From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jul 12 23: 4: 7 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from freefall.freebsd.org (freefall.FreeBSD.ORG [204.216.27.21]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 885AD37B676; Wed, 12 Jul 2000 23:04:04 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from kris@FreeBSD.org) Received: from localhost (kris@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.9.3/8.9.2) with ESMTP id XAA76027; Wed, 12 Jul 2000 23:04:04 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from kris@FreeBSD.org) X-Authentication-Warning: freefall.freebsd.org: kris owned process doing -bs Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 23:04:04 -0700 (PDT) From: Kris Kennaway To: Francisco Reyes Cc: FreeBSd Chat list Subject: Re: Is Stable really stable? In-Reply-To: <200007130542.BAA36692@vulcan.addy.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org On Thu, 13 Jul 2000, Francisco Reyes wrote: > The recent changes in the way of making new kernels plus the Repeat after me: it's not a recent change - people just didn't get the message until it was rammed down their throats recently. There is a certain minimal investment required to aggressively track -stable, namely the willingness to keep up with the mailing list, to read what others write when they describe upgrade pitfalls and temporary breakage after code changes, and to read the UPDATING file (which, by definition, usually lags a few days behind the leading edge because we can't predict all problems in advance). Frankly, stable is a lot easier to manage if you don't try and upgrade to the bleeding edge all the time, but gauge mailing list traffic for trouble spots, and upgrade every so often to a "safe" date once troubles have died down (e.g. you can use cvsup to update to specific dates, not just the very latest in the tree). For example, I think you'll agree that picking a date to upgrade when the mailing list is full of people crying "My stable is broken! My stable is broken!" would be a pretty silly thing to do. And of course, you don't blindly upgrade all of your machines at once, do you? If you're not willing or able to put in the time to manage source-code -stable upgrades coherently, then stick to discrete -RELEASE upgrades, or binary snapshots. With the 4.0 branch, developers are making a lot more of an effort to ensure that 4.0 doesn't severely diverge from -current. This was a major criticism of the 3.x branch, which soon lagged so far behind what was then 4.0-CURRENT that bugfixing became impossible, and the entire 3.x branch suffered as a result. On the one hand, you can have a -stable branch which becomes stagnant and for which merging bugfixes becomes impossible, on the other hand you can have a -stable branch which is actively maintained and developed, at the expense of occasional merge fallout. And before you suggest it, no, FreeBSD does not have the developer resources to maintain a third development track. If you're upset with -stable, I put it to you that you have the wrong expectations from it, and are trying to use it in inappropriate ways for your situation. Kris -- In God we Trust -- all others must submit an X.509 certificate. -- Charles Forsythe To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message