribution of Debian. That's how, for example, Ubuntu 20.04, released in April 2020, can be based on Debian 11 "Bullseye", which was released in August 2021.

You can find out the contents of the file without installing an entire system by view the sources for the package basefiles on Launchpad.

Andy
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Jacob Vlijm
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    Thanks a lot. Just to be clear, you checked this by booting up live CDs of different versions of Ubuntu and then looking into /etc/debian_version? – xkcd Apr 10 '14 at 10:40
  • @xkcd Only 10.04, the others I had either installed or on VM. – Jacob Vlijm Apr 10 '14 at 11:20
  • My 13.10 Ubuntu Gnome says wheezy/sid when I cat /etc/debian_version... – Rmano Apr 10 '14 at 19:38
  • @Jacob --- ok, now I got it. It's a kind of wheezy+... – Rmano Apr 10 '14 at 20:41
  • Note that this is only approximate. Ubuntu releases aren't based on a specific Debian release per-se. – Peter Green Apr 20 '16 at 15:09
  • @PeterGreen Not sure what you are referring to, Ubuntu is based on development release(s) of Debian. – Jacob Vlijm Apr 20 '16 at 16:13
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    Firstly a "development release" isn't really a "release". What was in the wheezy repo the day after squeeze was released is a very different thing to what was in the final release of wheezy. Secondly ubuntu normally pulls from sid which is never released, packages from sid may or may not make it into testing before the next Debian release. Thirdly ubuntu updates core packages (especially glibc) to versions ahead of those in Debian. Fourthly if a package has been modified in ubuntu then changes from Debian won't be imported until/unless someone manually merges them. – Peter Green Apr 20 '16 at 17:24
  • Put all of these things together and when you compare a Ubuntu release to the Debian release you have listed in your table you will most likely find it is behind it on some packages and ahead of it on others. – Peter Green Apr 20 '16 at 17:42
  • @TheodoreJameson Sorry, sorry, I missed the fact that you also changed the version, only saw you changed "the" to "this". I would have approved definitely. I should buy a new pair of glasses. – Jacob Vlijm Feb 24 '18 at 06:32
  • I have Ubuntu 18.04 and buster/sid. Does it mean that my debian version is unstable as seen here – Timo Jul 08 '20 at 12:32
  • The first link is broken. – WinEunuuchs2Unix Aug 22 '21 at 18:39
  • I wanted to know what's the oldest Debian version that's relevant to Ubuntu, but your table doesn't go back to Ubuntu 4.10 –  May 06 '22 at 03:24
  • Please keep this updated, I bookmarked it! :D – Ev Dolzhenko Jan 19 '23 at 08:41
  • I used this information to successfully migrate from Ubuntu bionic to Debian buster with the help of https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/718220/247520 – ñull Feb 07 '23 at 18:14
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Unfortunately there is no direct mapping /etc/debian_version as mentioned in Jacob's answer gives a rough idea but it only really reflects one package and said package is a package that is locally modified in Ubuntu so won't be automatically pulled in from Debian.

In particular Ubuntu is often ahead of Debian on core packages like libc6. Trying to install a package built on Ubuntu on a contemporary version of Debian is likely to end up with version errors on libc6.

According to https://superuser.com/questions/407745/wrong-libc6-version-in-debian-squeeze-can-i-go-back Debian squeeze had libc6 2.11 . According to http://web.archive.org/web/20110705212424/http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=libc6 ubuntu 10.04 lucid also had libc6 2.11 . So the packages for 10.4 lucid are IMO the most likely to work on Squeeze.

Depending on what other libraries your program needs you may well find that a specific build for Debian squeeze is needed.

Community
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Peter Green
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In addition to what was said,

Note that a package from an APT-based distribution (e.g. Ubuntu) should not be installed in another APT-based distribution (e.g. Debian), as default. Also vice-versa.

This question is still useful if you are a package maintainer, but not for end-users. End-users should just don't install packages from alien distributions.

When you need cross-platform packages, see instead these solutions that were designed for that purpose:

  • Flatpak
  • Snap
  • AppImage

Again, apt packages are not designed to be cross-distribution and should not be used for that purpose. That is, if you are interested in avoiding to create Frankenstein.

Explanations:

https://wiki.debian.org/DontBreakDebian

https://wiki.debian.org/DontBreakDebian#Don.27t_make_a_FrankenDebian

Valerio Bozz
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