I have bought the BDM Ubuntu manual which recommends using Version 16.10 instead of 16.04.01 LTS. However only 17.04 and 16.04.01 LTS are listed as choices on the www.ubuntu.com site. Please, which should I use, especially to be able to follow through the guide in the book?
Usually we have several supported Ubuntu release versions in parallel. These differ in stability, in the actuality of packages contained, and in the time span they will be supported.
Most stable are the LTS (long term support) releases, and least stable of course the lastest release that comes with up to date package version that may still have the one or other bug. LTS releases are supported for 5 years but the support for a normal release will end soon after a newer version was released.
For differences see: What's the difference between a Long Term Support Release and a Normal Release?
LTS-releases will get interim updates, mostly for support of newer hardware. A support for newer hardware can be installed to a LTS version later. At present this would be 16.04.2 point release. LTS point releases may come with a newer kernel. For 16.04.2 this would e.g. be the 16.10 kernel.
So if you are new to Ubuntu I would recommend you install the present stable LTS-release (i.e. 16.04.2 at present). Only very new hardware may be better supported with a still newer kernel we get with a latest Ubuntu release (i.e. 17.04).
Guides will stick to a LTS version rather than to a normal release cycle but usually changes are not so dramatic that they would make a guide entirely obsolete (except the switch to Unity from 10.04 to 12.04).
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