Installation question - is Yunohost an OS?

[nomad101]

Hi

I’m new to Yunohost. I plan to install an existing nas/homeserver box (treat as regular 64 bit computer). I’m a bit confused - is Yunohost is an entire operating systems (OS), or is it installed on top of say Debian?

Sorry for the newbie question.

[Aleks]

It’s both … it’s installed on top of Debian, but it can also be thought as an OS, for some definition of OS.

Like, you could define OS as “the part through which softwares interact with hardware”, in which case the OS is Linux, and Debian is not an OS, because Debian is a collection of pre-configured tools to effectively do useful stuff with computers without too much headaches.

Similarly, YunoHost is a collection of pre-configured tools / service ecosystem, with some sort of “package manager” (=Yunohost Apps) to do useful stuff with server without too much headaches.

Sure YunoHost can be installed on top of Debian, but you could also imagine that Ubuntu could be installed on top of Debian soooo … is Ubuntu an OS ?

[nomad101]

Thanks for the reply. Though I’m still rather confused

If were to install using the Yunohost ISO (for 64-bit computers), I’m assuming it would be installed on a blank formatted drive space/partition - and Yunohost is basically like a debian based distro (such as MX Linux etc).
If this is the case, would Yunohost upgrades be always like a rolling-realease?

Or could I also have debian installed already, and then add Yunohost?
If that’s the case, then when debian has a major upgrage (e.g. 11 to 12), would Yunhost have to be re-installed from scratch again?

Thanks

[Aleks]

@nomad101

If were to install using the Yunohost ISO (for 64-bit computers), I’m assuming it would be installed on a blank formatted drive space/partition - and Yunohost is basically like a debian based distro (such as MX Linux etc).

Yes, basically what this does under the hood is installing Debian then Yunohost

@nomad101

If this is the case, would Yunohost upgrades be always like a rolling-realease?

Not sure what you mean … Or maybe the answer is just too obvious to me like … yes of course you’ll be able to upgrade YunoHost, this doesn’t change anything with regarde to upgrade to install it this way or another

@nomad101

Or could I also have debian installed already, and then add Yunohost?

Yes, that works too, doesn’t really change anything

@nomad101

If that’s the case, then when debian has a major upgrage (e.g. 11 to 12), would Yunhost have to be re-installed from scratch again?

No, we provide an (hopefully) one-click migration procedure at some point, which usually comes at least 6 months after the initial stable release on Debian’s side, because we have to test/fix the compatibility for our 400+ apps, among other things, so it takes time

We’ve always provided migration procedure for major upgrade, some people are using the same install since like the Jessie era (or possibly even Wheezy)