From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Jan 17 23:27:39 2012 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A1DA01065670; Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:27:39 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from avg@FreeBSD.org) Received: from citadel.icyb.net.ua (citadel.icyb.net.ua [212.40.38.140]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B33678FC13; Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:27:38 +0000 (UTC) Received: from porto.starpoint.kiev.ua (porto-e.starpoint.kiev.ua [212.40.38.100]) by citadel.icyb.net.ua (8.8.8p3/ICyb-2.3exp) with ESMTP id BAA16497; Wed, 18 Jan 2012 01:27:36 +0200 (EET) (envelope-from avg@FreeBSD.org) Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]) by porto.starpoint.kiev.ua with esmtp (Exim 4.34 (FreeBSD)) id 1RnIRE-0005mM-JS; Wed, 18 Jan 2012 01:27:36 +0200 Message-ID: <4F1603E7.3080700@FreeBSD.org> Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2012 01:27:35 +0200 From: Andriy Gapon User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; FreeBSD amd64; rv:9.0) Gecko/20111222 Thunderbird/9.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Adrian Chadd References: In-Reply-To: X-Enigmail-Version: undefined Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: FreeBSD has serious problems with focus, longevity, and lifecycle X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:27:39 -0000 on 18/01/2012 01:01 Adrian Chadd said the following: > .. I'm replying to the OP because honestly, this thread has gotten a > bit derailed. > > If you'd like to see: > > ... more frequent releases? then please step up and help with all the > infrastructure needed to roll out test releases, including building > _all_ the ports. A lot of people keep forgetting that a "release" is > "build all the ports for all the supported platforms". > > ... longer lifecycle? Then please step up and contribute patches for > features for your favourite branch. As a developer doing this in my > spare time I'm only really working on new features on -HEAD and maybe > backporting fixes to 9.x. What _I_ would like is someone to take on > the task of testing and backporting net80211/ath fixes to 8.x and 7.x. > > ... longer branch lifecycle? Same as above. None of the developers are > going to reject bugfixes and backported drivers to a legacy, stable > branch. We may be a bit against the idea of porting entire new > subsystems to legacy, stable branches - but if there's a good enough > reason _and_ it's been tested _and_ there's a need for it - _I_ > wouldn't say no. And another 2 cents from me: we also have this KPI/KBI stability policy for the stable branches. So if anyone would like to have a "stable" branch but with some super wanted/needed/requested change added, then that would be a bit harder to arrange. I personally would call that a custom branch. And that of course can also be done, even as an "official" custom branch, but interested people would need either to take the job upon themselves or find (motivate, interest) those who would the job for them. > If you care this much to comment on it, please consider caring enough > to step up and assist. Or, pay a company like ixSystems for FreeBSD > support and get them to do this for you. Otherwise you're just > re-iterating the same stuff I'm sure all the developers know but are > just out of manpower/time/money/resources to do anything about. > > > > Adrian > (who _did_ step up and take over a subsystem, so I'm speaking from > recent experience.) -- Andriy Gapon