Microsoft Visual Studio Code (VS Code) has dropped support for Ubuntu 18.04 LTS — a move causing issues for scores of developers.
VS Code 1.86 (aka the ‘January 2024’ update) saw Microsoft bump the minimum build requirements for the text editor’s popular remote dev tools to ≥glibc 2.28 — but Ubuntu 18.04 LTS uses glibc 2.27, ergo they no longer work.
While Ubuntu 18.04 is supported by Canonical until 2028 (through ESM) a major glibc upgrade is unlikely.
Thus, this “breaking change” is truly breaking workflows:
“Yeah this has completely screwed me. I have a number of older servers and I can’t get into any of them now. The only way is for me to downgrade and never update VS Code. Doesn’t seem like a good solution.”
~thekendog
Now, I’m neither a developer, or someone super-familiar with VS Code’s release cadence, and developers of any size supporting any software are entitled to stop supporting things if needed — it happens all the time.
But in this case, it sounds like it wasn’t handled well at all.
It seems affected developers were caught off-guard as this (rather vital) change was not signposted before, during, or after the VS Code update (which was installed automatically for many, and the update was pushed out to those on Ubuntu 18.04).
Indeed, most only discovered there was an issue once the update was installed and tried to connect to a remote server — only to find it fails. The resulting error message mentions the deprecation and links to an FAQ on the VS Code website with workarounds (i.e. downgrade).
But as one developer politely puts it:
“An update like this, which is “major” IMHO, should have a security mechanism involved. It could have checked the libc versions and refused the update. Now, many people are screwed in the middle of their work. A lot of room for improvement here…”
~juxeii
All is not lost.
There are two options (for those who want to continue using VS Code; other text editors and remote dev tools are available):
- Upgrade to Ubuntu 20.04 LTS
- Downgrade to VS Code 1.85
An upgrade offers other benefits but is a “hassle”, especially if a development environment is setup, configured, and (otherwise) running well.
Downgrading to VS Code 1.85, which becomes the last “good” version for 18.04, is relatively easy, but folks should remember to disable updates to the app to prevent the latest version from being reinstalled after.
h/t Jesse
