Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2010 23:06:40 +0000 From: "Robert N. M. Watson" <rwatson@FreeBSD.org> To: "Poul-Henning Kamp" <phk@phk.freebsd.dk> Cc: mdf@FreeBSD.org, John Baldwin <jhb@FreeBSD.org>, freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: Schedule for releases Message-ID: <0626B045-E0D7-4875-8B72-9CC705BD133D@FreeBSD.org> In-Reply-To: <9194.1292972364@critter.freebsd.dk> References: <9194.1292972364@critter.freebsd.dk>
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On 21 Dec 2010, at 22:59, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote: > In message <alpine.BSF.2.00.1012212215320.36028@fledge.watson.org>, = Robert Wats > on writes: >=20 >> Looking at 7.x, I'm struck by how much it has slowed down. There's a=20= >> significant user community, but not a significant developer = community. >=20 > This is a very important point to interpret correctly: >=20 > FreeBSD is whatever its developers make it be. Agreed entirely. > A more structured and more desirabe option is to channel such funds > through either the foundation or a commercial entity, who then pays > developers to pay attention to 7.x >=20 > Companies who use Open Source are not adverse to paying for the > service they get, but somebody needs to make it easy for them. Yeah, I think we pretty much agree on this: someone needs to do the work = within the community. I don't doubt dozens of companies (if not many = more) are busy back-porting drivers locally to 6.x/7.x, etc, and it = would be nice to (a) amortize that cost, making it cheaper to use = FreeBSD in said products, and (b) get it out into the community so = everyone benefits. It's possible to imagine different models working = there, and possibly more than one at once. I think the obvious starting = point actually is in the device driver space, and possibly through the = support efforts already being made in companies. It's useful for our = community, however, to discuss whether we have any technical/social = obstacles that would limit that (i.e., would $vendor not like it if = third parties maintained their drivers in branches they no longer QA = for), and whether we can take any specific actions to support those = efforts. There are lots of other factors involved here too, of course, but I = think there's probably some moderately accessible work that if done, = will make the world a better place :-). Robert=
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