University of Auckland: End of Life Operating Systems

When an operating system reaches end of life:

• All security support for your system stops
• No more security updates are provided
• You need to upgrade or replace the system
  

Table of Contents

• What version is my operating system?
• What are the recommended operating system versions?
• Tips for picking an operating system
• Is my operating system end of life?
• How do I upgrade my EOL operating system?
• Ubuntu Upgrade Tips

What version is my operating system?

On a Linux system, the following command works on most modern systems:

cat /etc/os-release

winver

What are the recommended operating system versions

The UoA Centre for eResearch (CER) currently recommends the following operating system versions:

• Debian: 12 (Bookworm)
  
• Ubuntu: 22.04 or 24.04 LTS (Jammy or Noble)
  
• CentOS: Stream 9
  
• Rocky: 9
• Windows: 11
• Windows Server: 2022

Tips for picking an operating system

The following list documents a few tips for getting to most life out of your operating system.

• Pick an operating system with long term support (e.g., Ubuntu Long Term Support (LTS))
• Pick an operating system that is stable (these generally are maintained for much longer than bleeding edge or rolling release distributions)
• Pick the latest operating system version when creating a new instance to get the most life out of your system without version upgrade requirements

Is my operating system end of life?

Find the date when security support stops for your OS in the table below. If you operating system is not on the list below, check this website: https://endoflife.date/.

The table below outlines the End Of Life status for a selection of popular operating systems. The table highlights each row depending on the EOL status, where:

• Red == EOL
  
• Yellow < 1 year until EOL
  
• Green > 1 year until EOL

Table last updated: 2025-03

*Security support only (not software feature updates)

**Windows Server can support paid Extended Service Support

***Windows 11 End of life depends on system version installed

How do I upgrade my EOL operating system?

If your operating system version has reached end-of-life, upgrade to a supported version immediately, or set up a new instance with an up-to-date operating system.

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade
sudo do-release-upgrade

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade
sudo apt full-upgrade

sudo dnf upgrade --refresh
sudo dnf system-upgrade download --releasever=40

sudo dnf upgrade
sudo dnf install centos-release-stream
sudo dnf swap centos-{linux,stream}-repos
sudo dnf distro-sync

Ubuntu Upgrade Tips!

Upgrading Over SSH

When you attempt to perform a do-release upgrade and are connected via SSH you will get a warning (see screenshot below). If you lose the SSH connection, you will be unable to connect and finish the upgrade process. This is a very rare occurrence, and is primarily provided as a fail safe. We recommend that upgrade via SSH is a common and safe practice and you can continue with the upgrade.

If your SSH connection breaks during upgrade, you can always connect using the backup SSH port that the installer started. This is usually port 1022. Note that you will need to create a security group rule for this port.

Configuration File Changes

During a do-release upgrade various system services will be updated. Sometimes this process pauses the upgrade process, and asks the user about how to handle configuration changes (see screenshot examples below). This occurs because the new service update wants to know if you want to keep the old configuration, or update to a new default configuration. We recommend that you keep the existing configuration - this is usually the default option. We recommend this as many default configurations are implemented by Nectar in the base images, and provide sensible and secure settings.