There has always been a bit of confusion when people learn they can do a full upgrade of their distribution from the command line. Most people don’t brave such a feat. Some because they don’t use the command line, and others because they are afraid an attempt to upgrade from the command line will wind up fubaring their system. And new users aren’t quite sure what the difference between apt-get upgrade and apt-get dist-upgrade is.

In this Ghacks Linux entry, I am going t dispel the myths and fear of the dist-upgrade command. Of course, as with everything PC-related, you know their are always risks when you do a major upgrade. With that warning out in the open, let’s set out to curb a little fear.

Differences

First I want to compare the two apt-get options: upgrade and dist-upgrade. The difference between these two is very simple.