Strawman: Change the Ubuntu Release Cycle

[Joel Bryan Juliano]

On 12/31/07, Evan <eapache at gmail.com> wrote:
> This is a strawman, so feel free to rip it apart.
>
> While I generally like the current Ubuntu release cycle, I find it has a few
> problems:
>
> Forcing LTS users to make do with software that is 2 or 3 major versions
> out-of-date is just wrong. I understand that the focus is on stable software
> rather than cutting-edge, but some of the stuff in 6.06 is just plain
> obsolete, forcing people to upgrade to a non-LTS to get programs that do
> what they need.

At first, people will decide what version of Ubuntu they will use
based on what they need, and many companies will mostly be comfortable
with an LTS along with it's support benefits than a less documented
bleeding edge release. I know someone who is still using Hoary because
of the low system requirements and speed comparison to newer Ubuntu
release, and many companies are still using Red Hat 9 or 7.3. Use
cases varies that's why we still have an active 2.4 kernel
development.

> I find that the 6 months between major releases is just a touch too short
> for the developers to make significant changes and do a proper test cycle.
> Their are no 'service pack cds' meaning that any bug which makes it into the
> final release stays there forever. This has led to what is basically a
> never-ending early adopters penalty.
> Here's my proposal. While it isn't perfect, I think it fixes the issues
> mentioned above.
>

I agree at some point that 6 months is relatively short, I think
sacrificing features over time is what most people dislike, but
Freezes are a necessity in an open source software distribution.
There's a need to constantly highlight deferred/prospective specs,
that rigorously be reminded and discussed over time to ensure that
those specs made tentative changes until such status be reached that
they'll be good to go.