Date: Sat, 7 Jun 2008 14:41:32 +0800 From: "Adrian Chadd" <adrian@freebsd.org> To: "Paul Schmehl" <pschmehl_lists_nada@tx.rr.com> Cc: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Subject: Re: challenge: end of life for 6.2 is premature with buggy 6.3 Message-ID: <d763ac660806062341lf4cb4c7rfdd9276077940640@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <5B0709D83455470DA46533C4@Macintosh.local> References: <9B7FE91B-9C2E-4732-866C-930AC6022A40@netconsonance.com> <6010676B-91B0-4AF8-ACF8-039A59B29331@netconsonance.com> <200806050248.59229.max@love2party.net> <B9B83C12-7130-490D-A4BE-0469711B24DC@netconsonance.com> <20080605083907.GD1028@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org> <902E9703E6E50776A17E9F92@utd65257.utdallas.edu> <20080605220244.GP1028@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org> <34E9F0D46D7B9F45EDA38F4C@utd65257.utdallas.edu> <86tzg6aeye.fsf@ds4.des.no> <5B0709D83455470DA46533C4@Macintosh.local>
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2008/6/7 Paul Schmehl <pschmehl_lists@tx.rr.com>: > Not only is this wrong, but it completely misses the point. Why should Jo > have to upgrade to find out if his servers will fail under the conditions > already articulated in existing, unresolved PRs that affect hardware that he > is presently using? That's a bit like saying, "Buy this new car. Sure it > has bugs that could easily directly affect you, but what's the chance you'll > encounter them? in the off chance that they do, then you can help us > resolve them." The software is Free. The car was Bought (or suggested to be bought.) Re-visit the analogy with a free car that a friend wants to give you. (Car analogies suck.) > Trust me. From a server admin's perspective, a bug affects you if it exists > in hardware you use. Whether or not you're actually using the OS is > completely irrelevant. Upgrading to the OS would be foolhardy. Even > testing it on a handful of boxes will not prove that it won't fail under > load in production. Anyone who has done testing knows it can only simulate, > not duplicate, the conditions under which production servers run. I > personally have experienced catastrophic failures after extensive testing > that revealed no problems. You're using free software. This translates to "lots of people have put in a lot of effort to provide something to the community which they can use, at no cost, if it suits them." As said before, the reason FreeBSD isn't supporting older 6.x releases anymore is because there's just no manpower to do so. > Yes, I think some perspective is needed here, but it's not only Jo who needs > it nor is it he who needs it the most. > > I've lectured enough. If anyone doesn't get the point by now further > explanation isn't going to help. I still don't think you get it. FreeBSD is a community. A community works when enough people contribute positively towards furthering the goals of the project. Jo is a user. He sounds like he is using it in some reasonably critical and money-earning roles. Jo can participate by testing stuff on test hardware, reporting back issues and working with the community. Bitching about there being no long-term support for releases isn't constructive. Some developer comments may not be constructive either, but this is a -community project-. Join the -community- and help out. It doesn't matter if running a long-term support project would be beneficial for a certain subset of the userbase, its a losing situation to cater to them unless they somehow contribute back to the community. adrian -- Adrian Chadd - adrian@freebsd.org
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