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Date:      Wed, 18 Jan 2012 14:20:56 -0600
From:      Mark Felder <feld@feld.me>
To:        freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: FreeBSD has serious problems with focus, longevity, and lifecycle
Message-ID:  <op.v8aqs6ii34t2sn@tech304>
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.00.1201181141270.19710@kozubik.com>
References:  <alpine.BSF.2.00.1112211415580.19710@kozubik.com> <1326756727.23485.10.camel@Arawn> <4F14BAA7.9070707@freebsd.org> <alpine.BSF.2.00.1201181034580.51158@fledge.watson.org> <4F16A5B8.2080903@FreeBSD.org> <Pine.GSO.4.64.1201181147450.6287@sea.ntplx.net> <4F1707E6.4020905@FreeBSD.org> <CADWvR2ip=nADz=BLXW%2BuNkyUP4hUf88UkOhSoz%2B0AcY79Hzdag@mail.gmail.com> <alpine.BSF.2.00.1201181141270.19710@kozubik.com>

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On Wed, 18 Jan 2012 13:46:45 -0600, John Kozubik <john@kozubik.com> wrote:

>
> And as long as we're repeating ... :)
>
> Since 9.0 is already out of the bag, I think a decent approach would be  
> to fizzle out 8.x on the current timeline/trajectory (maybe 8.4 in 6-8  
> months, and maybe 8.5 in a year or so), then:
>
> - EOL 7
> - mark 8 as legacy
> - mark 9 as the _only_ production release
> - release 10.0 in January 2017
>
> And in the meantime, begin the every 4-6 month minor releases that we  
> all agree can occur with 9.  By Jan 2017, you get to 9.12 or 9.14 or so.
>
> This is nice because no upheaval needs to happen with 7 and 8, and  
> interested developers do not get kneecapped vis a vis 9 - they can just  
> keep going where they were going with it, and the only real change is  
> that 10 is pushed out a long ways, and people[1] get to really sink  
> their teeth into 9.
>

What are the policies for changes though? Are we stuck with 9.0's feature  
set for 5 years? Will we have to wait 5 years to get a stable release of  
FreeBSD with KMS/GEM? That work is unfinished and didn't make 9.0; it's  
also a huge changeset. How will things like this be dealt with? Five years  
is a long time for the next stable release if we have a policy to not  
import major changes from -CURRENT. It would be devastating to so many  
users.



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