Packages available for different FreeBSD versions

[Jerry McAllister]

On Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 07:05:27AM -0500, Andrew Gould wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 9:27 PM, RW<rwmaillists at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > On Mon, 17 Aug 2009 17:41:12 -0500
> > Andrew Gould <andrewlylegould at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> STABLE is what it sounds like.
> >
> > I don't think it is what it sounds like - STABLE branches are
> > development branches with stable binary interfaces. It's the security
> > branches that are intended for production use.
> >
> 
> From:
> http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/version-guide/index.html
> 
> "During the lifetime of each major release, an individual branch may
> also be termed STABLE. This indicates that the FreeBSD Project
> believes that the branch is of sufficiently proven quality to be used
> by a wide range of users. Branches that need further testing before
> being widely adopted are named CURRENT."

Yes, the snapshot is of a STABLE version when it is past the totally
on the edge CURRENT condition.   It is pretty close to becoming
a RELEASE version.  Generally only some more testing and getting
ports ready for that version separates STABLE from RELEASE.
CURRENT is where new development is happening.

In some sense CURRENT is akin to an early (pre) Alpha version, STABLE
is akin to a late Beta (almost release) version and RELEASE is the 
supported release of the version.   But it is not quite that.   Most 
companies do not put out their development source or a snapshot of
of the system as they are working on it.   They hold that secret and
only release something after pretty much everything locked in before
they let anyone in the public see it.    

////jerry


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