Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2007 11:40:47 -0500 From: "Scot Hetzel" <swhetzel@gmail.com> To: "Christian Baer" <christian.baer@uni-dortmund.de> Cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: suggest renaming and extending the -CURRENT and -STABLE lines Message-ID: <790a9fff0710100940v12539f86k3961d9009323fa1@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <feilee$2m3t$3@nermal.rz1.convenimus.net> References: <feilee$2m3t$3@nermal.rz1.convenimus.net>
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On 10/10/07, Christian Baer <christian.baer@uni-dortmund.de> wrote: > Hello people! > > Before you all bang around on my head :-) hear me out on this one. It's > actually possible that someone has already made this suggestion and I > haven't found that thread yet. If so, please point me in the right > direction and I'll read up on it, before writing in this thread again. > There was a thread on this a few years back when we only had the -CURRENT and -STABLE branches. The problem at that time was that when code was being back ported from -CURRENT to -STABLE it would break production machines that had been updated to the latest -STABLE code. The solution was to create the -STABLE security branches where only security and minor fixes were applied. > As the subject of this thread already suggests, I am referring to the > names of the developement branches, which I (even as a computer scientist) > consider a little "strange". > > If someone sees the result of RELENG_6 is called STABLE, he or she will > problably think, this is the line where bug fixes are added, security > problems fixed and the whole thing is meant for production systems. While > the first two things may be true, I would not suggest RELENG_6 for > production systems. Normally the -STABLE line works fine. But I *have* > times in the past where a driver was changes and suddenly the system > *didn't* work after a reboot or showed strange behaviour. > > What you could (and should?) use for a production system is RELENG_6_2. I > am using that, as you can see in the header. :-) Although the handbook > titles RELENG_6 as "staying stable...", people are warned not to use it on > production systems (which seems strange for something called "stable") > while RELENG_6_x isn't even mentioned. > The handbook needs a new section added to: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/current-stable.html which details what the -STABLE security branches (RELENG_x_y) are to be used for. : 23.2.2.2 Who Needs FreeBSD-STABLE? : 23.2.2.3 What are the FreeBSD-STABLE security branches? If you are interested in tracking the security of the current STABLE -RELEASE, then you should consider following the FreeBSD-STABLE security branch. The FreeBSD -STABLE security branches tracks only security and minor fixes relating to the currently supported STABLE -RELEASES. No major changes are made to these branches. Although we endeavor to ensure that the FreeBSD-STABLE security branch compiles and runs at all times, this cannot be guaranteed. <Re-write?> We do not recommend that you blindly update any production servers to FreeBSD-STABLE security branch without first thoroughly testing the code in your development environment. To use the -STABLE security branch you need to check out the FreeBSD sources using the RELENG_x_y tag. 23.2.2.5 Using FreeBSD-STABLE : Scot
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