From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Jan 17 00:06:46 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 CA9171065672 for ; Tue, 17 Jan 2012 00:06:46 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from yanegomi@gmail.com) Received: from mail-tul01m020-f182.google.com (mail-tul01m020-f182.google.com [209.85.214.182]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9088A8FC13 for ; Tue, 17 Jan 2012 00:06:46 +0000 (UTC) Received: by obcwo16 with SMTP id wo16so2285761obc.13 for ; Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:06:46 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject:from:to :cc:content-type; bh=iEZ54sjkKJw8nXy/IBJSAbd9KZ8MjQekCbpaEqFMu90=; b=jJgvkn5XfsvnJquTr9hYcXbBL3sSZXCAKX0vI+TKU5sfx+nNgvBYWVzeock1MnGPe1 7f7+qSO2RD9JWDIEr72LW/lOIrlGtvQw0yebG6cLXcZ3tyASxGrF0k7A3NinLzZkrx9f z4jTmYm/rzxKqT8snMc/3HdJJA0Ao+58Rcxb8= MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.182.41.5 with SMTP id b5mr9863369obl.79.1326758806147; Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:06:46 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.182.5.162 with HTTP; Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:06:46 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: <1326756727.23485.10.camel@Arawn> References: <1326756727.23485.10.camel@Arawn> Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:06:46 -0800 Message-ID: From: Garrett Cooper To: WBentley@futurecis.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 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 00:06:46 -0000 On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 3:32 PM, William Bentley wrote: > I also echo John's sentiments here. Very excellent points made here. > Thank you for voicing your opinion. I was beginning to think I was the > only one who felt this way. > > I also have several FreeBSD installations spread across different > development/production systems and it is not feasible to always upgrade > to the latest and greatest. Part of why FreeBSD is difficult to adopt > into more of the commercial/government sectors is because of this fast > paced release cycle and most of the important patches/fixes are not > backported far enough. This is why most of my customers decide to use > Solaris or RedHat and not FreeBSD. (Not looking to start a flame war > about the OS choice/etc just pointing out the Release cycle model). I > would love to push FreeBSD harder but it is becoming increasingly > difficult as of late. > > We seem to have lost our way around the release of FreeBSD 7. I am all > in favor of new features but not at the risk of stability and proper > life cycle management. > > Are me and John the only people that feel this way or are we among the > minority? You aren't. There are other people like Devin Teske's group that feel the same (they're upgrading from 4.x to 8.2! Brave man.. and godspeed to him), along with some development organizations that depend on long release cycles (IronPort, Isilon, etc). That being said. More people, more likelihood to succeed with what you need, like julian@ suggests. I like long release cycles too for stuff that I find critical and "in production", like my router. My fileserver is a slightly different story, but I just got off the CURRENT bandwagon off on to the 9-STABLE bandwagon :). Cheers, -Garrett