Upcoming release schedule - 8.4 ?

[Matt Olander]

On Tue, Jun 12, 2012 at 4:20 PM, Matt Olander <matt at ixsystems.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Jun 12, 2012 at 3:52 PM, John Kozubik <john at kozubik.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Matt,
>>
>>
>> On Tue, 12 Jun 2012, Matt Olander wrote:
>>
>>> So, we've (iXsystems, PC-BSD) been kicking around the idea of a Long
>>> Term Supported version of "PC-BSD Server", which is really FreeBSD
>>> with some PC-BSD cli tools and perhaps maintaining our own binary
>>> update server. While we were thinking of doing this with 9.1, we can
>>> consider 8.x. I'll speak with Kris Moore and the rest of the team and
>>> find out what it will take.
>>>
>>> We've hired a contract release engineer with this task in mind but
>>> you're right, most of the work will be in backporting. I like the idea
>>> of coming up with a number it would take and a plan to do it. We're
>>> not the only people with the problem, obviously.
>>
>>
>>
>> As a last resort, I would be interested in this, but I'm more interested in
>> changing the culture of FreeBSD releases and long-term support in general.
>>
>> I think that:
>>
>> a) there are a lot more people out there, that we never hear from, that have
>> these same problems, and another "4.x style" release would really help them.
>>
>> b) there are a lot of people out there that could be drawn into the FreeBSD
>> ecosystem if another "4.x style" release existed.
>>
>> I would much rather donate $10k to a $100k kickstarter and have this be
>> "official" than set aside $10k privately for unofficial maintenance, or a
>> "fork".
>
> I understand your position, John. FYI, PC-BSD is not a fork of
> FreeBSD. We have someone on re@ as well as security@ and several src
> and ports committers. We would backport to the official branch as
> necessary, since that's what we use to release PC-BSD. It's really
> irrelevant to me who manages the money. I'm just not sure we can start
> with 8.x rather than 9.x.
>
> However, this is pretty much the FreeBSD way. If we want something to
> change, we affect the change with our efforts.

*looping in the FreeBSD Foundation Board of Directors*

As John has suggested, if we come up with some requirements and vote
with our wallets, perhaps the Foundation can look into bringing on a
couple of people full time to assist with release engineering for a
Long-Term Supported release.

-matt