Date: Sat, 21 Jul 2001 16:03:17 -0700 (PDT) From: Lamont Granquist <lamont@scriptkiddie.org> To: Jordan Hubbard <jkh@freebsd.org> Cc: <a.l.meyers@consult-meyers.com>, <freebsd-stable@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: is "stable" "stable"? Message-ID: <20010721155421.V76974-100000@coredump.scriptkiddie.org> In-Reply-To: <20010721135510Y.jkh@freebsd.org>
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Here's my suggestion, there's a FIXME in there because it really needs a reference to the security branches off of the main release, there's also another FIXME where it needs a link to the mailing list. I'm getting hungry and I'm not sure if the security branches are already addressed in the docs somewhere and don't have the patience right now to look... [ I suppose I should probably go read the Documentation HOWTO and figure out the right way to make this submission... ] 20.2.2 Staying Stable with FreeBSD 20.2.2.1 What is FreeBSD-STABLE? FreeBSD-STABLE is our development branch for a more low-key and conservative set of changes intended for our next mainstream release. Any changes to this branch will have debuted in FreeBSD-CURRENT first, helping to reduce (but not eliminate) the chance that the changes will cause problems. 20.2.2.2 Who needs FreeBSD-STABLE? If you are interested in tracking the FreeBSD development process, and you want early access to the features that will appear in the next ``point'' release of FreeBSD then you should consider following FreeBSD-STABLE. Tracking FreeBSD-STABLE is one way to get easy access to security fixes for FreeBSD. If, however, all you need are security fixes to point-releases you should consider tracking the [FIXME: security-point-release-tag]. Also, every security advisory for FreeBSD explains how to fix the problem for the releases it affects. 20.2.2.3 Why is FreeBSD-STABLE not always "stable"? Although we endeavor to ensure that the FreeBSD-STABLE branch compiles and runs at all times, this cannot be guaranteed. By doing a CVS checkout of a head branch of a source tree which is getting daily updates you will be taking some risk of instability. For those who have never used CVS in a development environment before you should be warned that people will occasionally break the build and will occasionally introduce insufficiently tested code. In addition, while code is developed in FreeBSD-CURRENT before including it in FreeBSD-STABLE, more people run FreeBSD-STABLE than FreeBSD-CURRENT, so it is inevitable that bugs and corner cases will sometimes be found in FreeBSD-STABLE that were not apparent in FreeBSD-CURRENT. For these reasons, we do not recommend that you blindly track FreeBSD-STABLE, and it is particularly important that you do not update any production servers to FreeBSD-STABLE without first thoroughly testing the code in your development environment. It is also recommended that users of FreeBSD-STABLE track the freebsd-stable mailing list where problems in building and running FreeBSD-STABLE are discussed. [FIXME: needs a link to appendix C] If you do not have the resources to do this then we recommend that you run the most recent release of FreeBSD, and use the binary update mechanism to move from release to release. 20.2.2.4 If FreeBSD-STABLE isn't totally "stable" why not rename it? Several people have argued that tagging the head of a development branch as "STABLE" is a bad idea. It may set unrealistic expectations for people who are not developers. While this argument has merit, the difficulty is that too much currently depends on this tag to change it easily, and nobody has come forward volunteering to do the work. 20.2.2.5 Using FreeBSD-STABLE [...etc...] On Sat, 21 Jul 2001, Jordan Hubbard wrote: > Very well said. This should be added to the handbook. :) > > From: Lamont Granquist <lamont@scriptkiddie.org> > Subject: Re: is "stable" "stable"? > Date: Sat, 21 Jul 2001 11:27:01 -0700 (PDT) > > > > > On Sat, 21 Jul 2001, A. L. Meyers wrote: > > > Having followed the postings here for a few weeks it seems, at > > > least occasionally, that "stable" appears to be a bit less than > > > "stable". > > > > You are doing a CVS checkout of a source tree that is getting updates > > on a daily basis. If you have ever done this in a development environment > > before, you should know that absolute 100% stability in any such an > > environment is never, ever going to happen. > > > > If you want the latest -stable sources which *are* stable, then you > > really need to checkout sources on a fresh machine, build your > > distribution and spend a few days regression testing the features of the > > OS which are important to you. You should then roll out the build to > > your staging platform and give it at least a week or two. Following that > > you should put it in the load balancing rotation on your production site, > > and then gradually phase it in as you gain more confidence. > > > > Which, of course, you should be doing anyway. > > > > If you want better stability, then checkout the actual 4.x releases with > > the security fixes. Those have actually been frozen and then bugfixed for > > stability. They should be better. > > > > Why is this so difficult for people to understand? *ANY* time you are > > checking out the head of a development branch (even one where developers > > are supposedly being "more careful") then you should expect to > > occasionally see problems. People will break the build. People will have > > insufficiently tested their code and subsystems will break. I guarantee > > you that none of the FBSD developers have a sufficient testing matrix to > > *ensure* that the changes which are checked into the top of the tree will > > run on every platform out there (consider for a moment just how big the > > x86 testing matrix is). I'm pretty damned impressed that -stable works as > > well as it does (kudos for the developers). > > > > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > > with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message
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