From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (smtp1.linux-foundation.org [172.17.192.35]) by mail.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 42874CC3 for ; Tue, 4 Sep 2018 21:55:19 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-pg1-f177.google.com (mail-pg1-f177.google.com [209.85.215.177]) by smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id E6D627D5 for ; Tue, 4 Sep 2018 21:55:18 +0000 (UTC) Received: by mail-pg1-f177.google.com with SMTP id b129-v6so2298082pga.13 for ; Tue, 04 Sep 2018 14:55:18 -0700 (PDT) Sender: Guenter Roeck To: Sasha Levin , Laura Abbott References: <5c9c41b2-14f9-41cc-ae85-be9721f37c86@redhat.com> <20180904213340.GD16300@sasha-vm> From: Guenter Roeck Message-ID: <7e4a1cb8-9f3c-e1ea-e9bd-5f1f3588ce65@roeck-us.net> Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2018 14:55:16 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <20180904213340.GD16300@sasha-vm> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed Content-Language: en-US Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Greg KH , "ksummit-discuss@lists.linuxfoundation.org" Subject: Re: [Ksummit-discuss] [MAINTAINER SUMMIT] Stable trees and release time List-Id: List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , On 09/04/2018 02:33 PM, Sasha Levin via Ksummit-discuss wrote: > On Tue, Sep 04, 2018 at 01:58:42PM -0700, Laura Abbott wrote: >> I'd like to start a discussion about the stable release cycle. >> >> Fedora is a heavy user of the most recent stable trees and we >> generally do a pretty good job of keeping up to date. As we >> try and increase testing though, the stable release process >> gets to be a bit difficult. We often run into the problem where >> release .Z is officially released and then .Z+1 comes >> out as an -rc immediately after. Given Fedora release processes, >> we haven't always finished testing .Z by the time .Z+1 comes >> out. What to do in this situation really depends on what's in >> .Z and .Z+1 and how stable we think things are. This usually >> works out fine but a) sometimes we guess wrong and should have >> tested .Z more b) we're only looking to increase testing. >> >> What I'd like to see is stable updates that come on a regular >> schedule with a longer -rc interval, say Sunday with >> a one week -rc period. I understand that much of the current >> stable schedule is based on Greg's schedule. As a distro >> maintainer though, a regular release schedule with a longer >> testing window makes it much easier to plan and deliver something >> useful to our users. It's also a much easier sell for encouraging >> everyone to pick up every stable update if there's a known >> schedule. I also realize Greg is probably reading this with a very >> skeptical look on his face so I'd be interested to hear from >> other distro maintainers as well. > > OTOH, what I like with the current process is that I don't have to align > any of the various (internal) release schedules we have with some > standard stable kernel release schedule. I just pick the latest stable > kernel (.Z) and we go through our build/testing pipeline on it. If > another stable kernel (.Z+1) is released a day later it will just wait > until the next release based on our schedule. > > Why not set your own release schedule and just take the latest stable > kernel at that point? So what if the .Z+1 kernel is out a day later? You > could just queue it up for your next release. > > This is exactly what would happen if you ask Greg to go on some sort of > a schedule - he'll just defer the .Z+1 commits to what would have been > the .Z+2 release, so you don't really win anything by moving to a > stricter schedule. > Good point. There would actually be a downside of having a longer release cycle: Fewer releases means more patches per release. More patches per release results in more regressions per release (if we assume a constant percentage of regressions, which seems reasonable). Guenter