Re: Debian doesn't have to be slower than time.
[ Apologies for raking this up a week later - just back from
vacation. ]
Noel Meyerhans writes:
>> _IF_ (big if) a better release process could be devised, then it would
>> be stupid not to consider it.
>
>Then how come we haven't considered one yet? Joel specifically
>mentioned FreeBSD at the beginning of this thread. I use that OS daily
>in my job, and yes, they have a *vastly* better release process than
>ours. They release about 3 times a year, and all their releases are of
>very high quality. Most of their releases are not as major as the
>potato -> woody transition, but they don't need to be. The previous
>release was not so out of date that a huge game of catch-up must be
>played to get current software included in the next.
I've heard this suggested many times by various people - that FreeBSD
have done a better job than we have for controlling releases. Nobody
ever seems to have considered the major differences between
us. FreeBSD release a _tiny_ core system that is almost useless on its
own. They don't pretend to maintain all the random third-party pieces
of free software that we do, which makes their life so much
easier. They can throw the entire core system into one central CVS
repository and release from that. Most of the bugs that we have to
deal with can be entirely ignored by the core team - it's application
behaviour and therefore somebody else's problem...
Great work, good idea, but IMHO simply not practicable for Debian.
--
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK. stevem@chiark.greenend.org.uk
Use Debian GNU/Linux - upgrade your Windoze box today! http://www.debian.org/
"Can't keep my eyes from the circling sky, +------------------
"Tongue-tied & twisted, Just an earth-bound misfit, I..." |Finger for PGP key
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