From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Dec 4 00:55:25 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 11ACE106564A for ; Sat, 4 Dec 2010 00:55:25 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from rfarmer@predatorlabs.net) Received: from mail-qw0-f54.google.com (mail-qw0-f54.google.com [209.85.216.54]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C07DD8FC17 for ; Sat, 4 Dec 2010 00:55:21 +0000 (UTC) Received: by qwj9 with SMTP id 9so4731081qwj.13 for ; Fri, 03 Dec 2010 16:55:20 -0800 (PST) MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.220.168.70 with SMTP id t6mr532473vcy.49.1291424120574; Fri, 03 Dec 2010 16:55:20 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.220.195.9 with HTTP; Fri, 3 Dec 2010 16:55:20 -0800 (PST) X-Originating-IP: [128.95.133.183] In-Reply-To: References: <20101203194605.068da7e8.freebsd@edvax.de> Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 16:55:20 -0800 Message-ID: From: Rob Farmer To: JB Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: RELEASE vice CURRENT vice STABLE X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 04 Dec 2010 00:55:25 -0000 On Fri, Dec 3, 2010 at 13:26, JB wrote: > The other *BSD are developed sequentially, that is, there is one > branch and each major/minor release cycle follows the previous one > (at no time there is a parallel major/minor branch development). > > In case of FreeBSD, it seems (visually) that there is some mainline > CURRENT branch repository since FreeBSD 1.0 time, from which major > branches are started in parallel (right now there are 8.2-CURRENT > and 9.0-CURRENT developed, if I am correct), and they end their own > life so to speak, without affecting other major branches; but there > were periods of sequential dvelopments as well, e.g. 5.0 thru 5.2. > So, this is the overview, as I see it. In the past 5.x and prior, I believe things were a bit different, but this represents what has happened for the last several years: There is only one current. It is the main branch in CVS and is where primary development occurs. There are no guarantees with current - the ABI may change at any time, features added/removed, and other major changes made, with the build sometimes broken. Some debugging stuff is turned on by default and there is an expectation that you follow the commit mails and current@freebsd.org list to keep track of things which may affect you. Current is branched off every 18 months (approximately) to make a stable branch. On this branch, the ABI is consistent (applications will not need recompiled due to changes) and backwards compatibility isn't broken within the branch. Nothing is committed directly here - if a change in current meets these criteria, then it may be MFC'ed (merged from current) after it has been proven to work properly (can be several days to weeks/months depending on the severity). There are two supported stable branches right now, 7 and 8. The CVS tags have the form RELENG_8. For current and stable you build your system from source, though snapshots are generated monthly for a convenient starting point. Several times per year, a new release is created from the stable branches - such as 8.1. There is a list on the website of which are currently supported and when they will EoL. Once a release is created, only security fixes and serious errata fixes may be applied on that branch. CVS tags are like RELENG_8_1. These can also be updated with freebsd-update (binary updates). Current is (right now) called 9.0 for cases where a version number is necessary, because that is what will be branched from it next, but it will become 10.0, 11.0, etc. without a new branch in CVS once more stable branches exist. See: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/version-guide/index.html -- Rob Farmer