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Ask HN: What in the world is taking Ubuntu so long?

4 points by linsomniac ↗ HN
Ubuntu has CVE-2026-98432 marked as a 9.8, but yet it's coming up on a week with no update to fix it. It's still marked as "work in progress" (though at least now they've listed a mitigation):

https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2026-98432

I've had mitigations in place for a week, but this response is really shaking my confidence in Ubuntu. I'm just trying to understand what is going on with Ubuntu. Do they have too many kernels (that page is loooong), do they not have enough automation in the build/test pipeline, are their engineers overwhelmed?

We are moving into a world where there are going to be vastly more security issues; if you can't keep up now, where are you going to be in the next 6 months?

For a long time keeping on top of OS updates has been a huge part of keeping the attackers at bay. However, the world is changing.

107 comments

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adsfasf
Aren't the patches out since a day?
AnotherGoodName
It's Canonical. The company that literally asks for high school grades and a multi-page essay on any job application and will pass if you're not in the 99th percentile of year 9 maths even while requiring many years experience (which means you probably don't even know what your year 9 maths scores were). All the while they pay a fraction of any other Bay Area tech company.

What i just described isn't a joke or an exaggeration either. It's literally part of the application process and you can look this up.

Anyway they are quite simply hopelessly mismanaged and no one should be touching Canonical products at this point.

BeetleB
Reminds me of Epic (healthcare company). I was close to finishing grad school, and they wanted my SAT scores. When I gave it to them, they couldn't stop gushing. I wanted to wash my hands with a lot of soap at that point.
lotsofpulp
They wanted it because the SAT serves (or used to serve) as a decent proxy for IQ score. A business cannot ask an applicant to take an intelligence aptitude test without a lot of extra cost to ensure it complies with Griggs v. Duke Power Co (1971), so the cheaper workaround is to ask for SAT scores in conjunction with other proxies such as the school into which you were able to gain admission.
BeetleB
> In the US, businesses ask for it because the SAT serves (or used to serve) as a decent proxy for IQ. A business cannot ask an applicant to take an intelligence aptitude test without a lot of extra cost

Epic actually did (does?) administer a full blown "entrance exam" - generic problem solving skills, with some basic coding and math stuff. They literally arrange with the university to administer it in a classroom setting. So yeah, kind of like an aptitude test.

See https://pigment.is/blogs/blogs/epic-systems-skills-assessmen...

I actually don't mind that, as it ensures all applicants are being judged on a level field.

It's quite rare for people graduating with a BS to be quizzed about SAT scores - the focus tends to be more on GPA, etc. But asking for SAT scores when you've been in grad school for so long...? Kind of ridiculous. And if you are going to ask, might as well ask for the GRE scores instead.

They also did (do?) a full personality quiz. You know, the type where they give you a scenario, and say are you more of A or B, and you often find yourself to be neither or both...

tptacek
Businesses can and do ask applicants to take general cognitive tests, without excess compliance costs. IQ testing is presumptively legitimate for essentially all white collar jobs. The biggest companies that administer these tests for hiring companies have logo crawls that include a few of the best known companies in the world.

The reason more companies don't use IQ tests is that they don't work well for candidate qualification. Also, candidates hate them.

lotsofpulp
Thanks, I must have been misinformed. I was told that 20 years ago when a lot of NYC HFT firms used to (still do?) ask for SAT scores.
cmdrk
can confirm, interviewing there was unpleasant and demanded a ridiculous amount of work before ever getting to talk to a human. There was a post on HN a little while back about someone who made it much further along in the process: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44149549

Made me happy I was cut loose early.

ethin
Yeah, I did try applying to them a year or so ago and got a lot of those questions too. The really weird thing to me (and what confuses me) is why exactly they want these questions? How exactly is someone supposed to share their "rationale or evidence for the high school performance selections above" when the "grades" for maths/native language is decided by the institution/teacher doing the grading and not by the student? And, even better: why exactly does Canonical need this information at all? I'm pretty sure that it's well-understood that your grades in high school (let alone college) say absolutely nothing about you today. And there are many, many, many reasons why someone in HS or college might perform poorly but in actuality they're brilliant and very capable.
atomicnumber3
Shuttleworth is rich and Ubuntu/Canonical is his personal feudal holding. They basically can do whatever dumb thing they want and none of it actually matters because they don't really need to respond to market forces.

I've worked for one of these businesses before - basically staffing a daycare running a very compelling roleplay scenario so a millionaire/billionaire has an excuse to get away from their family for 10 hours a day. It works best if you're a fresh grad college kid who doesn't realize any of that for a few years and is just glad to have gotten a job.

So, the actual intent of all of their hiring circus is to ensure they don't accidentally hire someone who realizes what's going on.

93po
I think regardless of the school and instructor's difficulty, there's a group of people who basically make perfect grades in STEM topics (or all topics) regardless of those variables. And for some people it's easy to know what their grades were 20-30 years ago because their experience was "I made effectively perfect grades at everything my entire school career" and will vividly remember the couple exceptions. I didn't pride myself on my grades and it wasn't encouraged at all by my parents or peer group, but I was one of those students, and have the experience of remembering exactly the one class I got a B in (photo journalism, the teacher hated me). I don't say this to brag, this account isn't tied to my name, but more just explaining what Canonical is perhaps looking for.

I do think there is a large connection between grade performance/SAT scores and general aptitude and success later in life. But as you said there are plenty of circumstances that would lead to poor grades that aren't related to ability - but I would also say those circumstances are also possible indicators of how good of an employee you will be. For example having behavioral problems as a kid could lead to bad grades despite otherwise capable of good grades, and I would suspect there's connection between childhood behavioral problems and conduct as an adult.

ethin
I can't really agree with this. Even if we consider only college grades and not HS ones, the wider the gap between your university days and you today is, the less representative those grades are. I think this is especially relevant for the high school scenario though: even if your the perfect student, your HS days might be 10-12 years behind you and your probably a completely different person today factoring in life experiences and all that. Like I just struggle to see how grades (or, really, any academic performance information in general) says anything about the you who is applying for a job unless your like a year fresh out of college and applying to an internship or something.
93po
nothing about the things higher education or employers look at is a perfect signal of what they want from employees. you have to try to use available data as best you can, and it's hard to find something more reliable than past results, regardless of how old those results are. obviously more recent results should be weighed more. but old results don't mean nothing.
Hasz
I worked there for a couple years. IMO, the hiring process holds Canonical back from scaling like a typical tech co, but they probably don't want to. It also attracts a very specific type of person; everyone I personally worked with was very bright and capable.

IME, because of pay, they have a hard time retaining "senior" talent, eg Nvidia, Chainguard, Amutable, Lambda, etc etc etc all have lots and lots of senior+ Canonical engineers. Especially in the age of AI, I think this is a "people-strategy" mistake.

The application process is very long and you absolutely lose great candidates because of it. Salaries are not US-tech competitive, but absolutely are Central/South America and Europe competitive. Lots of great Brazilian and Polish engineers, for example.

Also I have never seen a post on HN, Reddit etc about Canonical/Ubuntu that doesn't complain about hiring process. I think it does a pretty incredible amount of damage to the brand.

ndiddy
> It also attracts a very specific type of person; everyone I personally worked with was very bright and capable.

How well did you and your colleagues do at math in high school?

queenkjuul
Well if they work at canonical we know they did very well
nish__
If they're so bright and capable why can't they patch their OS?
throwaway27448
> It also attracts a very specific type of person; everyone I personally worked with was very bright and capable.

I don't know anyone at canonical personally, so I have no specific opinion. However. This smells like the same bullshit peddled by any tech company's hiring policy but executed less competently.

throw-the-towel
I wonder why these bright abd capable people didn't join a company that actually pays reasonably.
rcxdude
>I wonder why these bright abd capable people didn't join a company that actually pays reasonably.

Sounds like they do when they get the chance. I've worked for a company that didn't have quite as crazy a hiring process but they had the same basic profile - very good at hiring for potential in juniors, but underpaid for the ability they wanted. As a result they really struggle to hire seniors and are often a stepping stone to a better paid position. They do manage to keep some people until retirement, though (a very bimodal distribution - generally either brilliant but don't care to work anywhere else, or utterly useless and can't get a job anywhere else)

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cute_boi
Feels like India approach where they will ask high school certificates and every personal details like marriage, family history and things like that lol.
wannabe44
Indian corporate has problems but this doesn't seem to be true apart from standard background checks (a la HireRight).
matheusmoreira
High school grades? That's pretty shocking.
AnotherGoodName
Not the worst part. I didn’t even reach the stage of multiple psychometric tests others report.
theideaofcoffee
I just love that this is always one of the top comments when it comes to Canonical.

"Nah, let's not build up our technical street cred by doing stuff right, we'll torpedo that by making bizarre aspects of our culture stick in people's minds. Success!"

And just for full disclosure, I've never applied or have went through their process, all I know about it is second-hand through comments like these. It's just a terrible look to have that be what people think about your company.

qrtzka
Canonical is looking for bureaucrats, so at least they are honest in the hiring process. Look at the Canonical people on the Debian lists.
_override
I wonder why they stop at high school grades. I don’t touch distros unless their engineers had perfect grades throughout elementary and middle school /s
tamimio
Haha, I remember years ago I did apply there but as soon as I saw the high school questions I just closed the page. Always pay attention to these red flags
FireBeyond
And yet, despite that, their recruiter brains break on things that it feels like they're selecting for.

In high school (in Australia), I went to Year 7 and 8 at one school, and did not do well (ADHD+"gifted"), and spent most of my time, it felt, in detentions, etc.

Moved to another school. Half a term of Year 9 and I was in 10. By the second week of second term I was in Year 11, and went on from there, graduating effectively 2 years early.

Canonical recruiter: "So you don't have any Year 9 grades to share? Or Year 10? Hmm, I'm not sure how we handle that, as we want to know those."

"Amusingly", when I went to do paramedic studies at a Community College in the US, high school graduation was required. Because my high school was overseas, they had to use a "translation service" to validate that my Australian high school graduation was "educationally equivalent" to the US. Never mind that whether or not it was (and I'd argue it was superior), "What about the fact that I have a B.S. (Hons)?". "Sorry, School of Health rules says we need this document for admission". (I got in, but the delays meant I had to wait until the next intake).

infamouscow
This is a problem with LTS distro kernels in general. You're trading the feeling of stability at the kernel level for security updates.
vanschelven
For Ubuntu it was _all_ their kernels though...
mxey
LTS distros can track the LTS kernels and they’ve all been updated
Maxatar
Ubuntu is the only Linux distro with an LTS release that has not patched this issue, so saying this is a problem with LTS distro kernels in general is categorically false.
infamouscow
A large number of security issues are not backported to stable or LTS kernels.

A patch containing a new feature which tangentially fixes a security issue is merged to mainline. It will not get merged into stable or LTS (by definition).

Maxatar
To the extent that you've made specific claims, they are false. It's hard to argue with vague claims about tangentially fixing a security issue but at any rate just looking over LTS releases, they absolutely and frequently do backport security issues to LTS releases. They don't do it for every security issue, but the idea that they rarely do it or only do it as part of a tangential change is once again... categorically false.
queenkjuul
Fedora took over two weeks to get a patch out too afaik
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throw0101c
As outlined in this weblog post:

* https://ubuntu.com/blog/fixes-available-in-proposed-pocket-f...

The fixes were in the "proposed" repo since October 26 (noble) and 28 (resolute):

* https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux

One could pull them down at any point in the last week. Yesterday afternoon they were still in "proposed", but I checked this morning (EST/UTC-5) there were in "updates".

The kernels go through an QA testing processes, and per this September post, they're looking at shortening the timeframe for kernel updates:

* https://canonical.com/blog/accelerating-delivery-of-cve-fixe...

gwbas1c
> The kernels goes through an QA testing processes, and per this September post, they're looking at shortening the timeframe for kernel updates:

Looks like they aren't flexible enough to get a 4-line fix out the door when they need to.

These situations need a CEO or other high up to pull some people into a room, and basically say, "this needs to be released by EOD."

throw0101c
> Looks like they aren't flexible enough to get a 4-line fix out the door when they need to.

Perhaps because Ubuntu, like most distros, release new kernels that include fixes and updates for more than one issue:

* https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:93413

* https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/6.8.0-149.149

* https://www.suse.com/support/update/announcement/2026/suse-s...

* https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/DSA-6568-1

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cassianoleal
Perhaps that's the problem? Surely they use a version control system that allows them to branch off of older commit for these kinds of urgent patches.
throw0101c
So distros should release a new kernel for each CVE? Or only the "important" CVEs? And if two "important" ones come out two days apart there should be two kernels running through the QA pipeline? So that people can reboot their production systems two days apart?
reverius42
Yes, if two 9.8 kernel CVEs come out two days apart, then yes, everyone should be rebooting their prod systems two days apart.
mjhay
Timely security updates are important. Debian LTS had the patch within a couple days. It’s not like you have to update if you don’t want to.
ravenstine
I was asking "what in the world is taking Ubuntu so long" back in 2006.
tosti
Yeah, sorry. That was when the first LTS was delayed by 2 months. I don't recall that ever happening again these past 2 decades.

The good thing was a LOT of bugs were fixed in those 2 months. Also you can install or upgrade to U+1, so you could've upgraded in april.

imjonse
Has there been a documented exploit of this CVE on Ubuntu or on the other distros before they were patched?
wtch98
I haven't had a documented packet with IPOptions arrive on any of my firewalls, the packets are typically dropped, so exploiting remotely is going to be very difficult. In theory you could use another exploit and then lateral move in some networks which don't drop them at a router level.
talon8635
Here’s the real answer. It’s not as scary as the original reporters made it out to be.
1over137
Then why is it rated 9.8? (Including by Ubuntu itself)
fwlr
Because the rating system is not very good.
wredcoll
Yeah, had this ever actually been proven in the "real world"?
cromka
Does it have to be? I am betting there's more people working on proving this and not disclose the proof than to do.
nekusar
Maybe the patch is going through their interview process?
marcosdumay
You were wrong to have confidence in Ubuntu before this, you are doubly wrong for it to still be "shaking your confidence".

You are expecting some quality that was never there. Visibly so.

warkdarrior
Do you have any evidence for why confidence in Ubuntu was misplaced before this? Or are you just vibe-accusing?
Scaled
Best example I can think of is when they shipped an update that they knew would cause corruption on ZFS disks and didn't warn people sufficiently to not update if they were using ZFS. (A warning was buried in the release notes, but such a serious issue should have held back release. Most normal people don't read fifty pages of docs before each update.)

I don't hate Ubuntu at all, but that incident showed a level of blithe carelessness to user data that is unacceptable and reduced my confidence in them.

Sephr
They closed feature requests to add secure ISO downloads instead of figuring out how to secure their ISO downloads
VCFundedGenYer
Unity UI, Ads in the OS, paid subscriptions, Snap, partnership with Amazon, etc, etc, etc.

At least 15 years of nonsense.

lp92
Wait what, I haven't used Ubuntu in a long time. They have ads like Windows???
xandrius
I'd love to try your open-source OS for my server next.
machska
Does Ubuntu Pro get this fix any sooner, or is it the same for everyone?
bakugo
My understanding is that everyone gets this at the same time.

Ubuntu Pro provides security updates for packages that wouldn't otherwise be supported by Canonical at a given point in time. If your version of Ubuntu is still within the (non-extended) support period, kernel security updates are always provided regardless of Pro.

queenkjuul
Pro only gives you longer support periods, not extra support during the normal support period. That and livepatch and some other things i forget. But all updates within the normal support timeframe for a given release are the same with or without pro.
atestu
Seems like a good time to ask: what do people use, if not ubuntu, on a web server? Like for example for a rails app, on EC2... asking for a friend (who is me).
esikich
I switched back to Debian.
mad182
I personally use Debian both on my servers and desktops, for the last 15 years or so. Never understood the point of Ubuntu, it's just Debian with some random crap I don't need bolted on top.
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qwerpy
Ubuntu has been the easy default for things like WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) for my coding on Windows, and a linux VM on my home server. But I don't really like the idea of having a distro that doesn't treat security patching with urgency in the age of AI-fueled exploits. Need a standard distro with decent hardware support, low churn, and fast patching.

People are saying Debian. What are the tradeoffs? (other than faster patching on Debian of course)

esikich
Nothing really. Ubuntu is just a wrapper around Debian. If you are familiar with Ubuntu, it's basically exactly the same.
dizhn
I am someone who believes ALL Linux distros are basically the same (with outliers like Nix) but on the other hand Ubuntu does use some things like it's own network manager that is not the same as Debian as far as I know. And it has a working remote upgrade functionality which I used just yesterday. On Debian the process is manual and is not recommender to actually do.
mhitza
Rocky Linux. But I've built my career working with RHEL-compatible/derivative distros like CentOS, Fedora.
kccqzy
In the age of AI, there are only more and more security vulnerabilities to be discovered, and backporting all of them to outdated kernels will be nigh impossible. I’d not rather make such security patches dependent on the timeliness of backports especially if it is done by a distro. I suggest you use a rolling distro rather than anything with LTS kernels. The CVE in the original post CVE-2026-98432 is fixed since 7.3 and 7.3.1 is already out. If a distro doesn’t offer kernel 7.3.1 today, rule it out.

In general I find distros using old kernels annoying because Linus treats compatibility seriously and “don’t break use space” has been their mantra for many years. On desktops in particular, GPU driver improvements like https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-7.3-DRM make it super worthwhile.

SahAssar
That is a wild take, especially consider the GP asked for a server use-case. Do you just assume that all new versions should be taken as soon as possible for all packages?

There is a balance: too outdated is bad, too eager for new versions is bad. The tradeoff that LTS tries to take is older, proven versions but with relevant security fixes quickly.

kccqzy
Not a wild take at all. Most server use cases already use containers to precisely specify what the server workload depends on, and can only access what's in the container. I see no reason for the base system to move slowly with proven versions. Even if you don't use containers, you most likely already use language-specific tools to lock in your dependencies. Leave these to the app developers and the sysadmin can move at any speed.
1over137
>...I suggest you use a rolling distro

This doesn't seem to be popular with linux though. It's one thing I like about FreeBSD, everything is easy to keep very bleeding edge.

Maybe Debian 'testing'?, is that commonly run in prod?

jolmg
>>...I suggest you use a rolling distro

> This doesn't seem to be popular with linux though.

Nobody gets fired for buying IBM.

Nobody gets fired for choosing Java.

Nobody gets fired for choosing Debian.

nevon
Amazon Linux (2023, or 2027 once it's out of preview).
opengrass
Devuan, it's debian without systemd. Other light picks are Alpine or dietpi. Want to get into vm's, FreeBSD for it's bhyve hypervisor.
_mpn_
I use Rocky Linux on my web servers and hypervisors.

However, since I run a VPS host most of my customers run Debian or Ubuntu, due to both being more approachable than RPM-based distros.

I'm not a huge Ubuntu fan due to it being a very heavy downstream of Debian, versus Rocky which is 99.9% RHEL. I hold no grudge against Ubuntu, they made desktop Linux very approachable when Mandriva, Knoppix, et al. weren't.

But Canonical is too much of a downstream versus Red Hat, constantly losing standards wars. And unlike BSD (where I can understand) Canonical is a downstream by choice. It's like Sony who keeps losing standards wars to rivals.

Even in my homelab EVE-NG runs on Ubuntu.

bpavuk
for personal use I'd go with NixOS. NixOS "Unstable" is both pretty reliable and receives latest feature updates a lot faster than stable branches. Nix is simply the fastest to iterate with, for me personally, and having a VM or a Docker image declared right in my flake is something I love.

for something more serious than a personal project, I'd go with Debian because of their vast free support windows and some incredible companies providing extended support

OJFord
Honestly Ubuntu doesn't even come to mind as a candidate... Alpine, debian, nix, distroless, scratch, Amazon Linux, coreos are what come immediately to mind that I'd expect to see.
hollerith
I wouldn't focus too much on this one because your Ubuntu install probably has about 700 other vulnerabilities.
lousken
Why is anyone surprised about this? Ubuntu had a shitty track record of critical vulns for a long time, seeing so many in Wazuh was fun.
dennysora-main
I now rely on AI to fix them, otherwise I simply can't wait for them to release updates.
VCFundedGenYer
Ubuntu is the Microsoft of the Linux world. Endlessly corporate, terrible decisions, and bureaucracy that’s prevents things from getting done quickly.

If you rely on Ubuntu, move to Debian.

leecommamichael
I installed their -proposed pocket kernel, then some tools on my machine broke so I installed arch with gnome and it's business as usual...

Back when I used arch last they didn't have `archinstall` which made it just as easy as anything else to configure. Arch wiki is still a great resource. Wasted a lot of time trying out desktops just to land back at gnome. Genuinely can't believe how bad Cosmic DE is after all this time. I should be nicer about that, but I'm willing to elaborate if anyone from Pop is here, no ill will.

I have a... potentially false sense of security now that I'm on a distribution that can keep up with all of this CVS madness. I wonder if it's not just the best way to do it going forward. We'll see, it could be so if things go the way Greg Kroah-Hartman supposes they will; that LLMs are just like when fuzzers were new, and the issues will gradually reduce over time.