nginx exception request

[Robie Basak]

Dear Release Team,

We (server team) would like to discuss some kind of one-off feature
freeze and/or SRU exception for nginx that we expect to want to land
either after feature freeze for X or shortly after it is released. I
think the situation is similar to what we do for Openstack - that we
expect an upstream final release around the time of our own release, so
we want to follow upstream closely with updates after our own feature
freeze and possibly shortly after our own release. However, in nginx's
case there is no upstream feature freeze until their actual final
"release" as they start their 1.10 series, so it is possible that we
will end up introducing new features during X feature freeze or even
shortly after X is released.

Previous discussions:

ubuntu-server ML[1]
ubuntu-server IRC meeting[2]

Please note that nginx use an odd-development/even-stable version
numbering scheme which I think is quite similar to the old Linux
versioning scheme. 1.9 (development/"mainline") has recently opened, and
Debian are currently following 1.9 in unstable. 1.10 (stable) is
expected in April 2016.

Option A: we think that what we want to do in Ubuntu is merge 1.9 from
Debian, follow it through while X is in development, and move to 1.10 in
X (via x-updates if necessary) as soon as 1.10 is released in April
2016. This will result in LTS users on X getting the upstream nginx
stable branch. However, this may involve some late or post-release
feature bumps in X that violate the usual feature freeze and SRU
policies.

Option B: the alternative would be to diverge from Debian, maintain 1.8
(the current nginx stable version as of this message) directly from
upstream, and release X with 1.8. However this will result in limited
support from upstream as they will drop maintenance for the 1.8 series
almost immediately as 1.10 is opened around the same time as X is
released, and users will end up with a particularly old nginx for the
LTS duration.

If we want to execute option B, then ideally we need to decide this now
so that we don't have to regress users back from 1.9 to 1.8 in future.

We think option A fits better with the needs of nginx users, but welcome
further discussion.

Please can we agree on feature freeze and SRU policy exceptions so that
we can execute option A, or otherwise discuss alternatives?

Thanks,

Robie Basak and Thomas Ward
Ubuntu Server Team

[1] https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-server/2015-June/007072.html
[2] http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2015/06/16/%23ubuntu-meeting.html#t16:20
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