Re: Another "testing" vs "unstable" question
On Tue, Jun 22, 2004 at 04:01:20PM +0800, John Summerfield wrote:
> Monique Y. Mudama wrote:
>
> >Indeed. I actually meant my statement to be in support of the stable
> >distribution. I guess I should have made that clearer.
> >
> >Still, no one benefits from having blinders over their eyes. Stable is
> >the most stable, and it's also the least current. I don't see how it
> >could be any other way. They're on opposite ends of the same spectrum.
> >
> >
>
> For me its lack of currency is becoming a serious problem. I'm deploying
> new systems: do I really want to deploy software that's not going to be
> supported much beyond a year? Do I really want to go through migration
> to new releases just after I've got it bedded down?
That's the beauty of stable. It _is_ supported for well over a year.
Actually, make that two years. The only problem _right now_ is that if
you go with stable _now_, there is sarge coming. But apart from that,
stable is supported for years.
> No I don't.
>
> My choices are going with testing: what then about security patches? or
> unstable? From my reading it's not unknown for unstable to be seriously
> borked for a time: I think new glibc did it a while ago, and gcc was
> forecast to do it shortly after.
>
> If I want to support a USB Laserjet 1200, then I really need the latest
> hpoj stuff: Woody is far too old.
Woody is old, but have you looked at www.backports.org? A list of
well-supported backports is available there. Security updates will be a
tad slower than unstable, which is behind stable. But then, you're not
backporting glibc, but imap servers or whatever.
> What I find myself doing increasingly is building the occasional package
> from Sid for Woody: sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's too much trouble
> (think xfree where I think I found circular dependancies).
Also, see www.apt-get.org for various backports, including xfree. But
then, www.backports.org also has an xfree backport. Check it out.
David
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