Apt is another part of it, but honestly Debian seems to 'feel' better. Perhaps due to the packaging?
Anyway, I'll probably try this out. Say I wanted to take Canonical out, does anyone here have anything to say for Debian Unstable?
It's pretty subtle. Ubuntu packages, maybe not all DEBs, like to prompt for input on how to proceed with new configs.
For servers at scale with varying packages, levels, and requirements - this gets painful. Some config hackery can help, but creates a bit of a circular problem.
RPM systems (by default) will trust the administrator. They don't prompt, and provide the new config file as a reference - without messing with what's already been deployed.
Apt also likes to get hamstrung on previous transactions. If they broke for the reason I just mentioned [or any other], installing new/completely unrelated things is blocked.
I can pretty much trust my RPM systems to do what they want/have been told... but not the DEB.
Granted, my experience with DEB has mostly been limited to Ubuntu - so it could be that/Canonical.
It is not a Canonical specificity, but it is overridable behavior.
For the dpkg prompting on configuration file changes:
https://raphaelhertzog.com/2010/09/21/debian-conffile-config...
> You can also make those options permanent by creating /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/local:
> Dpkg::Options { > "--force-confdef"; > "--force-confold"; > }
Along with invoking apt with -y (assume yes) will get you close to the behavior you seek. Or as a permanent setting:
APT::Get::Assume-Yes "true";