Best way to upgrade from 7.04 to 10.?
 

I am using Ubuntu 7.04 to learn Linux. I think some of my problems would be solved by upgrading to ver 10. Not sure the best way to do this. i don't want to uninstall my current Distr but not a problem if necessary.

Not just the best way ... but, the only way to upgrade across so many versions of an OS, is to do a 'fresh install'

There is 'no way' you can even consider a dist-upgrade . . . download the version you want and do a new install over the existing partition.

The link I gave has information on how to do it. They recommend making a backup of your data first, and at the end it says sometimes you'll need to take an extra step to download certain updates... it looks like a little bit of a hassle, but you can do it.
Under no circumstances can you upgrade an older version to the newest one automatically, though. For instance, not long ago I had a 9.04 live CD, and to get to 10.4 I had to upgrade twice (once to 9.10, then again to 10.4) and that's just how it is. So once you upgrade from 7.4 to 7.10 you'll have to upgrade to 8.4, 8.10, 9.4, 9.10, 10.4. That's where it becomes a real hassle. If you just do a fresh install, that'll be it.

I would also recommend a clean install of Ubuntu 10.04. The chances of something going wrong when doing dist-upgrades from 7.04 --> 10.04 are high. As others have said, this will be time consuming and a hassle.
If you have a separate home partition, then all your data will be safe. If you do not have a separate home partition, then this would be a good time to reformat and create one.
See this tutorial on manual partitioning if you need help:
http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/installseparatehome

As others have said, going from 7.04 to 10.04 is a big jump. Better to do a clean install. As tommcd said, take steps to preserve your data first! Depending on your stage in the learning curve, you might also try installing 10.04 to another partition and dual boot. But if you want to keep it simple, just do a clean install of 10.04 into the partition that 7.04 is currently on.

Regards,
feffer

I researched all the replies and finally decided to get Ubuntu 10.04 & do a clean install. After many hours of trying to get my wireless card to work I finally figured out how to get it to work. Thanks to all who replied.
Go Linux.

Thanks for the help. I had to work at getting the wireless to work but used The Internet to find out how to get the driver to work.

Believe it or not, that's exactly what we all do!

Congratulations on your migration to a more up to date version of linux. Hope you like it :)