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FreeBSD Looks Ahead to 6.0
I was catching up on mailing list archives when I came across an announcement from Scott Long of FreeBSD's release engineering team, noting that after the rather substantial amount of time that it took to take FreeBSD 5 to a -STABLE designation, their release schedule will be speeding up in the future. With the official release of FreeBSD 5.3 coming Real Soon Now, a new branch for 6.0 is now tentatively scheduled for mid-2005. It would seem that while the version numbers may increase more rapidly, so will the rate at which new features are merged from -CURRENT, so end users can get new features faster.
BSD lives!
- Move to a timeline-based release cycle rather than feature-based.
- Development of major features in Perforce. The goal is to keep the head branch from going unstable very often and allows major features to stay under development if it isn't ready for -STABLE branch point. Appears CVS will still be used for the main tree.
- Frequent scheduled releases will keep the bug count under control.
- Current plan is to branch for 6-STABLE in the May/June 2005 time frame with 6.1/.2 etc in 4-6 month intervals thereafter.
Two very big, interesting changes. Given the very usable ports tree moving to scheduled releases for the core system makes a lot of sense. The decision to move development of major features out of the main CVS tree compliments the scheduled-release strategy. If anyone can make it work it'll be the FreeBSD team.Congratulations on achieving 5-STABLE and best wishes on 6-CURRENT development!
then the devil is 6
and god is 7...
As you can see here, gvinum is still broken, after almost one year.
Scott, I'm still waiting for my patches to be reviewed and committed. But hey, I guess Poul-Hennings new toys have higher priorities than actually fixing ULE problems.
HawkinsOS, for the adult in you.
[nt]
With feature based release you get the pressure to get things done because everyone is waiting for you. I'm worried that with time-based releases a lot of features will languish with tweaking or becoming more and more ambitious and they'll never get finished to be merge since there is no pressure. I'd rather see feature-based for at least one majour feature in a release. In other words keep it feature-based but bite off only a little (and not more than chew) and aim for that bite to be doable in 9-13 months (to leave for debugging, testing, etc.).
Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
This model seems similar to the one used by OpenBSD. It seems to have worked very well for OpenBSD; Hopefully the FreeBSD team will have similar results.
I use FreeBSD heavily in my environment, and have been stuck on 4.x while waiting for some of the 5.x features (mainly UFS2's spiffy snapshots. While not has fast as WAFL's, still spiffy).
I also use a pair of OpenBSD boxen as my firewall cluster. I have to say from an end user standpoint, I am far more pleased with the OpenBSD release cycle. I know in 6 months there will be a new rock solid stable release, so I can plan accordingly.
From a purely PHB POV, IMO having published firm release cycles can help push OSS into the corporate world. Commercial software claims to have this advantage already, but just look at Longhorn and Solaris 10...
what does mean? anyone? does this mean that 5.4 will be released shortly after 5.3 or that a patch will appear or that...?
Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
It's an exciting era in the Berkeley Software Distribution world; indeed, things started off with a litigious bang over a decade ago, but now BSD solutions are more varied than ever before and offer the user heretofore unprecedented choice and power. So many are the options today that it's time for a roll call from the various distributions. Each of the four major BSD projects are pushing forward with development and experiencing growth, diversifying the Open Source playing field's offerings Let's take a look at what each project is up to these days.
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is in a precarious state. While it's almost hit critical mass in the corporate world, their latest growing pains have left potential adopters confused. The new FreeBSD 5 branch offers some exciting technology, generally regarded as comparable with or superior to what is offered in Linux. The FreeBSD foundation is still upgrading its FreeBSD 4.x line and suggesting its use for production environments over FreeBSD 5. The reasons for this are very simple FreeBSD 5 won't be ready for prime time until FreeBSD 5.4 or 5.5 but users are left confused and timid.
FreeBSD's last major release, which now sits highly optimized at version 4.10, works just as well as always. For systems already running with FreeBSD 4.x that see no need to adopt the new technology in FreeBSD 5 or jump to Linux, this operating system is a godsend in stability and continued support. FreeBSD 4.11 is scheduled for a February '05 release, while plans for FreeBSD 4.12 are on the backburner should FreeBSD 5 not achieve -STABLE status by the fourth quarter of 2005. But what if you need the technology available in FreeBSD 5 and don't want to jump to Linux?
FreeBSD 5, currently available at FreeBSD 5.2.1 with FreeBSD 5.3 in late beta, tantalizes the BSD world with the culmination of several year's hard work and narrow escapes. Back in the late Nineties, when WindRiver bought BSD/OS (a closed-source BSD operating system owned by the now-defunct BSDI), FreeBSD users were promised a next-generation BSD made possible by crossing the ultra-robust corporate OS with its Open Source counterpart. While WindRiver let go of its plans leaving the future of FreeBSD in peril, the realization of its goal is almost here thanks to the FreeBSD community and Apple Computer, Inc.'s contribution of FreeBSD code.
That almost is a killer, though, in that it now causes potential users to look elsewhere for modern operating system features elsewhere until FreeBSD 5 is blessed as stable. Given FreeBSD's track record and the corporate sponsors now behind its operating system, however, it has a bright future ahead of it despite these stumbling blocks. Sadly, the same can't be said for its two little brothers, NetBSD and OpenBSD.
NetBSD
NetBSD's claims to fame aren't its optimization or secure code it's instead known for running on a wider variety of platforms than any other operating system out there, including Linux. NetBSD's binary releases include support for an amazing 40 platforms and an additional 12 platforms in the source code. In other words, it runs on everything but the kitchen sink. NetBSD forked from the 386BSD/4.4 BSD merger in 1993 and continued on its own in parallel to FreeBSD since then, albeit at a slower pace. It's currently at version 2.6.1, with aggressive testing on the new NetBSD 2.0 promising fruition by the first half of 2005.
Those familiar with NetBSD swear by it, though its use in serious environments is limited. It is not secure and device driver support is paltry at best. NetBSD's true usefulness comes in providing developers of other operating systems such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and Linux with hardware support to base their own new ports off of. For instance, much of the code for the PowerPC FreeBSD port comes from NetBSD. OpenBSD implemented support for AMD64 by means of hefty imports from the NetBSD source tree, and Linux runs on Motorola's ColdFire processor family thanks to the work previously for NetBSD
..But do you know who you're listening to?
"sold nearly 2,000 copies of my beta system"..
"remove assholes like x and y from the team".. "I made money off *my* work"..
"it's not usable in a production environment, not without my patches"..
"they won't be getting my patches unless I see public apology from a and b"..
--
Being able to read *other people's* source code is a nice thing, not a 'fundamental freedom'.
Mr. Hawkins,
I'm one of your 2.000 customers.
I know you enjoy trolling on slashdot, but we kinda need some assistance here.
We deemed you trustworthy enough to buy 2.000 copies of your *beta* system - a decision that has been very easy for us to make, since you're such a reliable person and such a skillful programmer - but enough is enough.
We paid you a lot of money. I have no doubt that *your* HawkinsOS is worth every penny, and that these BSD alternatives are just pieces of junk since they don't have your "patches", but now it's time to come back to work.
Sincerely,
Mr. Joe Moron
HawkinsOS user
Mr. Hawkins,
I'm one of your 2.000 customers.
I know you enjoy trolling on slashdot, but we kinda need some assistance here.
We deemed you trustworthy enough to buy 2.000 copies of your *beta* system - a decision that has been very easy for us to make, since you're such a reliable person and such a skillful programmer - but enough is enough.
We paid you a lot of money. I have no doubt that *your* HawkinsOS is worth every penny, and that these BSD alternatives are just pieces of junk since they don't have your "patches", but now it's time to come back to work.
Sincerely,
Mr. Joe Moron
HawkinsOS user
OpenBSD already does this and it shows. Things get introduced into the tree and gradually grow to perfection between releases, with snapshots regularly giving users a chance to test and give feedback. Theo gets angry if the current tree won't compile for more than 20 minutes.
It allows gradual changes to happen, I can only remember one "flag day" when the binaries went from a.out to ELF format. Everything else has been pretty gradual. I happen to like installing snapshots, and have found them to be pretty stable, stable as a rock in my experience.
Kudos to FreeBSD for going this route. It will mean wider exposure. The one problem is regular upgrades and supporting past releases. If it took 4 years to get 5 ready for stable, in that time OpenBSD has had 8 releases (one every 6 months). Noone has the resources to support all the old releases, so they only support the past two releases.
Now if all the *BSDs will continue to cooperate, and maybe spread the release dates out so each can share in the publicity we can have a release each quarter. Of course I didn't notice the schedule of release dates, maybe FreeBSD will choose to release every 9 months, or 72 weeks or biennially or whatever.
The FreeBSD 5.3 RELEASE version looks like it just came out this morning and is being mirrored accross the FreeBSD FTP servers at the following address:h andbook/mirrors-ftp.html
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/
I have already downloaded and installed it. In addition, I set up a BitTorrent tracker for 5.3-RELEASE-i386-disc1.iso temporarily at the following URL:
http://209.6.188.15:6969/
Mr. Hawkins,
I'm one of your 2.000 customers.
I know you enjoy trolling on slashdot, but we kinda need some assistance here.
We deemed you trustworthy enough to buy 2.000 copies of your *beta* system - a decision that has been very easy for us to make, since you're such a reliable person and such a skillful programmer - but enough is enough.
We paid you a lot of money. I have no doubt that *your* HawkinsOS is worth every penny, and that these BSD alternatives are just pieces of junk since they don't have your "patches", but now it's time to come back to work.
Sincerely,
Mr. Joe Moron
HawkinsOS user
Mr. Hawkins,
I'm one of your several Fortune 100 customers.
I know you enjoy trolling on slashdot, but we kinda need some assistance here.
We deemed you trustworthy enough to make our Fortune 100 company migrate to your OS - a decision that has been very easy for us to make, since you're such a reliable person and such a skillful programmer - but enough is enough.
We paid you a lot of money. I have no doubt that *your* HawkinsOS is worth every penny, and that these BSD alternatives are just pieces of junk since they don't have your "patches", but now it's time to come back to work.
Sincerely,
Mr. Joe Moron
HawkinsOS user
Fortune 100 company CEO
I bet these kind of mistakes keep you up at night.
Of course, I realize that from a user/technical standpoint, this means nothing. But there are too many trolls out here who are bent on conducting a smear campaign against FreeBSD developers, going even as far as to question their programming skills. Now think about this: these developers have kept up with the pace linux development dictates with 1/100 of the resources linux development has. It is still one of the most reliable operating systems out there, no matter what disgruntled HawkinsOS guys will tell you about FreeBSD not being 'enterprise ready.' In fact, if you check netcraft's monthly reports about the most reliable sites, 4-5 sites from the top 10 is always running FreeBSD. In october, the top three sites having the fewest failed requests all ran FreeBSD (the 4th is Net~ or Open~).
So I just can't emphasize enough how impressed I am (as a desktop user btw) with the work of these guys. And now this announcment! Excellent ideas there! And I hope to see ULE allowed in -STABLE again soon :))) (did I say I was a desktop user?).
Thanks guys ... for everything!
Perforce is stable, fast, and well-tested. I don't see how using a great tool is a handicap, even for an open-source project.
This one has been impacting me for quite some time.