Ubuntu
meson package

Request: Update meson in 18.04 to newer version

Asked by dreamer_

Originally posted here: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/issues/8247

Soon, Ubuntu 16.04 will reach EOL and 18.04 will become the oldest "stable" offering by Canonical. Meson is already a very important tool for the numerous software packagers, e.g. Mesa, systemd, or Gnome.

Ubuntu 18.04 packages older version of Meson (0.45.1); once 16.04 will reach EOL it will be the oldest Meson version available compared to other distributions.

Here are some features missing:

- dictionaries (meson >= 0.47.0)
- support for 'in' operator for lists and dictionaries (meson >= 0.49.0)
- support for 'break' and 'continue' statement in loops (meson >= 0.49.0)
- support for 'not_found_message' keyword for dependencies (not documented when this feature was added)
- support for 'ppc64' machine cpu family (it's named 'ppc64le', contrary to Meson documentation)

Packaging newer meson version (e.g. 0.49.2 to match Debian Stable) would have a very high impact throughout Ubuntu ecosystem and beyond:

- It would be easier to backport new Mesa and systemd releases (!)
- Developers depending on Ubuntu 18.04 (such as myself) would be unblocked to use newer Meson features (dictionaries in particular are very useful)

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Manfred Hampl (m-hampl) said : 		#1

Manfred Hampl suggests this article as an answer to your question:
FAQ #3037: “no rolling release”.

Revision history for this message
Manfred Hampl (m-hampl) said : 		#2

If you want a newer version of meson, then you should upgrade to a newer Ubuntu release that contains that version (or a higher one).

There are PPAs available with an updated version for bionic.

If you deem it really necessary to upgrade meson in bionic, then please create a bug report to request this (see the FAQ).

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dreamer_ (dreamer-tan) said : 		#3

@m-hampl I am not asking for a rolling-release style update, but rather for an upgrade to meson package (perhaps for next 18.04.6 point release) to match the version provided by Debian Stable.

Meson is quite an important infrastructure-wise and it would not only solve my problem, but also made it easier for Canonical to backport future Mesa, systemd, and Gnome releases.

If Ubuntu team considers this unfeasible for some reason and intends to keep using Meson 0.45.1 for the remaining lifespan of Ubuntu 18.04, then I will just switch to Debian Stable as using PPA (or pip3) does not solve my problem.

Revision history for this message
Manfred Hampl (m-hampl) said : 		#4

Did you read FAQ #3037 ?
There you find the steps that are necessary to request a SRU or backport.

Can you help with this problem?

Provide an answer of your own, or ask dreamer_ for more information if necessary.

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