From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 29538 invoked from network); 22 Jul 2004 09:00:56 +0000 Received: from smtp.gentoo.org (156.56.111.197) by lists.gentoo.org with AES256-SHA encrypted SMTP; 22 Jul 2004 09:00:56 +0000 Received: from lists.gentoo.org ([156.56.111.196] helo=parrot.gentoo.org) by smtp.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.34) id 1BnZRd-0007QM-AQ for arch-gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org; Thu, 22 Jul 2004 09:00:53 +0000 Received: (qmail 10293 invoked by uid 89); 22 Jul 2004 09:00:52 +0000 Mailing-List: contact gentoo-dev-help@gentoo.org; run by ezmlm Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-dev@gentoo.org Received: (qmail 17409 invoked from network); 22 Jul 2004 09:00:52 +0000 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org From: Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net> Date: Thu, 22 Jul 2004 02:00:43 -0700 Organization: Sometimes Message-ID: References: <20040720131405.GW18023@mail.lieber.org> <40FDCD20.6080302@scms.waikato.ac.nz> <1090441261.19552.124.camel@localhost> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1250 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: ip68-230-66-58.ph.ph.cox.net User-Agent: Pan/0.14.2.91 (As She Crawled Across the Table) Sender: news Subject: [gentoo-dev] Re: Revisiting GLEP 19 X-Archives-Salt: 91ee5ed9-8610-47ed-9bf7-a9e439cc036f X-Archives-Hash: e4d25584e30f0de56b6319f53947855b Chris Gianelloni posted <1090441261.19552.124.camel@localhost>, excerpted below, on Wed, 21 Jul 2004 16:21:01 -0400: > I think 2 a year with a 2 year retention (4 releases) would be the sweet > spot. Nothing keeps users from running older releases, just we don't > support them officially any more. First, I'm a personal desktop user who migrated to Gentoo in large part for its "freshness". Thus, the very idea of slowing things down seems counter to the entire Gentoo thing, here, tho I understand the enterprise need, and the appeal of a Gentoo Linux Enterprise. If it's going to be done, in some ways, I think some other name might be more appropriate, tho if it's based on Gentoo, the other side says it's entirely appropriate. Anyway.. I replied here in particular, because I wanted to comment on the point quoted. From my observation of the commercial distribs and their reaction to Enterprise, as well as business reaction to their enterprise products, both the six month window and the two year window are to short. If it's to be based on Gentoo Linux with its current quarterly releases*, it /would/ seem a multiple of that would be a good idea, and an annual one sounds like just to big a deal, to much invested. Thus, I'd propose a tri-release multiple rather than every other release, for a nine-month Enterprise release cycle rather than six. The first three months of the cycle could then be devoted to mostly supporting upgrades. The second three months would be focused on choosing and stabilizing a snapshot. This would offer a choice of two normal snapshot versions in case one had been found to be less than optimal, plus the possibility of an intervening version of individual packages if necessary. At the six-month point, a pre-release (aka Gentoo Enterprise Community) would be produced, which enterprise users could then start validating, with the full release (Gentoo Enterprise Official) three months later, incorporating any fixes necessary during the three month early validation period. This would also allow a bit more room for vacations and various other short term breaks of a month or so, where such might crimp a six-month release cycle (and certainly /does/ crimp the Gentoo three-month cycle =:^( ). If this sounds a bit like Mandrake's community/official release policy, that's no accident. They found there simply wasn't enough testing of the beta and rc releases, and after a couple "dud" releases, came up with the community/official release policy. Enterprises don't like "dud" releases, and if we start out with something like this, I think it'll improve the likelihood of Gentoo getting the reputation for solid releases. With a nine-month release cycle, that would be four releases every three years. If Gentoo Enterprise supported four releases back (five releases total), that would be four years of actual support, including the three months of "Community" support for verification. That should be comfortably enough beyond the three year general upgrade cycle that even the conservative corporations should be comfortable with it, as it would allow for three years of actual use, PLUS a comfortable verification and conversion time at each end. That would be comfortably more than the competition (save for Debian) supports, as well. OTOH, cutting that to four releases total (three back) would remain an option, and still be reasonable. ... * RE: the current quarterly releases: IMO, these might better be three a year since all they are is snapshots tested and fit for installation anyway, and don't really affect current users with Gentoo already installed. This would give the arch teams and releng a bit more QC time on the snapshots, and allow more ebuild maintenance and development time in between releases, instead of the constant focus on snapshot release stability, getting one out and having to immediately start focusing on the next, with little time to focus on just ebuilds/package quality itself, instead of the larger snapshot quality, between release snapshots. Or, to put it another way, it'd allow for a problem AND a vacation, in the same release window, without crowding out individual package attention entirely. For Enterprise, this would change the every third release, nine month spacing, to every other release, eight month spacing, above, three in two years, six in a four year life cycle (or five, and remain reasonably over three years). Of course, that's just my opinion. I'm not trying to tilt at windmills, wasn't yet around for the debate behind the quarterly release decision, and if the current Gentoo Linux quarterly releases work.. -- Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin -- gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list