Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2008 14:51:36 -0700 From: Jo Rhett <jrhett@netconsonance.com> To: Mark Linimon <linimon@lonesome.com> Cc: freebsd-stable <freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.org>, Andrew Snow <andrew@modulus.org> Subject: Re: Upcoming Releases Schedule... Message-ID: <78BA6D76-2667-44B3-BF21-0B940D3C6E13@netconsonance.com> In-Reply-To: <20080916065657.GB12295@soaustin.net> References: <1219409496.10487.22.camel@bauer.cse.buffalo.edu> <593618A3-56DA-4891-A4A0-690E9A9C5B32@netconsonance.com> <F17BE4F1F989BB4A81EB94C36712A9736F3493@dni-mail.datanode.com> <20080904133604.GB1188@atarininja.org> <CB36FE28-D125-4C22-B5DE-1001515DD8A6@netconsonance.com> <47d0403c0809051319r3c82f87bhdb15ce5b0167987a@mail.gmail.com> <alpine.BSF.1.10.0809061159410.28840@fledge.watson.org> <2742CAB1-8FF2-425D-A3B6-0658D7DB8F4D@netconsonance.com> <48CF5282.10608@modulus.org> <20080916065657.GB12295@soaustin.net>
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> On Tue, Sep 16, 2008 at 04:30:26PM +1000, Andrew Snow wrote: >> I think FreeBSD is getting in a difficult position now because >> there's >> so much cool new stuff being shoe-horned in, but without the >> necessary >> volume of contributors to back it up with testing and bug fixes. On Sep 15, 2008, at 11:56 PM, Mark Linimon wrote: > We're interested in suggestions about how to get more people involved > with testing and bug fixes. > > There's certainly no lack of demand for the features -- all the way > from > running on inexpensive wireless routers all the way up to 'enterprise- > grade' distributed storage solutions. (These are real examples from > various mailing lists.) > > So, in your opinion, what's the way to reconcile all these demands > (features + stability + long-term support of release branches) with > a group that is 95%-plus volunteer effort? As I have said to you directly in personal e-mail, the maintenance schedule is creating a chicken and egg problem. If companies weren't forced to run internal distribution and release management on their own, they could allocate more resources (ie volunteers -- PAID ones!) to testing and release management of the main distribution. To speak personally from my own experience: our business can not afford to pay me to help develop a release effort with an unknown maintenance period (6.4-REL). Since we need to have a clear maintenance window for any installed/upgraded host, we are forced to provide that support internally. If we had known (and longer than 12 month) maintenance periods for a given release, then I could avoid maintaining this infrastructure internally and would have somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 hours a month I could dedicate to testing and bug fixes of FreeBSD as a whole. -- Jo Rhett Net Consonance : consonant endings by net philanthropy, open source and other randomness
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