KDE Neon is the official KDE distribution that packs the latest version of KDE Plasma desktop and software on top of Ubuntu LTS (long-term support).
In the desktop Linux community, KDE Neon is known for providing the latest release of KDE Plasma desktop and KDE applications.
But do you know that KDE Neon also had a special edition that served the Plasma LTS edition?
What’s KDE Neon LTS?
What’s Plasma LTS, you ask? You know what LTS is? It is when a software is supported for a longer time than the regular releases. KDE Plasma desktop also has regular (supported for 4 months) and LTS releases (supported for 2 years). The LTS release of Plasma desktop stays on the same base and provides maintenance and security updates to them.
This works well for distributions that look for stability like Debian or openSUSE Leap. But KDE Neon is not one of them. KDE Neon was created for the purpose of providing latest KDE Plasma desktop.
This is why Plasma LTS edition of KDE Neon never made much sense, even to their developers. Three years ago, they decided to hide the download option for the KDE Neon LTS edition and today they announced the discontinuation of Neon LTS edition altogether.
KDE Neon LTS will be discontinued in July’21
For any existing Neon LTS user, this edition will be discontinued on 1st July 2021. The reason is that it wasn’t used by many and it never fit with the goal of the KDE Neon project.
It never quite fit into way KDE neon works as a product, nor as a project. Plasma was caught in the past while the rest of the system kept rapidly leaping forward, resulting in a less than stellar user experience and a huge cost in maintenance. All the while it has always been the least used edition.
Existing Neon LTS users who want Plasma LTS experience are recommended to go with proper long-term support stable distributions like Kubuntu LTS or openSUSE Leap.
There is also an option to switch from Neon LTS to regular Neon edition and the instructions can be found here.
KDE Neon will continue to serve the latest and greatest of KDE
I don’t want anyone to misread it as discontinuation of KDE Neon itself. KDE Neon will continue to function as it is. It will continue to provide you the latest KDE applications and Plasma desktop on top of Ubuntu LTS base.
Personally, I never used KDE Neon LTS edition. What about you? Ever used it?
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