Ubuntu 18.04 project image upgrade

The CoCalc service provides and extensive collection of software packages. The underlying "image" for each project is based on Linux (Ubuntu).

Up until Summer 2018, we used a release from 2016 – 16.04, named "xenial" – which we enhanced and maintained via many small incremental updates. All that became quite "dusty" and we decided to switched to 18.04, nickname "bionic", which is a more recent release from 2018. That offered us to start fresh from a clean sheet. This is a major update and despite our best efforts to offer the same overall set of solutions for everyone, there are a couple of subtle differences.

Overall, you can expect these updates of our more frequently used software packages:

• Python 3 in Ubuntu is currently at version 3.6
• Sage: pushed to 8.3
• R: 3.4.4 and we'll soon upgrade to 3.5
• PostgresQL: version 10 is installed, and we'll switch to it being the default soon
• Anaconda Python environment: start it via anaconda5 or the kernel with version 5.

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Switch project image

Most importantly, we do offer a way to dial back this upgrade via the project settings. At the bottom of the project control box, you can select the "old" image to work in the previous environment. This setting is just for that particular project. Keep in mind that we're only continue upgrading the newer "default" image. You can also opt in to follow us on our most recent "experimental" image bringing you our newest updates a bit earlier.

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Known Issues

• GAP Jupyter Kernel. There are robustness issues with the newer version of GAP and it's native kernel. As an alternative, you can use it in the Terminal via jupyter console --kernel=gap, by using the classical jupyter notebook (in project settings), or just use it directly on the command line. There is also a "GAP mode" in Sage Worksheets via %gap.
• Axiom: there seems to be an overall packaging issue in Ubuntu/Debian

Discontinued

There are some software packages which we're no longer supporting any more. We'll try to include them again if there is significant demand or technical hurdles preventing us from offering them are resolved.

• RethinkDB: as a mitigation, anyone can upload the binary release.
• Scala Jupyter Kernel: we were not able to get it to run in the newer environment. If someone is able to help us or knows a viable solution, please drop us a note at [email protected].
• Anaconda 3: we'll no longer offer updates and it will be removed
• Giac

Upcoming

• Julia 0.7/1.0: we're aware of that major release. Once we know how to setup the global repository with a set of libraries, we'll roll it out as the default.
• R 3.5 with a larger set of available libraries

Testing

Like before, we're committed to offer a well working and complete solution for everyone. If you're teaching using CoCalc and want to make sure that some specific functionalities are available, we're happy to add some tests to make sure they work fine.