From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jun 13 17:32:14 2012 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1C8E51065677; Wed, 13 Jun 2012 17:32:14 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jhb@freebsd.org) Received: from bigwig.baldwin.cx (bigwig.baldwin.cx [96.47.65.170]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id DE5708FC0C; Wed, 13 Jun 2012 17:32:13 +0000 (UTC) Received: from jhbbsd.localnet (unknown [209.249.190.124]) by bigwig.baldwin.cx (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 0CF78B960; Wed, 13 Jun 2012 13:32:13 -0400 (EDT) From: John Baldwin To: Adrian Chadd Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2012 13:27:19 -0400 User-Agent: KMail/1.13.5 (FreeBSD/8.2-CBSD-20110714-p13; KDE/4.5.5; amd64; ; ) References: <201206130853.32687.jhb@freebsd.org> In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-Id: <201206131327.19688.jhb@freebsd.org> X-Greylist: Sender succeeded SMTP AUTH, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.2.7 (bigwig.baldwin.cx); Wed, 13 Jun 2012 13:32:13 -0400 (EDT) Cc: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org, Matt Olander , Mark Linimon Subject: Re: Upcoming release schedule - 8.4 ? 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: Wed, 13 Jun 2012 17:32:14 -0000 On Wednesday, June 13, 2012 11:52:28 am Adrian Chadd wrote: > On 13 June 2012 05:53, John Baldwin wrote: > > >> You don't need to change the FreeBSD culture. We'd love to do an 8.4 > >> release. And an 8.5 release, and 8.6 release, etc. The problem is one > >> of resources and time, not of culture/desire. > > > > I disagree. The pace of X.0 releases is a deliberate choice FreeBSD > > has made and directly impacts the number of "live" branches in existence. > > Given our developer base, we can't really support 3 branches concurrently > > (head + 2 stable like we have now with head, 9, and 8). Having longer lived > > stable branches requires either increasing resources to support exising > > releases longer, or slowing the pace of X.0 releases (but more aggressively > > merging things from HEAD back). The latter case, especially, is part of > > the culture and would be a choice we as a Project would have to make. > > Right, but I don't think the freebsd project would really mind or > change much if more people came on board to handle legacy releases and > support them. > > If you're a company that uses FreeBSD stable releases, please consider > contributing engineering resources and/or donations to the Foundation > to improve the support of said stable releases. :) No, that doesn't actually work. Having additional support on a stable branch requires someone able to 1) commit changes to stable branches and 2) be able to cut newer releases from said branches (i.e. doing the work of re@). You cannot get that as an outside entity. It requires buy-in from the Project itself. -- John Baldwin