I have a netbook running 12.04 sitting on my nightstand that I use for listening to Podcasts / audiobooks as I go to sleep. I usually wake up after a few hours, put the netbook to sleep, then turn around and go back to sleep.
This means I only update the netbook on rare occasions, because when I go to bed, I want to... sleep, you know, not update my netbook. So currently, that thing has about 180 days of uptime (although it spent most of that time sleeping, of course). I have been meaning to install updates and reboot it for months, but during the day, I forget about it, and only think of it as I go to bed... A vicious cycle... ;-)
With a kernel update, one doesn't have to reboot, technically, it is merely required for the update to take effect.
This means I only update the netbook on rare occasions, because when I go to bed, I want to... sleep, you know, not update my netbook. So currently, that thing has about 180 days of uptime (although it spent most of that time sleeping, of course). I have been meaning to install updates and reboot it for months, but during the day, I forget about it, and only think of it as I go to bed... A vicious cycle... ;-)
With a kernel update, one doesn't have to reboot, technically, it is merely required for the update to take effect.