I’m aware of Debian’s reputation for not having the most up-to-date software in its repository but have just noticed that Thunderbird is on its current version. Which makes me ask:
When does Debian update a package? And how does it decide when to?
I’m particularly interested in when it will make available the upcoming major release of GIMP to 3.0.
They get all the patches and minor upgrades in a timely fashion, similar to other distros. The major version updates do not come as readily though.
Minor upgrades don’t usually come to Debian at all, unless they are fixing some critical vulnerability or something, but that is usually patched over the previous version anyway.